Page 82 of Roped

“But then, everything happened, right? Arsen broke into our ranch and attacked my dad. We were sent to live out in the city, and I thought things would be fine now. I thought my mom would be okay, that she’d finally escaped, and for a few months, it looked like she had. But then I saw my dad’s doctor leaving our house one day when I was coming back from school, the one who gave pills to my mom, and that was it. That was my last clue. I didn’t need more evidence after that. I understood, really understood, that my mom wasn’t free. She hadn’t made her escape. He still had her under his thumb; he still had me under his thumb. No matter what happened to him, no matter what happens to him in the future, he’ll always be powerful. He’ll never leave us alone. We’re tied to him, my mom and I.”

I take a deep breath and blink my eyes to get rid of my tears. I keep myself wrapped around the man, the first man I’ve told the truth to, and whisper, “My mom, she lives up in the mountains now. She had a… she had a stroke a couple of years back and everyone keeps saying it was an accident, but I think it was the pills. I don’t know what they are, but they aren’t good for her. She’s more or less catatonic. She has care around the clock, but they all work for my father so even in this state, she isn’t free. I go up there every summer to spend time with her, even though she never knows I’m there.

“We tell everyone that she’s out globe-trotting, but it’s a lie. And I can never tell the truth because if I do, he’ll kill her. I can never go against him or his wishes, or he’ll kill my mother. Those men he forces me to go out with, I can never say no to that. I can never say no when one day, he’ll ask me to marry one of them. It’ll probably be for more land because that’s why my dad married my mom. For more land. And maybe the man I marry will do the same thing to me that my dad did to my mom and I’ll never be able to tell the truth about that either. Because if I did, he’d push me off the horse. And I’d die.”

After I’m done talking, I feel such relief that all I do is breathe. It feels like the first free breath I’ve taken since I was ten. Ever since my world fell apart around me and monsters came crawling out. Real monsters. Who hurt people for money and power. Like my dad. And it wasn’t until he came into my life, my Phantom, that I realized not all men are monsters. Some men are good. Some men are gods, kings. And Radisson King is one of them.

I don’t know how much time has passed since I stopped talking, but it seems like a long time and when I come back to myself, I realize something. I realize that his hold on me is stronger, much stronger, than mine on him. And I was holding him with a death grip. I also notice that he isn’t frozen like he was before, no. He’s shaking. There’s a tremor running through him, and since his body is so large and muscular, thick arms, thick neck, bulging thighs and boulderlike torso, it feels like an earthquake. It feels like the ground is shaking with him.

I tilt my face up to his ear and whisper, “Radisson?”

I hear a low growl.

And I push myself away from him to look up at his face. My own must have blanched because I’ve never seen him look like this. He looks darker somehow, and it’s not his Stetson casting a shadow or his skin being bronzed by the sun. It’s something else. It’s him. It’s like the blood in his veins is rushing so fast and so close to the surface, painting the harsh lines of his face, his scar flushed. Even his eyes that are staring into mine are pitch-black, and I thought I’d seen him go dark before. But not like this, never like this. It’s like his fury is a living thing inside of him. It has a heart and a thousand degrees of heat. His fury is fire, and it’s ready to engulf the world in its flames.

I put my hand on his cheek. “What’s wrong? What—”

His arms around me squeeze me hard. “You know, I’m goin’ to end him. For this.”

His voice also sounds darker, lowest of the low and the roughest it’s ever been. And he says it so slowly, pausing at every other word. They settle into me, into my bones, heavily. But I don’t let it slow me down as I shake my head and tell him, “You can’t. Radisson, you promised your sister. You promised—”

His jaw pulses beneath my palm, his scar twitching and pulling tight. “Goin’ to destroy the very essence of him.”

“No,” I say urgently, trying to get his attention. “You can’t. Listen, I have a plan. I think I found something.” At this, he focuses on me finally and I breathe out a sigh of relief. “I found reports. In Mars’s office, when I was looking through it. They were bank statements. I think my dad’s involved in some sort of money-laundering thing. I always knew my dad’s been into some illegal stuff, but I have evidence of it now. And I know it sounds like my dad’s too powerful and he is. I know he is. But I think if I’m smart and use it against him, I can get free. I can get my mom free too.” Then I add even more urgently, “And I want you to know. That night, when I gave you that note and asked you to kill my dad, it was… It wasn’t because of how he is with me or my mom. I’d never ask you to kill him for me. I did that for you. Because I thought you needed it. But, Radisson, you can’t break your promise to your sister. You can’t. It’ll only drive you guys further apart, and you can’t let that happen. You need to get her back. You need to mend your differences, okay? I can take care of myself. Maybe… maybe I can show them to my brother, too, those reports. And he’ll help me like he’s helping you.”

At least that’s what I’m hoping he’ll do. And if not, then I’ll just figure out a way to use this evidence against my father anyway. I’m not an idiot. I know it sounds like a flimsy plan in the face of such an influential man. But for the first time ever, I have something solid in my hands, and maybe it’s time to grow up. To grow out of my childhood fears and face the monster under my bed.

Although I realize belatedly that I shouldn’t have brought up my brother. I should’ve known better after what happened at the bar. But I was so busy trying to stop him, to convince him not to go after my father and damage his relationship with Lynnie even more, that it completely escaped me.

He hates the mention, even the thought, of someone else saving me.

“Your brother,” Radisson growls, his arms flexing around me, “isn’t goin’ to save you. Because you’re mine to save. You’re mine to protect. Mine to avenge. Mine to kill for; mine to wreak havoc for. Mine to burn the world for; mine to declare war for. You’re. Fuckin’. Mine. And my sister, like everyone else includin’ you, is gonna have to live with the fact that I snuffed the life out of a man who didn’t deserve to breathe in the first place, for scarin’ my Princess.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

THREE DAYS HAVE passed since he took me on a horse ride that I thought would kill me but didn’t, and I ended up telling him the biggest secret of my life.

Since then, he’s taken me on a ride every single day, and I’ve realized two things. One, I’m so grateful he did that. I knew I wanted to ride with him but didn’t know how much. Didn’t realize how much I’d love being pressed up against his body, feeling it in action rather than simply seeing it from a distance, feeling the power thrumming through his thick muscles and dense bones. Feel the authority in him rather than simply witness it. Not to mention, the act of riding itself. Not that I do anything other than cling to him like a spider monkey on these rides. I don’t even open my eyes, not until we stop, and we always stop by the blue lake. Where he lets me watch it as my breaths calm down and my hold on him eases up. But anyway, just the wind whipping against my skin and ruffling my hair, the sensation of the world going by in a flash, is so exhilarating. I finally know what people mean when they say riding a horse feels like freedom. And it only took me nineteen years to figure it out.

The second thing I realized: I missed so much of my life because of my father. Because of the fear he instilled in me. He forced me to grow up when I was only ten. When all the other kids my age were worried about their homework or test scores, my concern was whether or not my father was raping my mother while I was at school. What kind of a mother I’d come home to. When everyone was sharing secrets with their best friends, I was trying to do everything I could to hide mine from Reverie. I pretended to love going to parties when I hated every second of it; pretended to have fun at the mall when all I kept thinking about was if my mom’s OD was deliberate or an accident. I pretended I loved skipping classes and didn’t care if I got bad grades when, in reality, I could never focus enough on anything to do good at school because I couldn’t escape wondering if I was a child of rape too. If my father had forced himself upon my mom and she got pregnant with me.

Not to mention, every time I thought about taking an interest in my courses, finding joy in books, movies, music, or literally anything else, I kept thinking it was of no use. Who cared if I had a hobby or if I liked something enough to turn it into my passion when I knew my future was set. I knew where I was going to end up, married to a man like my father and trying to survive like my mother. And then probably end up like her too. Again, it took me nineteen years to figure out that my dad stole from me more than I’d realized. More than I could ever get back.

Another thing that came to me: I love him. I love Radisson King. My Phantom, my hunter, the man who stole me not once but twice and whose life my father destroyed in more ways than one.

This wasn’t a realization, though. It was more of a knowledge, lying bone-deep, something ancient and instinctual. I could say I fell in love with him when he threw himself in front of the bullet for me. Or when I realized he watches me so closely that not only does he know my coffee order but exactly how I order it and how much I tip. I could say I fell in love with him up on that cliff where he admitted to feeding those three men to the coyotes because they’d scared me. And that he beats up those men my father forces me to go out with, all because I’m disgusted by them. Or maybe I fell in love with him when he told me he’d kill my father for everything he’s done to my mom and me.

But it would all be a lie. Because I know the moment it happened. It was when he came to my rescue the very first time. When he beat those men up, the ones he later killed, and I stared into his stunning green eyes. Before that moment, I thought I was alone. I felt so very alone, but he made me realize he was there for me. He was watching. And maybe, just maybe, he’d keep me safe. And he has. All this time, in so many, many ways. In ways that only he can and not anyone else. Like he keeps telling me.

Much like he told me I’d be safe tonight through the summer storm they’ve been predicting as long as I stay indoors. They say it’s going to be a bad one. It’s going to be short but intense, mostly overnight. Heavy downpours and even heavier winds. All day today black clouds have gathered in the sky, making it seem swollen. The heavy and humid air clings to everything, the trees, the grass, the windows, to the very pores of our bodies. Everything seems close to bursting, restless and impatient.

Even now as I sit in my bed, hugging my knees, through the window I can see the wind blowing, whipping, lashing, bending trees this way and that, howling with power. It’ll happen any second now. Any second the sky will open up and start pouring rain down on the earth. I’m not afraid of it, though. I don’t need protection from it, no matter how vicious it may seem. In fact, I want to revel in it. I want to seize the moment. I’ve already lost too many of them. I’ve already lost too much time.

At my thought, the lightning flashes through the sky, quick but so bright that the night turns into day for half a second, and I spring up from the bed. I don’t wait for the crack of thunder to follow, I simply run out of the room and head to the front door. I throw it open just as the thunder booms through the sky, but the sound of the door hitting the wall is louder. Another flash of lightning and I see him. He’s in the stables just across from the house and tending to Tulip.

Or he was. Until I showed up on the porch, my chest heaving, my eyes focused on him.

He’s too far away from me to notice these things, but I still think he frowns under his Stetson. I still think his chest shudders with a breath because even though he shouldn’t be able to see me that clearly either, he can still read my intentions. He can still figure out what I want.