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“Why would she be upset by us?” I asked, wondering if I wanted this answer.Was I ready for the truth I kept demanding?
He sighed, as if he had hoped I wouldn’t ask more. That didn’t help my growing dread.
“Angel hasn’t always been like this. We were kids together. Grew up in this world together. She was my first girlfriend. My first kiss. We were young, and at that time, we thought we’d always be us.” He paused and studied me for a moment.
“She was with her parents when they were killed. She was shot last. She should have died, too, but the gunman didn’t check to see if she was dead. The gunshot to her head didn’t go into a critical part of the brain. It went in with a high enough velocity that it didn’t wobble or move, but it went clean through. Her parents weren’t as lucky.” He let out a heavy sigh.
“She was thirteen years old. It took a year of therapy before she could walk, talk, feed herself, do common tasks again. She was able to remember things. All the events of that night. But her brain didn’t mature. She remained the same intellectually.
“My dad brought her home. She lived with us. He had special nurses move in for her. When Gina’s mom—one of my dad’s ex-wives—left, Gina stayed. She was there with Angel through all of this, and she became a sister to her.”
I sat there, silently digesting this. My heart hurting for all she had suffered. Feeling like a complete bitch for acting the way I had when Blaise left me there. Gina had been so nice to me when she knew I was upset about Angel.
“Angel lives here. On the third floor. Gina does too. She refuses to leave Angel, and honestly, I don’t know what I’d do if she did. My dad tried to get me to let Angel and her nurses stay at the farm, and for the first few years, I did. That’s when the cutting started.”
I closed my eyes and exhaled.How horrible.
“I’m sorry,” I said, knowing that wasn’t enough. Not for what all she’d been through and all he’d done to help her.
“You didn’t know. I didn’t tell you. Don’t apologize,” he said.
“Gina was so nice to me tonight,” I whispered mostly to myself.
“Gina knew this was going to be hard for everyone. She also knew you didn’t know the story,” he replied, taking my hand and threading his fingers through it.
“I’ve not been up front with you about a lot. I don’t share things with women. I keep my life closed off. It was always sex for me, but I didn’t give them anything else. I never brought them here. This was my sanctuary. I didn’t plan on keeping someone long enough to tell them about Angel or show them my life.”
He stopped, and I lifted my gaze from our hands to meet his eyes.
“But you brought me here,” I said.
He nodded. “Yeah, I fucking did. I couldn’t get you in my bed fast enough. From the moment I gave in to this pull you have on me, fucking you was all I could think about.” He smirked. “But I fucked you here. In my sanctuary. I had known before I did it that you were mine.”
I bit my bottom lip to keep from smiling. It felt wrong after all he had shared with me. “I was referring to it as your cave in my head,” I admitted.
He cupped the side of my face and ran his thumb over my lips. “As long as you’re in it, you can call it whatever you want.”
Tonight, he’d told me a lot. The heaviness of it still sat on my chest. I had more questions, but the raw truth I’d just heard was enough for now. I wasn’t sure the other answers mattered so much. Yes, he had power and money. His group of friends treated him like he was their king. It was strange, but none of that changed how he made me feel.
Safe, wanted, needed, cared for, and like I had a place where I belonged.
“Why me?” I asked him, swearing to myself that was the last question for now.
“I knew long before you did that you’d be mine. I fought it. I hated it. I didn’t want it,” he said, and then he rested his forehead against mine. “Until I saw someone else touching you. Looking at you like he wanted you to be his. That undid me. Flipped a switch that wasn’t ever going back.”
I started to point out that we hadn’t known each other that long, but I let it go. What he had said was sweet, and if he wanted to make it pretty with flowery words, I’d listen. I liked fairy tales anyway. Fiction was always better than reality.
Twenty-Seven
Blaise woke me up with a kiss the next morning and told me he had some business to go handle, then said it was early for me and to go back to sleep. I immediately fell back asleep, and when I did finally get up, I checked my phone to see what time it was.
Just after seven. It felt like I’d been sleeping a long time, but maybe I had just slept deeply. I took a shower and got dressed before going upstairs. I wondered who had stayed last night and if there was going to be a crowd in the kitchen for breakfast. I doubted it, considering Angel and Gina lived here.Did the rodeo squad live here too?
More questions I had no answers to.
After last night, I wasn’t ready to ask anything more just yet. I’d let my emotions be controlled by my insecurities. That wasn’t me—or at least, it never had been. I didn’t like that side of myself. I hoped it never reared its ugly head again.
Gina was at the kitchen table with a bright red mug that saidQueen Bitchon it in white letters. She looked up from her phone she’d been studying when I walked in the room.
