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Who did this to you?
He was ashamed that he didn’t have a good answer, that nobody had done anything to him, that he had done nothing to stop this from happening, and that Mariana had almost died because he’d let Dornan walk her inside without following.
Part of him wished that Dornan had just knocked him out when he’d had the chance.
But another part of him, a part that sounded extremely familiar, like a beautiful young seductress, had the loudest voice of them all. We have to take these kids, and we have to leave.
CHAPTER FIFTY
MARIANA
SIX WEEKS LATER
Nine years is a long time, and it isn’t.
Nine summers.
Nine falls.
Nine winters.
Nine springs.
Nine anniversaries that marked the night Este bled to death, a bullet in his chest, his only crime the fact that he was with me.
I thought I knew how my life would end. In fact, I’d fantasised about it enough times to know the details intimately. I’d drive my car off a bridge and let myself drown. Or I’d cut into the soft flesh at my wrists until I hit an artery, letting my life force pour from me until I was a bloodless husk, floating in water that would grow cold. Or, more realistically, I wouldn’t have to end my own life at all: it’d be snuffed out by Emilio, or Murphy, or even by Dornan himself. I imagined a smooth silver bullet, puncturing my skull at point-blank range, tearing through bone as it bedded into my brain and exploded.
I’d resigned myself for so long to the fact my life was in somebody else’s control, that I assumed my death would be as well.
But that was before, when I was selfish, when I only thought about myself. That was back when I was in love with the man who’d saved me, instead of just afraid of him. And I was afraid of Dornan. Afraid of what he was. Afraid of what he was becoming. There was a darkness within him – there always had been – but it was growing, threatening to swallow up everything else in its wake.
I was terrified.
* * *
I held John’s hand in the dark. Nobody knew he was here with me. He’d come in like a ghost and he’d leave the same way. We were lying on the floor in my bedroom, the door locked in case Guillermo got back to the apartment and came knocking. We were on our backs, side by side, and we’d just done something very, very wrong.
But it had felt so good.
I rolled onto him again, feeling his bare skin underneath mine. I straddled him, splaying my palms over his warm chest as he grew hard underneath me once more.
We didn’t speak. Didn’t make any noise. I lowered myself onto him, stretching around him until I felt like I could barely breathe. Slowly, gently, I rocked against him as we tried to devour each other with our mouths.
He was everything Dornan was not. He wasn’t a fucker. He was a lovemaker. I didn’t even know what I felt for John, but when he moved inside me it felt like he was loving me, even if only for a fleeting moment.
But it wasn’t just some kind of love that drew us together, at least not in the typical way.
It was desperation.
He kissed me, his lips soft, his stubble deliciously rough, lifting my hips up and pressing me into his lap as he thrust into me. We came at almost the same time, so, so quietly, and that made it feel even more illicit, more exciting. Even when Guillermo wasn’t around, after I’d relayed news of Agent Lindsay Price bailing me up in the gym showers, we’d convinced ourselves that we were being watched. And who knows? Maybe we were, even then.
John supported himself on his hands, covering my body with his as he withdrew from me and went in search of his clothes.
I heard the shower start, decided I might as well join him. We didn’t turn any lights on. I’d already lit candles everywhere, and they illuminated the bathroom enough that we could see.
Somehow, it felt safer in the dark. Part of me couldn’t believe how brazen we were being – carrying on while Guillermo could come back to the apartment at any moment.
I slipped into the shower and found John, pulling him towards me. He held me tight, pressing his lips to the top of my head. I didn’t even know how this had happened, but it had.
