Chapter 9 Willow
WILLOW
My heart kicks back into gear suddenly, crashing against my ribs as it pounds at a quick pace.
Malice.
What the fuck is he doing here?
He stands like an imposing statue in the living room, the sunlight from the large windows pouring into the room and bathing him in a halo of warm gold.
His muscled, tattooed frame looks out of place in this elegant apartment, especially considering he must’ve broken in.
The contrast between him and his surroundings makes him look even more rough, dangerous, and wild.
For a long moment, we just stare at each other.
I’m at a loss for words, half from the shock of seeing him here and half from the riot of emotions rushing through me. Even after everything that’s happened, there’s still a part of me that feels glad to see him—and I hate that.
Then Malice’s gaze drops to my neck. His tongue flashes out, licking his lips, and I catch my breath softly, trying not to follow the motion with my eyes.
“Your bruises are almost gone,” he says. His voice is rough, and he sounds almost… relieved. Like he actually cared that I was hurt.
His voice snaps the tense silence, and I swallow hard, stiffening my spine. I can’t afford to get dragged into this mess with him again. I can’t afford to let my guard down. When I told them all I was done before, I meant it, and I have to stand firm to that.
I call up all my anger from the night I saw that video, letting it burn hot and bright in my chest.
“Yeah, they are. I’m lucky I got out with just some scrapes and bruises,” I tell him coolly. “No thanks to you and your brothers.”
Malice’s jaws clenches, a flash of anger darkening his gray eyes. He stalks toward me slowly, not looking away, staring me down the same way a predator watches its prey.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about, Solnyshka,” he murmurs.
“We did everything we could to find you. As soon as we realized you were fucking gone, we all lost our shit. Vic was scrubbing through footage, Ransom and I were trying to track you on foot. Don’t you know that we would have protected you if we could have?
We were going out of our fucking minds trying to get to you before Ilya could hurt you. ”
I want to take a step back, to put distance between us as he comes closer, but I make myself stay put. This is my fucking apartment, and I’m not going to let him intimidate me like this. I take a deep breath and hold my ground, lifting my chin as I glare back at Malice.
“Well, in the end I didn’t need you,” I bite out. “So I guess it doesn’t matter.”
“Why the fuck did you leave?” he demands, his voice rising. “Why did you go where we couldn’t protect you? Why would you do that?”
He sounds angry, which isn’t all that unusual for him. But there’s also something almost… desperate in his voice. Like he needs to know what happened, like it’s tearing him up inside.
My throat tightens, making it hard to breathe. Hard to swallow. Malice is close enough now that I can make out the tiny flecks of dark blue in his irises. He’s closer than he’s been since the night I left, and my heart slams in my chest.
“I already told you why,” I force myself to say, my voice raspy.
“Why the fuck would I stay with people who think I’m worthless?
Who fucked me like a whore and treated me like one too?
Worse than one, because at least whores get paid.
You three just saw me as nothing but a hole to stick your dicks in.
You used me. You lied to me. Of course I couldn’t stay there. Why the fuck would I?”
My chest hurts, as if calling him out for what he and his brothers did is bringing me right back to the night when I realized they’d betrayed me.
Tears burn in my eyes, threatening to fall, but the last thing I want to do is cry in front of him.
I won’t give him the satisfaction of knowing how badly he hurt me.
Ducking my head, I stare down at the shiny wood floor of the living room. I drag in a deep breath, trying to clear my mind and get ahold of myself.
Calloused fingers slip under my chin, and I blink in surprise when Malice tilts my head up, making me look at him.
There’s something almost gentle in his eyes, mixed in with the intensity, and it stops me in my tracks for a second—long enough for him to speak again.
“That’s not true.” His voice is low and rough. “That’s not how we see you.”
I swallow hard and then swallow again, almost shaking with the force of the emotions I’m feeling. How can he still make me feel so much? So much pain and longing all jumbled up together? Why couldn’t the bruises on my heart have healed as quickly as the bruises on my neck?
“Then why did Victor put that video together?” I whisper, my lips trembling. “Who did he send it to? What was the point of it?”
Malice’s jaw stiffens. The emotions I could’ve sworn I saw on his face a second ago disappear as his expression hardens, and he looks away, not answering my questions.
I let out a ragged breath, feeling like there’s a hard lump in my chest where my heart should be. I take two steps back from Malice and then walk around him altogether, putting more distance between us.
“Why are you here?” I demand again, turning around to face him. “This thing between us is over, don’t you get it? Ilya is dead. There’s no reason for you to be here. There’s no fucking reason for you to be in my life anymore!”
“You’re right.” Malice nods once, his gaze never leaving my face. “There’s no reason for me or my brothers to be in your life anymore. We shouldn’t be in your life.”
The simple honesty in his voice twists like a dagger in my gut, even though I just said the same thing. I cross my arms over my chest, goosebumps scattering over my skin as I hug myself tightly, clenching my jaw as if that could keep out the pain.
“Then go,” I tell him, jerking my chin toward the door.
But he doesn’t move. He stays right where he is, rooted to the spot and still staring at me.
“There’s no reason for us to be in your life,” he repeats. “Except I can’t fucking stay away.”
My breath hitches, my mouth falling open slightly. “What are you—”
“I’ve been watching you all week,” he continues, stepping toward me. “I know I shouldn’t, but I can’t stop myself.”
I hate hearing him say that. I hate the way some part of me is glad to know that I’m like an addiction to him—because he and his brothers feel like one to me too.
But most of all, I hate that he can still break through all the walls I put up around my heart.
“Stop saying that. Stop fucking with me!” I blurt, and it comes out ragged and almost pleading. I try to draw on my anger again, to make it clear that I’m done with this, but it’s not as easy as it probably should be.
Malice comes closer, looming over me as he stops less than a foot away.
He stares down at me, emotions playing over his face.
I can’t stop myself from gazing back at him, trying to catalogue the emotions and make sense of them all.
Trying to see past the mask I’m sure he’s wearing to all the lies and deceit that I know lurk beneath.
“Willow…”
Instead of the nickname he gave me all those weeks ago, he says my real name softly—and it snaps something inside me.
“No!” I shout. “No! Don’t fucking do that!”
All my emotions bubble up at once, spilling over until I can’t hold them back. I curl my hands into fists and beat at Malice’s chest, for all the good that does. It’s like hitting a fucking stone wall, but that doesn’t stop me.
“Don’t say my name like you give a shit about me!” I shove at him, wanting him to move. Wanting him to crumble. Wanting him to… I don’t even know what. “Who the fuck do you think you are? I told you we were done. I told you I wanted you out of my life! Get out! Leave. Me. Alone!”
All the anger and hurt pour out of me as I yell at him, hitting him with every sentence, every condemnation. Tears well in my eyes and trail down my cheeks, my breaths coming in harsh bursts as I unleash everything I’m feeling in a torrent.
Malice catches my wrists in his large hands, his fingers forming bands that might as well be made of iron, stopping me from hitting him. He stares down at me with eyes that burn, but he doesn’t say anything.
“Why?” I demand again, struggling against his hold. I hate the way my voice trembles and cracks at the end. I hate how weak I sound. “Why would you make that video of me? Why would you do it?”
Malice’s fingers tighten around my wrists, almost to the point of pain. It looks like he’s wrestling with himself as I stare up at him, his nostrils flaring as his jaw hardens.
Then, suddenly, an answer bursts out of him.
“We did it to protect you, alright?” he growls. “Because we didn’t have another fucking choice!”
That stops me short, and I blink in surprise. “What? What do you mean?”
He lets out a ragged breath. “I didn’t want to tell you. Hell, I probably still shouldn’t tell you. But we used that footage to try to keep you safe.”
I shake my head, tugging against his hold on me. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Malice.”
“I know. Just… fuck.”
He lets go of my wrists, but I don’t run away from him this time. I just keep staring up at his face, waiting for it all to make sense.
“There’s a man we work for,” Malice finally says, the words coming slowly as if he’s still wrestling with himself over whether or not to tell me more.
“We owe him something pretty fucking big, so he gets to demand favors from us in return. We do jobs and shit for him. I guess at some point, this fucker found out that you were living with us, and he decided he wanted you.”
“Me?” My brows draw together as a shiver runs up my spine. “Why would he want me?”
“More specifically, he wanted a virgin,” Malice returns, giving me a look. “So we had to make sure you weren’t one so he wouldn’t want you anymore.”
It feels like an invisible fist squeezes my heart as he says that, and I wince, pressing the heel of my hand against my sternum.
I’m still trying to wrap my head around the fact that there was more to this than I knew. Some guy they work for wanted me, and Malice and his brothers made that video to protect me. To keep me from falling into the other man’s hands.
But… they still lied to me. They still kept secrets from me. If I hadn’t happened to wake up in the middle of the night and seen that video on Vic’s computer, I never would have known what they’d done.
Even worse, it means that the night that meant so much to me, when I felt wild and free…
they planned that. They orchestrated the whole thing for a completely different reason.
Not just because they wanted me the same way I wanted them.
Not just because of the connection I thought existed between us.
Even if they don’t truly believe all the things I saw in that message Vic wrote, it still hurts. To be used. To be lied to and made to think one thing while something else entirely was going on.
They may not think I’m trash, but they treated me like an object.
I step away from Malice again, dropping my hand away from my chest. I have to force myself to take measured breaths, and the room feels like it’s spinning around me a bit.
“Get out,” I tell him.
Malice draws in a sharp breath. I can see that he doesn’t want to leave—it’s written in every line of his body. He moves to take a step toward me again, but I shake my head, my shoulders tensing.
“No,” I repeat, my voice low. “Just go.”
For an interminable moment, he stares down at me, the two of us frozen in place. Then, finally, he turns on his heel and leaves.
Once the door closes behind him, I sink down onto the couch, my knees giving out beneath me. Burying my face in a pillow, I let the sobs I’ve been holding in burst free.