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She fought again when we tried to get her toward the car. Her feet dragged against the ground while she tried to pull away, and I could see she wasn’t fighting me anymore as much as she was fighting everything that had happened to her.

When I finally caught her wrists, I held them without hurting her.

“Look at me.”

She looked at me, scared and lost.

“Je te protège.” I’m protecting you.

For a few seconds, she stopped fighting. It was enough time to get her into the car without security putting their hands on her.

The door closed, and I stood there listening to her cry through the glass before the convoy pulled away toward the estate I had prepared for her.

Everybody else could call it whatever they wanted.

I knew what I had promised her in that room.

I was going to get her clean, get her healthy, and make sure nobody used her condition against her again.

Whatever this marriage became after that, we would deal with it when she could stand on her own.

CHAPTER 9

Zay

“We Don’t Get To Be Soft”

Ihad no desire to sit in a meeting with men who auctioned off their families for peace. As far as I was concerned, every last one of them was my enemy.

I still showed up in France with my girl and my son by my side. While Ares and the rest of them finished their circus of contracts, I waited at the safe house he had turned into a private rehabilitation fortress for Azaria. I stood in the foyer with the medical team assigned to her, including a head nurse, an on-call physician, an addiction counselor, and security dressed in plain clothes.

We had everything money could buy to get my sister clean.

When I heard engines pulling up outside, I opened the double doors. The door to Ares’ Rolls truck flew open, and Azaria stumbled out looking frantic. She tried to run before her heels were fully on the pavement.

Ares caught her.

He wasn’t hurting her, but he wasn’t letting her go either.

“Get off me! I am not staying here!”

She clawed at him until he picked her up and threw her over his shoulder like she weighed nothing. I frowned while I watched him carry her inside. The ink on that contract wasn’t even dry yet, and this nigga was already fighting for her.

He put her down on the cushioned bench in the foyer.

“Sit down,” he told her. “Let them help you. Stop acting childish. You’re better than this.”

Azaria slapped at the blood pressure cuff when the nurse tried to put it around her arm.

“Ma’am, we need to get your vitals,” the nurse told her.

Azaria kicked at the table instead.

Ares looked over at me, and I could tell he was running out of patience.

“I’m not wrestling anymore,” he muttered. “Stick her.”

The head nurse nodded and pulled a syringe from her scrubs.