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The leather vest matches my memories, but the man wearing it is from a completely different time in my life. Somehow, in my current state, I’ve managed to combine two different things, and it has the ability to do more damage than the kicks I took to the stomach while being held captive.
My eyes flutter closed as tears begin to streak down my face, hot little lines of pain and regret.
“You said she was fine,” the man says.
“As good as can be expected.” That voice I recognize as the nurse who loaned me her phone. “She’s been through a lot. Grace?”
I jerk away from the warmth of someone’s touch on my arm, opening my eyes partway.
I give her a weak smile. “Thanks. Phone.”
I feel the weight of the device being lifted from my lap, nodding a little when she smiles at me.
“You have a visitor, but I can tell him to leave if you want to be alone.”
A familiar scoff rings out in the room, causing my head to jerk back in the direction I last saw the apparition.
This has to be the best and worse hallucination I’ve ever had—two parts of my past, all of my regrets colliding together.
“Trenton?” I manage, the hoarseness in my throat making it difficult with the heightened level my emotions are at right now.
“Hi, Grace.”
My shoulders shake as I begin to sob. He inches closer, his face a little more worn than I remember. His laugh lines are deeper, the creases in his forehead when he frowns more prominent.
“You’re gonna get wrinkles,” I whisper, having said these exact words to him hundreds of times before.
Silence fills the room. He doesn’t say, “You’ll still think I’m sexy.”
That was his response each time I mentioned why he shouldn’t scrunch his face up like that.
“I’ll let you two visit,” the sweet nurse says before leaving the room.
“We’ve been looking for you for days. I’m glad to see you’re okay.”
I shake my head, trying to rid it of these horrific images. I don’t want my dreams filled with this version of Trenton Cole. If I’m going to go insane, I want the man I remember from the beginning. Twelve years ago, he had the uncanny ability to make me smile and laugh. He treated me with respect in front of his friends and did all sorts of filthy things to me in private.
He was never distant or formal unless he was forced to act that way on base.
Hating this eerie limbo, I let the sobs take over. I may have escaped now twice from my captors, but I’ll always be stuck in hell.
Chapter 11
Grinch
Twelve years later and she’s just as gorgeous as I remember. Even after having suffered God knows what, she’s beautiful.
I always hated her tears, even though the only time I ever saw them was when we watched sad movies.
I hate them even more now that I don’t feel like I have the right to go to her and offer my arms in comfort. Touching her could cause more damage than I realize, especially after witnessing her pulling away from the nurse the way she did.
Other than a small bruise on her cheek, she has no other injuries on her face. I know the rest of her body to be different. I didn’t read the file myself, but Max told me they had done X-rays and scans to make sure she didn’t have internal injuries from being kicked repeatedly. I also know she refused the rape kit exam. What scares me about that is many women respond the same way even after being raped because they don’t want to further the violation to their bodies. Telling hospital staff she doesn’t need one because she wasn’t raped, doesn’t necessarily mean she was telling the truth.
“Grace,” I whisper, desperately needing her pretty blue eyes back on me.
Her head rocks back and forth, but her eyes don’t open.
Her refusal to face me is beyond unfamiliar. The woman lying in that bed may have the same DNA as the woman I once knew, but she’s not the same person. It’s been so long since I’ve seen her, I have no way of knowing when the shift happened. She could’ve changed a week after we split up or just a handful of days ago when she was taken.
I take a seat in the chair across the room as she cries, trying to reconcile what I knew about her then with what I’m facing now. The memories invade my mind.
I smiled up at her, winking when I noticed the surprise on her face.
“Say something,” I urged, my grin growing wider when she glanced from my eyes to the black box in my hands.
“No.”
The word made my body seize. “No you won’t say something or no—”
“I won’t marry you.”
I chuckled, thinking that she was joking, but the laugh faded away when I saw the seriousness in her eyes.
