by Mia Ashlinn
Strained silence yawned out between them, neither of them making a move or speaking a word. Her chest rose and fell rapidly, the harsh panting coming from her mouth the only noise in the room. She didn’t know how much time passed, and she didn’t care. All she knew was she couldn’t take any more. “Drew—”
He held up his hand, telling her to stop without saying it. “Why didn’t you tell anyone?” He dropped his hand, asking the one question she couldn’t bear to answer. “Why didn’t you tell us?”
Unable to look him in the eyes and answer truthfully, she peered over his shoulder. God, she hoped he didn’t call her on her evasion. “I didn’t have any proof.”
“Bullshit,” Drew yelled. “I would have believed you, and you know it. We all would have. Try again.”
Shannon slid to the foot of the bed and braced her feet on the plush carpet. “No one else would have. Hell, Sheriff Atkins would’ve probably found a way to blame me for it. That asshole was a woman hater. Then you, Jared, and Randy would have taken matters into your own hands and killed my uncle if he didn’t kill you first.”
“You’re damn right, Shannon. No one touches what is mine.”
His possessiveness and arrogance was sexy as hell. Her body responded instantaneously, and it was all she could do to not touch herself. She squeezed her legs together, wriggling as sneakily as she could manage. Too damn bad she sucked at being covert. I wouldn’t make a very good spy.
Drew scowled at her despite the growing cock in his pants. “Not now.” He ran his fingers through his hair, his agitation evident, but he kept his cool. “You’re worse than a horny teenager.”
“Fine, damn it.” She got to her feet and paced from one end of the room to the other and back again. “I wasn’t yours—not then.”
Drew watched her closely through his narrowed eyes. “You have been ours since the beginning, even if we didn’t realize it.” He prowled toward her. “You knew it, too. Don’t deny the truth. Lying to me right now is dangerous.”
She halted pacing midstep. “That’s different.”
He drew closer to her, agitating her. “I disagree. Isn’t that why you protected us?”
With nowhere to go, she backed up as far as she could. She hit the wall, her eyes darting around the room, seeking any escape route and finding nothing.
“We are yours, and no one touches what is yours, right?” He hooked his arm around her waist, pulling her against him. Her generous breasts came in contact with his expansive chest, her slightly rounded tummy touching his flat one, her soft pussy to his hard cock. Damn it, she hated clothes. “What was it you called yourself? Oh, right. A selfish bitch.”
She groaned, unable to form more than, “Drew.”
“Your heart is racing,” he told her as if that surprised him. She looked up into his face, spotting the sensual glint in his eyes. “Naughty girl. I’m not trying to get in your pants, sexy as they are. I just need to hold you.”
Yeah, well, I need to fuck you. She didn’t say it, but damned if she didn’t want to. Instead, her head fell forward, and she burrowed it into his chest, seeking comfort for the conversation they were having and what was coming.
He would demand more answers, ones she didn’t want to give. She would give them, but she would rather be beaten than have to share the years she wanted to forget with anyone, even her men. “Drew—”
He shushed her then kissed the top of her head. “Let me tell you my story then you tell me yours. Sound good?”
She nodded, breathing a sigh of relief.
Drew shuddered, his body shaking hers slightly. He exhaled loudly as if his words would exert him physically, and he had to prepare himself. “My father wasn’t the man who everyone thought he was. He was…”
Drew paused to gather his words, giving her a chance to openly demonstrate her support. She offered him solace, holding onto him securely and rubbing his back wherever her hands touched him. His body heat seeped through his shirt, warming her icy hands.
Not speaking, not urging him on killed her, but he needed to do this in his own time and own way. Whatever he planned to tell her was significant, and the fact that he was willing to share it with her showed how much he loved and trusted her. She wasn’t going to do anything to screw it up.
“He was hard and cold and bitter. He hated me with every breath he took, and I don’t know why.” Drew swallowed audibly. She could feel his heart thumping wildly in his chest. “I was his personal punching bag. He came home every day and ordered me to help him in the barn. At first, I got the occasional tongue lashing I thought I deserved, but that didn’t last long. Within a few weeks, he progressed to screaming foul names and jeering insults my way. Then he started locking me up for hours in the tack room, and finally, he settled on beating the shit out of me.”
“God,” Drew groaned. “He was smart about it. My bruises were always in inconspicuous places. He made sure to make it appear like I was his helpful son. I was his pride and joy, you know.” Drew’s voice went husky, and he stopped to clear his throat. “I hated him so much, but he was my father. What could I do? I couldn’t tell my mother or call that old bastard, Sheriff Atkins.”
Drew shook his head. “Jared and Randy knew. I tried so damn hard to keep them out, but I couldn’t. They tried to help me. They really did, but it only made things worse. He got more violent when they were involved, and if that wasn’t bad enough, it made me feel like I wasn’t man enough to handle my own father.”
By the time he finished, tears gushed down her face, drenching his shirt. What could she say? Suffering the same fate he had, only at another’s hands and mouth, she felt every detail he did like someone shoved a knife into her heart and twisted it.
She knew that nothing she could say would change anything. The past was the past. Nothing she did would change that fact, but she held the key to the future in three small words. It was time. “I love you.”
Drew stiffened, his breathing faltered, and he stammered, “W–w–what?”
She rubbed her head up against him, disregarding her damp face. It wasn’t sexual or possessive. It was loving and affectionate. “I love the boy you were. I love the man you are. I always have, and I always will.”
“God,” he ground out, tugging on her hair and tilting her head back. He bent and kissed her, taking her breath away. His warm lips moved over hers tenderly, sweetly. “I never thought I would hear you say those words.”
Needing the connection, she kissed the underside of his chin and inched her way upward until she reached his lips. She pecked a kiss to the corner of his mouth—“Um, hello”—and then pecked him again on the other corner before settling her lips on his. “Don’t you have something to say?”
His deep chuckle vibrated against her lips. Keeping their mouths connected, he murmured, “I’ve already told you, munchkin—more than once.”
“Mmmm,” she purred appreciatively, nibbling on his sinful lips. “Say it again.”
“No.” He pulled back, evoking a huff from her. “I need to say something else to you, and I don’t want to lose my courage.” He cleared his throat, his eyes meeting hers. Remorse filled his baby blues, and she recognized the apology buried deep within. “I’m sorry about yesterday,” he said quietly, his cheeks going adorably ruddy. “When you apologized, it reminded me of my father and how he used to apologize afterward. He really believed it would fix everything.
“I felt like I did when he was still alive. Then, when I went to sleep, I had the nightmare, and he was there. But, it was different. He was beating you. He was torturing you, not me, and I couldn’t do a damn thing to stop him.” Drew coughed nervously. “It just made me feel so powerless and, frankly, panicked because you could hurt me far more than he ever did. It about killed me when I couldn’t save you from him in my dream. I love you so much it overwhelms me sometimes.”
“I understand,” she rushed to reassure him. “That sort of happened to me when we…well, you know.” Normally, she would say whatever ran
through her mind to them, but for some reason she felt awkward calling it fucking or sex at the moment. It probably seemed silly, but it just didn’t feel right to use either word.
Drew kissed the tip of her nose. “When we were trying to get in your pants?”
Her face flamed as embarrassment hit her. Now, why couldn’t I have said something cool like that?
“Yeah,” she agreed with a nod. Bile rose in her throat, and she had to quash it down so she could finish what she had to say. “All I could hear was that mean, old bastard and what he planned for you three.” Images that Pauley had put into her head popped into her mind, causing a shudder to wrack her body.
Drew’s hold tightened around her. “He can’t hurt any of us now.”
She snuggled into his tall, muscular face. Her face sought the side of his neck as though she could hide from the world. “Does it make me a bad person that I’m happy he’s dead?”
“No, munchkin, it doesn’t make you bad.”
Closing her eyes, she sucked in a harsh breath and asked hesitantly, “What about the fact that I wish he’d died a long time ago instead of robbing us of so many years?”
He rubbed her back in tiny, unhurried circles with one hand and his other hand buried itself in her hair. His support and love cocooned her, pulling her from the guilt looming over her conscience. “For that, I wish he had died years ago. Hell, I would enjoy if he came back to life just so I could put him back in the ground.”
She kissed his neck swiftly. “Drew Dalton.”
He sighed, and she knew that he wasn’t through. “Since we are apologizing, I’m sorry about earlier in the elevator, too. You were right.”
Those were the words every woman loved to hear, and she couldn’t gloat. She couldn’t tease. Speaking even seemed like a bad idea right now, just in case he decided to close back up. She didn’t need his apology, but he needed to say it. That much she knew.
“With you, I am addicted, and I can’t control myself. I’m in over my head, and I know that I can’t walk away even if I wanted to. For a man like me, it’s instinctual to fight that kind of dominating hold,” he said gruffly, his throat having a small catch in it. “I lashed out at you because I didn’t know what else to do. If I pushed you away, I regained control, which made me feel almost normal for about two seconds.”
Drew tugged her hair gently, and she met his gaze. “I was coming back to do this when I overheard you. I wanted to apologize and tell you that I’ve been an ass. I know it, and I’m sure I will be an ass again.”
He shrugged, and her body jostled. “It’s in my nature, munchkin, to piss you off but, I promise that I’m in this for the long haul. I won’t purposefully hurt you, and I will always love and protect you. That being said, I think it’s your turn to explain why you felt compelled to protect us.”
“Do I have to?” she whined with a smile, letting him know that she was just kidding around. “Fine. You remember my Uncle Pauley? Do you remember the way he was?”
He stiffened, his body tautening until she feared he would break. A deep rumble broke free from his chest and color rushed to his face, giving him a crimson complexion. His blue eyes glittered perilously, and his nostrils flared in typical Dalton fashion. He clamped his jaw shut with a snap, his jawbone protruding on each side.
A horrifying noise filtered through the room, startling her. She glanced around the room, searching for its source. When she found nothing, she looked up at Drew and immediately realized what the noise stemmed from—him. He ground his teeth against each other with enough power to leave him without teeth, only dust of their remains.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” she said when Drew refused to reply. “When I was sixteen, he randomly showed up and claimed to be my long-lost uncle. Like a fool, Dad believed him and let him move in with us. Well, the day after he moved in, he—” She stopped briefly, giving herself a little time to regain her courage.
Once her tears stemmed and she wasn’t on the verge of a breakdown, she forged on. “He, um, came in my room to talk. I was uncomfortable, but I didn’t want to be rude, so I let him sit on the bed with me. He didn’t touch me that day,” Shannon rushed to assure him before he went ballistic. “Instead, he told me what he planned to do to me when I grew up.”
Shannon’s heart jumped into her throat, cutting off her air supply. She could barely talk, but she had to find a way to. If she stopped, she would never go there again. “Apparently, the psycho had a hang-up on age and virginity. He, um, wanted me to be more mature before we got married and, uh, wanted me to be completely untouched on our wedding night, not that it kept him from playing sick games with me. He loved to put me down. Did you know that I’m stupid, fat, and ugly? Did you know that I’m a whore he needed to save?” A hysterical laugh bubbled in her chest and spilled out of her mouth. “He would call me that then touch me.”
Drew tried to stop her, but she paid him no mind. She wasn’t with him anyway, not really. Her body was, but her mind had receded as soon as she’d started sharing her story.
“The bastard played head games. I can still see his crude smile.” She shivered uncontrollably. “I can hear the vulgar things he wanted to do with me. It was disgusting.”
Her stomach heaved, the contents rolling around inside. She pushed him away and ran for the bathroom. Falling onto the floor, cold tiles pressed against the fevered flesh of her legs. She leaned over the toilet and gulped in air, fighting to settle her stomach. She heard footsteps but didn’t take her eyes off the clear water in the toilet. “Shan—”
“No, let me finish, Drew. He killed my parents because they figured out what was going on and threw him out. He came back the next day and mutilated them with our kitchen knives after he’d tortured them for hours. Hours, for God’s sake! Do you know how it felt to find them like that?”
Not giving him time to form a response, she rambled, “It was hell on Earth. It was almost as bad as the night of the funeral when he snuck into my bedroom and gloated about every depraved detail of their deaths. Did anyone ever tell you exactly how he killed them? The police tried to keep everything quiet—for my sake.”
She snorted. “Well, let me enlighten you. He tied them up and beat them with my old baseball bat then poured water over their fucking faces to make them feel like they were drowning.”
She trembled violently despite the fever raging inside of her body. “He told me that they never spoke a word to him, not once. The only damn response they gave was when they struggled against the restraints. He loved that, by the way. It made him just prolong their inevitable deaths because he wanted to break them.”
“Shannon,” Drew shouted. He sat down behind her, cuddling around her without moving her away from the toilet bowl, and ran his hands through her hair. “Stop this, munchkin. Just stop.”
She cocked her head to the side, twisting around to where she could see him. With tears in her eyes, she pleaded, “Please, Drew. I have to get this all out. You have the right to know.”
Drew’s eyes probed hers, searching for something. He found whatever it was and allowed her hesitantly, his voice thick, “Fine, but I don’t like this one bit.”
She shrugged slightly and gave him a half smile. “You don’t have to.”
“You better keep going before I change my mind,” Drew said gruffly as he massaged her shoulders.
Her body relaxed marginally with his tender touch, and she dropped her eyes to the floor as she braced herself for the rest of her tale. She turned her head back around to face the toilet in case she needed it, and she suspected she might. “That night, he told me what he would do to you three if I got involved with any one of you.”
She cringed, remembering the things he planned for Jared, Drew, and Randy. “I don’t want to go into it, and I will never want to go into it. Let’s just say it made my parents’ death look easy. Anyway, a few weeks later we had that whole bar fiasco. It gave me the perfect reason to keep you guys at an arm’s length, so I used it.”
> “Shit, munchkin,” Drew cursed. She suspected if her head wasn’t hanging in the toilet and she wasn’t about to toss her cookies, he would probably be trying to shake some sense into her. “Do you realize how long we’ve regretted the way we treated you that night? Do you have a clue how much it hurt us to know we hurt you?”
“What about me?” She lifted her head too fast, causing it to spin. “You called me everything under the sun in front of everyone in the bar, so don’t play innocent with me, Mr. Dalton.”
Drew’s massage ended abruptly, his hands stalling on her shoulder. “I am not playing anything with you.” Unconsciously, his grip tightened, and she flinched. He took notice immediately, loosening his fingers and rubbing the spot soothingly. He apologized, “Sorry,” and kissed her sweetly.
“Let me ask you something. How would you have felt if we came strolling in a bar, dressed provocatively, intending to seduce the first woman we saw? What would you have done when you were that woman? How would you have felt when we told you it was all for some fucking bet? Tell me that, munchkin.”
She breathed in and out slowly and closed her eyes, willing away the dizziness in her head. “You know what I would have done. I would have called you male whores.”
He chuckled, knowingly, with an edge of mischief. “You would.”
“Then I would have kicked your asses all the way back to your house of ill repute.”
Both of them went silent, but for just a moment, before they exploded. He guffawed, and she giggled. His voice went high, and her voice went low. They harmonized as if singing a melodious song.
“Don’t. Make. Me. Laugh,” she panted, swatting at his hands, then groaned. “Oh, I feel sick.”
They quieted down as the humorous moment passed them by. Drew sobered first and strolled down the path she didn’t want to follow. “Shannon, it’s not your job to protect us.”
She reached for his right hand and clasped it in her own. “That’s where you’re wrong.” She turned her head then brought his hand to her mouth and skimmed her lips across the skin of his palm. “You protect me, I protect you.”