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My hands settle on her shoulders, and touching her is everything and more. I thought I’d lost her. I thought I’d never lay my hands on her again. She whips around to face me. “You told him to protect her.” Her words drip with accusation, and crackle with anger.
My gaze slides over her delicate, heart-shaped face, her lips parted, her breathing labored, as if her mind is racing while she forces her body to remain still.
“I know you like I know myself. Letting her die is not who you are, Alana. I will not let you forget that, and I damn sure never will, either.” I cup her face and tilt her gaze to mine, her blue eyes glistening with unshed tears, but there is nothing weak about her in this moment. Instead, there’s an air of defiance that clings to her, a second skin that I fear is more about suppressing today’s events than defeating them.
As if she reads my thoughts, she says, “I don’t know what happened to me. I told you. I don’t know. I don’t remember.” She tries to pull away, and I hold onto her, capturing her narrow waist.
“Why are you pulling away from me? Stay with me. Let me help. And stop holding back because you think I’m going to kill him, Alana. The man deserves to die, but I’m not foolish enough to end up in jail, either. And I’m damn sure not wasting another day I could have with you. Today drove home how foolish I was to ever try to protect you by staying away from you. And you need to remember that. We’re better together, stronger together, Alana.”
“I know,” she whispers. “I do know that. I just need you to really know it, too.”
“I do. I promise you, baby I do.” I stroke my fingers over her soft cheek. “Talk to me. Tell me what you’re feeling.”
She curls the fingers of one hand into her palm and presses her fist to her face, as if she’s creating a shelter of sorts. I caress her hair, trying not to push her, terrified of what she hasn’t told me. “When I was in the shower,” she finally confesses, lowering her hand and allowing me to see the stark emotion in her eyes, “I was checking myself, making sure there was no evidence of anyone touching me.”
My heart races, and my anger rages like thunder crashing in that moment before the downpour. My hands capture her shoulders, dread a painful groan inside me. “And?”
“Nothing,” she replies easily, “but what if—what if it’s not easy to know? Maybe you should check, too? Make sure—”
I capture her face and tilt her gaze to mine. “I love you. You know that, right? So fucking much.”
Her lashes lower for a flutter of a moment and lift. “I know. Of course, I know. I love you, too. I’m just not sure how we ever escape this curse that’s on us.”
“Baby, there’s no curse. There is just my father. And we’ll deal with him.”
“He always wins.”
“Because I let him. This is all on me.”
“Stop,” she hisses vehemently, grabbing my shirt again and twisting it in her fingers. “I told you—”
I capture her mouth and kiss her, and she tastes like everything I’ve ever wanted and almost lost. I back her up against the steel divider across the window, as I have once before. It was when we were finding our way together, and it feels like forever ago now, when it was far too recent. “Alana—”
“Please check.” She tugs at her robe, and I ease back to allow it to fall to the ground.
Her legs tremble against mine, and her fear is like an unripe berry on a tree—bitter, not sweet, as her safety should be. She reaches for the pink silk of her gown, and I help her pull it over her head. And then she’s gorgeously naked, and the act of showing me this much trust, after what she went through, all but moves the world around me.
My hands slide over her arms and linger on her fingers a moment. “Turn around, sweetheart,” I order softly.
Her chin bobs, and she rotates, offering me her back, and it’s another sign of the bond we share that is decades old that formed as we grew up together. Very few people find someone who can live a lifetime with them, but I have in Alana. And I will not lose her. I will not push her away ever again.
I might have promised not to kill my father, but I never said I wouldn’t make him suffer.
And enjoy it.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Damion
My hands settle on Alana’s shoulders again, and she exhales a breath, lowers her chin, and waits on me to inspect her body. Waits on me. I feel like this has been the story of her life, and I don’t know how to make it up to her. I don’t know how to make it right, but I will. Somehow, someway, I will deserve her.
I caress a path down her arms, goosebumps lifting on her delicate skin, and as much as I want to worship her and make love to her, I do as I know she desperately needs me to do. It’s me who holds a tightly balled breath in my chest as I caress every inch of her pale, stunning skin and look for bruises, look for marks, which I blessedly do not find.
When I rotate Alana to face me, her expression pinches with fear. God, I wish I could claw back time and never allow this day to happen. I would bleed to make it happen. “Well?” she queries anxiously.
“Nothing,” I murmur, but I press her hands to the steel behind her, determined now for both of us to ensure that remains true.
My hands glide over the silk of her skin, but I do not allow myself to enjoy her body, to touch her, and absorb all that it means to me to have her back now. I examine her, my touch gentle, but I’m focused on proving she has not been violated. I end squatted down in front of her, my hands on her hips, my lips pressing tenderly to her belly. “You’re all mine,” I murmur, a promise in those words to protect her—really protect her from this point forward. And as much as I want to own her tonight, to brand her as mine, I don’t dare, not after what she’s been through.
