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As did the physical distance.
Until I all but forgot the attraction was there anymore.
Eventually, the other men rumbled up the driveway.
Drex came in to replenish the supplies, casting curious glances at Red who had been weaned down on the pain medicine, but still showed no signs of coming back to the world.
I didn't say—namely because no one asked—but I was really starting to worry about her. Not so much on a physical level. She was healing, slowly but surely. But mentally, emotionally. I couldn't think of a reason she was still trapped inside her mind. Other than the psychological impact of the events that left her whipped, beaten, and horribly injured.
That kind of thing was enough to cause some sort of psychological break. I mean, I couldn't claim to be an expert in that field, but I'd seen several assault victims come in very much shut down to have their kits done and wounds treated.
I hadn't even been able to do a kit on Red. If anything like that had happened. Even if it hadn't, the damage she'd endured everywhere else was more than enough to traumatize her.
It was the night after the other men returned home that I woke up to a different type of voice in the room.
Ace's, but not the slow, comforting timbre he used when he recited poetry to Red. This was a pained, desperate tone I'd never heard from him before.
"You've got to fucking wake up, Red," he demanded.
I slit my eyes to look over at him, finding him with his usual poetry book in his hands, but leaning his arms on the bed beside her, his shoulders slumped, his head hanging.
"I need to know who did this." The way he said it made me believe that he wanted to know not because he wanted to report them to the authorities, but because he planned to take justice into his own hands.
I'd never been a fan of vigilante justice. I'd seen too many instances of people being ugly with each other in the hospitals I'd worked at. But just this once, I was pretty sure I could condone an eye-for-an-eye sort of vengeance.
I'd never seen anyone as badly abused as Red had been.
Someone needed to pay for that.
It would feel like the scales were tipped toward evil in the world until that happened.
"This never should have fucking happened," he added, voice rough. "I'm supposed to take care of you all."
I didn't want to feel bad for him.
But there was a rawness in his tone that I hadn't heard before. And some part of me responded to it.
Because, clearly, he felt responsible in some way or another. Because he was their leader. Because he thought it was his job to protect them all. And she'd been horribly abused without him being able to stop it.
It wasn't his fault, of course. People did wicked things every single day, and no amount of love and protection could help at times. Wicked things happened because wicked people existed. No one has any control over that.
"It wasn't your fault," I said, wincing, knowing I was breaking my rules about not talking to him, not connecting with him in any way.
Ace's head shifted, gaze finding me.
I saw the pain there that I'd heard in his voice.
"You don't know what you're talking about." There was a hint of that condescension I had begun to associate with him, but it sounded more forced than usual.
"Did you whip her?" I asked, folding up on the couch.
"No."
"Did you hold her down while someone else did? Did you stand by and do nothing while they did that to her?"
"No."
"Then it's not your fault. People are evil sometimes," I told him, shrugging. "There's nothing we can do about that. And beating yourself up over it isn't going to change what happened."
"I'm not looking to change what happened," he told me, rising. "I'm looking to peel the skin off the bastards who did this," he told me, tone icy as he made his way across the room toward the door.
The scariest thing, though, was the fact that I felt like he meant every word. Not only did he mean them, but I absolutely thought he was capable of something that horrific.
It wasn't until about half an hour later, after I took care of Red once again that I realized something.
He'd stormed off.
He'd slammed the door.
But he hadn't locked it.
This might be my only chance to escape.
Chapter Nine
Ace
"Why isn't she snapping out of it?" Aram asked. "She's looking better."
On the outside, yeah, she was.
The swelling was going down on her face. The wounds the stitches were holding together were less angry-looking.
She was healing.
But only on the outside.
I'd been operating under the misconception that only humans had issues with their heads. It seemed like something that came with the pesky shit like a conscience and a soul. Anxiety, depression, and psychosis issues were nonexistent in our world. At least as far as I could tell.
