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“I’m here,” I say, pushing open the door.
The moonlight bathes Leighton’s face in silver light. Her eyebrows are furled. Her lips twisted. She wasn’t trying to trick me. She really needs to go.
“Please.” Leighton sucks in her lips, her thighs clenching.
I should rush to untie her. Sweep her in my arms, take her to the bathroom. Let her pee.
But she wears her distress so beautifully.
“Marcus,” she groans. Not crying. She won’t give me her tears that easily. “What are you doing there?”
“Breathe, Leighton.” Step by step, I move forward.
When she doesn’t, I place my hands on the rope of her left ankle. That’s it.
“Breathe?” she grits out. “What for? Free me. I have to go.”
“Before I do, let’s get one thing straight. There’s no use in running, if that’s what you have in mind.” My gaze steels, tone hardening. “For the small chance I won’t catch you and you’ll get far from here, someone else might grab you. A naked girl out in the middle of the night. Can you imagine what they might do to you?”
A vein pulses in my neck. This isn’t an empty threat. These things could happen. Someone else could dare touch what’s mine.
“I won’t run. Just, please.” Her thighs squeeze again, desperately holding in her pee. “Help me.”
Help me. I like the sound of that.
I nod, untangling the knots binding her ankles. Next, I untie the ropes around her red and scraped wrists. She doesn’t move other than twisting her hands this way and the other, getting used to the freedom I’ve granted her.
Me. The man who loves her.
“You’re sick, you know that, right?” she says when I pull her up by her waist.
Sick?
I’m being kind to her. I haven’t really left her here, bound and helpless. I’ve been here, right outside the room. Ready to come for her when she needed me. And I did. I rushed in here the second she called out my name.
Even ended up confessing my feelings to her, for fuck’s sake.
Yet here we are.
You’re sick.
Soothing her some more, being kind to her, all those things will have to wait.
Just until she realizes that no matter what, we’ll always be together.
No. Matter. What.
“I’m not sick.” I slip my arms beneath her, carrying her exhausted body bridal style to the bathroom. Despite the hours she’s spent in bed without a shower, Leighton still smells of daisies. Of sunshine. “I’m more aggressive than usual. That’s all. But you can’t fucking blame me when I’m like this because of you. You, Leighton, have turned me into this possessive”—and protective as hell—“man. Only you.”
“Blaming me for being kidnapped?” Her hands curl around my neck, though her next words aren’t loving. “That’s some narcissistic shit if I’ve ever heard it. Who the hell are you?”
I could tell her I took—not kidnapped—her for her own good. I could lay out the evidence of my daughter’s crimes. Go back to my home in Santa Barbara and show Leighton what kind of fertilizer Rylan has been using to grow the flowers in her garden. Explain that she won’t hesitate to put her best friend in the ground too.
Except doing so would defeat the purpose of this exercise. I need her to love me for me. To be willing to give up everything for our relationship because she wants me, not because she’s scared.
That’s the only way she’ll be mine for life. That way, she’ll trust me to handle Rylan and make her see reason.
It’ll have Leighton begging for me instead of begging for my help.
