And the last thing he needed was to worry about me.
Not then. Not when his own heart was in danger of shattering to pieces as he faced losing a man he’d called his brother for the last three years he’d served alongside him for the department.
I knew I couldn’t fix this for him, no matter how much I wanted to.
But I could give him the only part of us that I’d been keeping at bay for the weeks we’d been toeing the waters between us, finding our rhythm as my fears pushed him away and his protective nature allowed me the safety I needed so badly.
He’d become my home.
My safe place to rest my head at night, my shield; both of my physical safety and of my delicate, fragmented heart.
I knew I should have said it before today, but my fear of being rejected had kept me quiet, because if I told him how I felt and he didn’t feel the same?
I wasn’t sure I could withstand that.
“You’re not alone anymore, Hud. I need you to know that. The day we met, I knew it. You were different than any other man I’d met. You were a good man. I could trust my heart with you, trust that you would never hurt me intentionally. And then my fears got the best of me and I got scared. I thought keeping my feelings inside would mean I wouldn’t have to face being hurt if you didn’t feel the same way. But, baby, that’s the thing about love that I’m learning. It’s a risk. A risk that you’ll hurt me. A risk that you’ll reject me. But it’s a worthy risk, to me. Because to have all of you, every piece, every inch, everything? It’s the ultimate prize.”
I closed my eyes, then, because my heart was so full of love for him I was sure it would burst. I felt rather than heard him move away from me and as my hands dropped to my sides, so did any hope for us. Because if Hudson couldn’t accept me for who I was and love me in spite of it? We’d be over.
I would have to let him go.
“Shit, Darlin’, look at me. Right now.”
It was both a plea and a command, the harsh bite of the words coupled with the desperation in his voice making it impossible to brush off.
I held my breath when I found Hudson’s eyes with mine but my worry for what I’d see there diminished the second a large, no holds barred smile graced his face.
“About time.” It was all he said before his hands took my face in a strong, possessive hold and dropped his head beside mine, the lips my dreams were made of crushing me under their intensity. And I melted.
As I always had.
My breathing escalated to short, ragged pants as he ravaged me with his mouth, merciless and hungry for a taste of me. I was grabbing at his shoulders and grasping the collar of his shirt in frantic fingers, the realization of what it all meant hitting my chest and quickening my heart beat all at once.
He loved me. Suddenly, I didn’t need the words he would say or the sentiment of love I’d yearned for in my dreams. Because the emotion in which Hudson kissed me told me what I needed to know.
“Em,” He breathed against my forehead as we parted, our ragged breathing and the slow beeping of the machines around us the only sounds in the room.
“I know.” I whispered, placing my hands on his chest, feeling the slow, but sure beats of his heart through the fabric that separated his skin from mine.
The smile he’d worn before our kiss returned to his beautiful features and I smiled, too, because it finally felt like I’d given him some of what he’d been gifting me every time we were together.
Love.
“I’ll go get us something to eat. What do you feel like?”
Kissing me softly, but reverently, I felt him shrug his shoulders against my hold.
“Whatever gets you back to me sooner.”
***
The hairs on the very back of my neck stood on end unexpectedly as I turned the lock in the small bathroom stall, the water I’d had earlier in the day pressing on my bladder even as a shiver of unease slid down my spine.
Someone’s watching me.
The thought wasn’t a new one but for the first time, it was inescapable.
The tremors in my hands begun as I folded them in front of me, legs shaky while I held my breath, listening for a sound. Any sound that would tell me I hadn’t gone crazy.
Cold chills covered the surface of my skin and a feeling of dread I’d never felt before coiled in the pit of my stomach and then I heard a voice.
“Come out, come out. Wherever you are…”
No, no, no!
Not now.
Not him.
It couldn’t be…
“You can’t hide forever, sweetheart.”
The voice was oddly familiar, with a husk that told of old age and a slant of Irish descent. But it was the roughly worded endearment that had me clutching the metal handle of the stall with a desperate hold, the memories of darkness and forgotten shadows engulfing me in bone chilling shivers that wouldn’t cease.
Brad?
The abrupt and terrifying sound of the stall door crashing open, the force of the action breaking through the metal of the lock and the last shred of protection from the stranger on the other side was gone. A large, darkly skinned hand reached out and took a hold of my hair and the quake of my body intensified as the realization that he’s found me registers in my mind.
But he’s not a stranger, is he?
He’s the shadow you’ve been running from.
He’s the man who almost took your innocence.
He’s the man who almost broke you.
“J-Brad?”
His clutch on my hair has a cry of pain falling from my lips, the tearing agony of his fingernails in my scalp keeping me from staying quiet.
“Yeah, Sweetheart. That’s me.”
Brad Sullivan was my fathers most trusted adviser in his business and he was a constant in my life from the age of ten years old. As I grew up, he started taking an interest in me and at first, I thought he was nice. My dad always said he was like a brother to him and that should have been my first clue. Because any man that could befriend my father had to be bad news.
God knew my father was.
When I was sixteen years old, Brad cornered me in my fathers office one of the few summers I worked for his law firm.
My father often said I had to pay him back for all of my failures in his eyes.
I was always inadequate, no matter how hard I'd tried to make the man proud.
"You've grown up, Em. I think it's time you and I get to know each other a bit better."
"Brad- no... I-"
"Shut up, Bitch."
His hand was up my skirt before I knew it but when one of his large hands grabbed a breast, something from deep inside of me broke free from the chains my fathers world had on me. And I fought back.
My knee collided with his groin and the second he released me, I ran.
I'd ran the whole way home with blood dripping down my neck from where he'd bitten me when he'd kissed me and I went straight into the shower, intent on scrubbing away the grime his touch had left on every inch of my skin.
I didn't stop until it was raw and red from the loofah and even that wasn't enough. When I heard the front door slam shut with a loud, deathly sound I knew my dad had likely found out what had happened. I didn't have any hopes of him believing me, because he wasn't that kind of parent.
He would say it was all my fault.
But it wasn't.
"Don't... don't you dare touch me."
He kept approaching me, though. My skin crawled with fearful goosebumps and my heart was racing in its effort to keep up with my rapid breathing but I had no hope of calming. Because if he got any closer, I wouldn’t be able to fend him off.
Not this time.
Not him.
The man had gotten bigger, I could see the definition of his arms and chest, the angry tick of his neck telling me he wasn’t having any success in keeping his fury at bay.
That terrified me even more.
"Funny, you don't get it, do you? Let me clari
fy a few things, for you."
The sensation of his fist hitting my cheek brought on the most intense pain I'd ever felt and I was on the ground beneath him before I knew what had happened.
"I. Own. You."
The words were spoken with such anger, such possession, I begun to shake with the meaning I knew they held.
He'd been watching me, this whole time.
After the near miss in my fathers office, I'd gone to stay with my grandmother. Unlike my father, she was a good soul.
Kind.
Smart.
Sassy.
She didn't take shit from anyone, least of all him.
But her health was deteriorating and by the time I graduated nursing school, she was gone.
I felt her loss heavily, because she'd been the only person in my life, besides my mother, to show me true love.
She'd loved me.
She'd wanted the best for me.
But she'd been taken from me.
The pieces of what had transpired between then and now begun to make sense as I laid there, barely breathing while his cold, emotionless voice told me of all the ways he would make me pay for denying him of me for so long.
The agony of the kicks to my stomach ceased as he knelt down at my side and ripped the top of dress open, his horrid laughter in my ear a taunt if I’d ever heard one.
He was demented in his obsession of me and all I could think of was Hudson. He would find me before it was too late.
He would always protect me.
He'd made me that promise.
His hand was back in my hair as his spit landed on my face and I clenched my eyes shut, willing it all to be a nightmare.
Because that's what it felt like.
"This isn't over."
And then he was gone.
***
Everything hurt.
Every muscle, everywhere.
All I felt was the physical pain he'd given me but the memory of what had almost happened by his hands years ago was the thing that hurt the most.
Dragging myself from the floor, I struggled to my knees and crawled across the tiled floor to the still open stall door, with the last of the strength, I shut myself behind the door and engaged the lock, just in case he decided to come back to finish the job.
Clutching my knees to my chest, I dropped my head to my lap and whispered a prayer.
Hudson.
Please find me.
My thoughts stayed with him until my eyes drifted shut, the pain giving way as the harsh weight of exhaustion took me over.
***
"Em?"
Hudson.
I didn't know if I should believe it, but it was his voice.
Right?
"H...hud?"
It was my fears that kept me back.
Didn't they always?
“Open the door, Darlin. I’m right here. I’ll always be here.”
“I…I’m scared. Is he still here?”
His hands appeared beneath the stall door and I knew it was him.
My man.
My protector.
My home.
"Hudson." I whispered on a broken cry, fresh, hot tears spilling over my cheeks as I realized what I should have known all along.
I could trust him.
As my hands met his much larger ones, the hands that had given me so much care, so much solace, my heart begun to calm its pace.
And it was a painful and a beautiful reminder.
He was my home.
It was with that hope in my heart that I stood on still shaking legs and slid my fingers to the lock of the door, using the last bit of my strength to loosen it from its cradle and then it was his eyes, skimming the damage.
His hands, tightening in mine.
His love, shining in his blue irises.
And the strength I’d thought he stripped from me was restored.
“Who?” His voice was rough, broken, agonized.
I’d done that to him.
“J…Brad.”
I saw it, the recognition, the fury filling his usually expressive eyes and the proverbial shutters fall as they blocked me from witnessing it all.
How did he know Brad?
Tears soaked his t-shirt, my head dropping to his chest, the gravity of what had happened making me weak and desperate for the solace I knew I’d found in his arms. I heard his foul curse before he wound a large, possessive arm around my waist, pulling me too gently to his chest, where I belonged.
Where I’d always belong.
“I’m so fucking sorry, baby.”
His face was in my hair and I felt it, for the second time that day.
He was crying for me.
“Hudson.” I whispered, but he wouldn’t budge from his hold on me.
As if our bodies were incapable of parting.
As if we were two halves of a whole and without me, he’d been nothing.
I drew gently from his grasp and grabbed his face in urgent fingers, needing his eyes on me when I assured him of this.
“It’s not your fault, Hudson.”
He didn’t believe me.
I felt it.
I saw the evidence in his gaze.
But he would.
Someday.
So I did what I knew he needed the very most.
I let him hold me.
And it was enough.
Chapter Twenty- One
Hudson
FEAR LIKE NOTHING I had ever experienced overcame me the second I found my beautiful girl in that bathroom stall.
Her eyes, dark and haunted by shadows I knew plagued her spirit and pained her heart. The bruises he’d left on her otherwise perfect skin incited the most intense fury I’d ever felt and I knew precisely what I would do with it.
Destroy. Because this woman was everything to me.
My air. My breath. My life.
It was my job to protect her from ever being hurt, again and the second I took my eyes off of her, I failed her. The arm I had secured around her still shaking body tightened at the realization and I muttered a foul curse under my breath. She deserved so much better than me.
My eyes roamed her upturned face while she slept and I knew one thing for certain. I could never let go of her. Maybe before her attack, I could have forced myself to let her go but that wasn’t an option anymore.
It never would be, again.
This girl right here was the missing part my heart had been missing. She was the woman I’d always hoped to find. The kind of woman that would stick by my side, through thick and through thin. The woman that I would someday marry.
Yeah, that shit was happening. Soon.
Almost losing her had opened my fucking eyes. I was in love with her.
Despite the walls she put up around her heart and the secrets I knew she kept locked away deep inside of her she’d yet to tell me. It was all a way for her to protect herself. And I got that.
Emberly hadn’t had a good life thus far.The darkness I sometimes saw in her eyes were proof of that. That ended now.
Smoothing her matted hair away from her face, I dropped my head gently to hers, placing a kiss to the top of her head as I realized what I’d been fighting against since the second I laid my eyes on her. I loved her.
Her hands wrapped around my neck as I moved to pull away and I instantly knew she’d fallen into another nightmare. The night terrors that plagued her dreams most of the night were wreaking havoc on her psych and I didn’t have to see her eyes to know that the darkness of her past was back at the forefront of her mind. I wanted to punch the nearest wall, yell and scream, anything to take away the agony my girl was engulfed in, but I knew none of those things would bring her solace.
When I touched her, like this, it helped. Her small, thin fingers clung to my neck as if I was her lifeline and fuck, I wanted to be.
I wanted to be the anchor that kept her grounded and the home she needed when life got rough. I wanted to protect her with my life, just like I had for the
citizens of the city of Austin in my service to the police department. Because that was me.
It had been ingrained in me from a very young age to shield the ones I loved from anything that threatened to do them harm.
Emberly was my only priority, now and protecting her was all that mattered. Somehow, I’d find a way to shield her from all of this.
I had to find a way.
“Fuck,” I cursed when I heard the shrill ring of my phone interrupt the quiet calm of my bedroom and I hastily pulled the large comforter her more tightly around her body and slipped out of the bed to retrieve the phone.
Finding it on the edge of one of my bureaus, I pressed accept call and carefully shut the bedroom door behind me before padding into the large, open concept kitchen for a glass of water.
“Officer Lennox.”
“It’s Sergeant Lewis. How’s my daughters security coming along?”
All the blood drained from my face at the voice and I inwardly cringed.
I didn’t even spare a glance at the screen before answering the phone and then I’d wished I did. Because I really didn’t feel like having this conversation.
“She’s perfectly safe, Sir. The threat isn’t hers, it’s my girlfriend.”
A long, pregnant pause met my ear and then what sounded like a sigh of relief coming from my sergeant.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. I’ve guarded her for two months now and as far as I can tell, she isn’t being followed. The stalker didn’t have his sights on Ashlee.”
“Alright. You said something about your girlfriend? I wasn’t aware that you were dating.”
Because it’s none of your business. Didn’t dare say that, though.
“Her name is Emberly. She’s a close friend of your daughter, sir.”
“I see. What happened?”
I took a deep breath before saying the words, because they felt foul on my tongue, but I had to tell him in order to do my job. Except now, I had two jobs.
One was as a police officer under his command.
And the other? Was to protect my girl.
“She was attacked in the hospital tonight. I think whoever did it was the one stalking Ashlee for these past few months.”
“Shit, I’m very sorry to hear that, Lennox. If you need anything-”
Breath We Take (Cuffed By Love Duet Book 1) Page 14