She squeezed her eyes shut.
My hurt felt like all the blood was getting drained out of me with a dull knife.
With tears streaming down her face, she opened one eye, then the other.
My eyes pooled with tears as I wiped her cheeks with my thumbs. “Thank God, I don’t have experience in this sort of thing, but I figured you’d want to take a bath or shower or something.”
She nodded and broke down into more sobs.
“You’re beautiful, Trace,” I murmured kissing her forehead. “And Phoenix is a monster. You know that, right? What he did — it’s unforgiveable, and I promise you, I will make it right.”
“By killing him?” she asked in a small voice.
Hell yes. I shook my head. Comfort, she needed comfort, not scary. “It’s your call, sweetheart. I don’t want to upset you more, but believe me when I say your family and mine won’t let this slide without a severe punishment. We don’t typically turn people over to the authorities, but if you want him to rot in a hell hole all his life, just say the word. I’ll link his accounts to prostitution and a drug ring in five seconds. Hell, I’ll frame him for murdering a politician. Just say the word.”
She chewed her lower lip. Then, as if deciding that answer was good enough, lifted her arms into the air like she wanted me to help her undress, her facial expression fearful.
I’d die before I let her be afraid of my touch.
Her arms snaked around my neck. “Will you help me?”
I sighed. “Whatever you need. I’m here, Trace.”
“You aren’t going anywhere?”
“No.”
“You aren’t going to pretend to like me today and hate me tomorrow?”
“Hell no.” My heart shattered. I’d made her doubt; that was all on me, but never again. Never again would she doubt my love. I’d end my own life before I ever made her doubt how much I loved her.
“You aren’t going to say you love me and then take it back?” Her voice was thick with tears.
I jerked away from her. “Listen to me, because I don’t want you to ever forget this.”
Her body swayed a bit in my arms. “Remember what I said about making promises?”
She nodded.
“I promised, Trace. As a man, I promised your grandfather that nothing would happen to you. He believed the longer I was with you the sooner Phoenix would put the pieces together. He already blamed you for everything. If he saw us together…” I swore and looked down for a brief second before meeting her gaze again. “I had to make you believed me. I didn’t know what else to do. I thought the day before, when we’d talked— Damn, Tracey, I thought you knew me better than that. I’ll protect you until the day I die, even if it means I have to protect you from myself. Because in protecting you from me, I was protecting you from them.”
“But you weren’t.”
“I know that now. And I’m not leaving, but Chase—”
“I love him too.” She shrugged as if it really was that simple when I knew— Hell, Chase knew it wasn’t. “He was there for me when you weren’t.”
“Do you love him like you love me?” I asked.
“Who said I loved you?” she fired back.
“You did.”
“When?”
“That night when—”
She smirked.
“Glad to see you still have your sense of humor.” I rolled my eyes and tried to shrug it off even when my heart was still going, Holy shit, she doesn’t love me? “I’ll understand if you’re not ready. Shit, I don’t even know if I’m ready, but Trace, I really want to kiss you.”
She nodded. “First a bath. I don’t want any part of him on me when you touch me.”
I nodded and backed away as she stood in front of me. I gently helped her take off the jacket Chase had covered her up with. The minute the jacket was removed I saw bruising.
First on her stomach.
Then her neck.
Fingerprints.
“Son of a bitch!”
I closed my eyes and pinched the bridge of my nose. “Breaking his hands wasn’t enough. Not by a long shot. I’m going to cut out his tongue and—”
“Can we not talk about him?”
“Sorry,” I muttered, reaching for the spigot. I turned on the water then dumped some of Chase’s girly bath-stuff into it.
Suddenly nervous, I rubbed the back of my neck. I slowly turned her away from me, unzipped her skirt and watched it fall to the floor.
I examined her from head to toe, kissing every bruise, vowing to every scar that I’d end Phoenix’s life.
When I was finished, I was so upset it was hard to speak. “I’ll turn around while you get in. There should be enough bubbles too cover you up.”