AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I don’t do this shit. I’m methodical, checking into every aspect of a woman’s background before I pick her up for dinner. I analyze every word that comes from her mouth, looking for discrepancies.
Yet here I am, knowing nothing about this woman except she harbors a giant secret.
Her enemy wants her dead.
And there could be a very valid reason for that.
Yet my heart tells me otherwise.
I usually never listen to that fucker, since I’ve experienced indescribable pain every time I have. The kind that splinters you into pieces, drawing you into the darkness, unable to function unless you learn to live inside the pain.
Exhaling a loud breath as my penthouse comes into view, I stop analyzing my reaction and desire to see her.
I’m parked inside the garage and dashing into my elevator in record time.
Again, I’m not questioning my motives for that, either.
Once the doors open and I step inside, her jasmine and amber scent permeates the air, filling my lungs. I close my eyes, breathing her aroma in before I continue toward the room she’s been occupying since the car accident.
Her door is ajar. I raise my knuckles to knock and announce my presence, but something stops my hand mid-air.
She stands in front of the full-length mirror, topless, her back facing the glass. Her head is turned away from me, her long brunette locks covering one breast as she twists and turns, a frown pulling her lips down.
Her pained stare is full of anguish as her shoulders curl over her chest. Her lips tremble as she looks at the scars covering her back.
The scars are a gruesome sight. My eyes narrow as I zero in on them. Some of them appear to be burns, while others look like someone took a knife to her back, carving her up. As my gaze moves to her torso, I spot a few on her stomach, her arms, and even one on her breast. They are perfectly round burns, roughly the size of the cigarettes I tried smoking and detested.
Her eyes are vacant, even as the first tear falls down her porcelain cheek.
I have the strangest urge to throw open the door, rush over to her, and hold her in my arms until I convince her that her scars are the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
The trauma on her body, which has clearly been surgically improved by a plastic surgeon, albeit not someone as adept as the ones most of the elite people go to in my world, speaks of someone who has suffered the unspeakable horrors of abuse.
I can tell those scars are old, likely obtained during her childhood.
I know because they match mine.
My hands curl into fists, my arms shaking as the rage roars through my head, sounding like a train barreling down an open track. The fury swirling inside me demands I find whoever did this to her and inflict endless suffering on them until they beg me for death.
But I won’t give it to them. They don’t deserve it.
And she should be the one to end whoever inflicted those wounds on her. It will give her closure.
As I watch, she straightens, her spine stiffening. Impatiently brushing a hand beneath her eyes to wipe away the tears that have fallen, she chides herself. “Anyone who really loves you will love the scars you bear on your body.” She pauses, her chin quivering. When she regains her composure, her chin lifts. “That bitch was wrong. One day soon, she’s going to come face-to-face with me, and it will be her fear I delight in, just like she took pleasure in mine.”
I couldn’t agree more with her words. The strength she possesses impresses me, causing my breathing to hitch.
I’ve never been so impressed by someone in my life.
She shifts, and I silently move away from her door, holding my breath until I reach the hallway. Expelling it, waves of respect crash over me like the surf pounding against the rocks on the beach.
She’s like a phoenix, rising from the ashes, powerful and majestic, her beauty and strength refusing to be dimmed by those who have harmed her.
When her spine stiffened and she gave herself that brief pep talk, she was the most resilient person I’d ever seen, refusing to bow down to the memories that haunt her.
And suddenly, I realize that I don’t just want this woman in my life.
I need her like I need both of my lungs to breathe properly.
