Page 48 of Crimson Love

What I really want to do is toss the tray of cold food sitting between us to the side and pull her into my arms like I did earlier. It’s either that or hunt down Andrei Petrov and wrap my hands around his neck until he takes his last breath so he’ll never breathe the same air as her again.

Instead, I say, “You’re safe now. We can go to the authorities. He’ll never touch you again.”

She shakes her head and refutes me. “No. I can’t go to the police—ever. You told me I can trust you, and I did. Promise me you won’t tell anyone.”

“You were kidnapped and held against your will,” I argue. “There’s no better time to go to the police than now since Andrei is in the country. He’s close. They’ll find him. Hell, I’ll find him if I have to.”

Her words come out rushed and panicked. “You can’t make me do that. I’ll run away again if I have to. I thought I could trust you, Jett. Please, don’t make me regret telling you.”

“Baby—” The word slips from my lips before I can stop myself. I have no fucking idea where that came from. When I said it downstairs, it was solely to show the fucking asshole that he has no claim on her. That she was mine, which she damn well isn’t. “The police will help you. Hell, the feds will help you.”

“No,” she demands with conviction. “That will never happen. He’ll turn it against me, and I’ll be the one under the microscope. I refuse to be the victim anymore.”

She makes no sense. I wonder if Petrov brainwashed her or if she’s suffering from Stockholm Syndrome.

I slide the tray to the side, take both her hands in mine, and look deep into her eyes where tragedy and anguish become one. “No one will ever persecute you for what you’ve been through.”

But she stands firm in her argument. “They will. And I’ll be the one thrown in jail ... for murder.”

Lennon

T here. I said it.

Somehow uttering it aloud makes it a reality, not just linked to a horrible nightmare that I can’t shake.

The memory lives in my soul like a black cloud I can’t get rid of. It suffocates me when I’m awake and haunts me when I sleep. It follows me everywhere I go and is a noose around my conscience.

I planned to take that secret with me to the grave, even if that came sooner rather than later. I’m not afraid of prison. I’m afraid of Andrei finding me and exacting revenge.

He thought I was his obedient little pet.

And I guess it was out of pure self-preservation. It was six years of hell, but I made it through.

I’m not sure why I chose now to tell someone the truth. It doesn’t feel better getting it off my chest. But there’s something about Jett Cross. And it wasn’t because he begged me to tell him about Andrei or that he promised to keep me safe or even that he cooked for me. It started before that.

It’s especially not the way he looks at me. I’m so sick of men looking at me, I could pluck my eyes out.

But with Jett, it’s different

With him, it’s the way he sees me.

No one has bothered to see me in a long time.

That and I’m out of options. Andrei found me. If Jett is going to step in and pretend we’re together, he needs to know what he’s dealing with.

Jett’s grip on my hands tightens. “Murder?”

My heart races at the memory. “The captain. I didn’t set out to kill him. When we were at port, I was always locked in my room. Months earlier, I found a way to break through the window. I was almost free, but he was monitoring the cameras and caught me. And once I was caught, that was it. My choices were fight to get away or live with the consequences Andrei swore to six years earlier. I’d rather die fighting for my freedom than subject myself to their violence. He tried to lock me in a room, but I fought back. He beat me so bad, I could barely see out of one eye. But I finally found a knife that was left out in the kitchen. It was so ugly, but I finally hurt him enough that he fell back and hit his head. He was unconscious.”

Jett scoots closer to me on the bed and frames the side of my face with his hand. His touch feels just as good as earlier. No. Better. “That’s not murder. That’s self-defense.”

I place my hand over his on my face because I don’t want to lose it. “I might have hurt him, but he wasn’t dead. I couldn’t take a chance of him coming to and calling Andrei. I knew he’d be gone throughout the night. I needed a head start. The captain was dead weight—even though he was very much alive at the time. I managed to push him overboard. When I finally left, he was floating face down in the water. I killed him.”

“You did what you had to do to survive. There isn’t a judge or jury who will fault you for that, no matter how Petrov tries to spin it.”

“I’m sure Andrei would like to torture me right now but never involve the cops. He has his own brand of justice system that he lives by. He’s looking for something else. He came all this way when he hates the U.S. But that shows how desperate he is.”

Jett’s tone takes a sharp turn from comforting to heated. “What the hell could he want other than you?”