Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
His fingers trailed lightly over the scar on Wren’s right shoulder. “Are you going to tell me what happened?”
She stiffened.
“If you don’t want to talk, that’s fine,” he hurried to add. “Go to sleep. Crash. Hell, all you probably want to do is shut your eyes and forget this day.” He hadn’t intended to fuck her again.
Okay, fine, he had intended to fuck her. Fucking her endlessly would always be on his to-do agenda. Not like he could lie to himself about that. Wren breathed, and he wanted her. Done deal. But he’d seriously planned to be the gentleman—or at least, try to act like one for her—that night. She’d been attacked. She’d been questioned and interrogated. Exhaustion had to claim her. He’d truly, truly intended to keep his hands off her.
But she’d wanted him.
He would never be strong enough to turn her away.
“You killed to keep me alive today,” her soft voice replied. “I’m pretty sure that entitles you to a few of my secrets.” A little sigh. “But be warned, you probably won’t like what you hear.”
She was naked. Still in his bed. He wanted her to stay there the rest of the night.
No, not just the rest of the night. Always.
But not the time for that confession. Not yet. He was trying not to absolutely terrify the woman. Or at least, not terrify her more than she already was.
As for not liking what he was about to hear... “I’ll never like anything that involves you getting hurt.” This time, it was his mouth that brushed across one shoulder blade.
“Jake?”
Another kiss. “Talk, don’t talk.” He shouldn’t have asked the question in the first place. If she wanted him to know her secrets, she’d tell him. If she didn’t, hell, he’d take her exactly as she was. “Your past is yours and you don’t have to parade it out for anyone to see. Sure as hell not for me.” He eased back toward his pillow but moved his hand to curl around her stomach. “You’ll be safe tonight, I swear it.”
“Because you’re sticking close to me?”
Damn straight, he was. Skin-to-skin close.
A soft sigh rustled from her. “He wanted to see if there were wings beneath my skin.”
Jake couldn’t have heard her correctly. “What?”
“There are scars on each shoulder because he figured if I had wings, they would grow from my shoulders. So he cut the right shoulder first, looking for a wing. Then he cut the left because he said he had to be sure one wasn’t there.”
Shock and rage surged through his body. “ Wren. ”
“That’s not the name I was born with.” A quiet confession.
He didn’t even know her real name? Doesn’t matter. I know her.
“But it’s the name I chose,” she explained as she turned on the bed. Darkness covered the room, so he couldn’t see her eyes, not clearly. He wished that he could. “Want to know why?” Wren asked.
He wanted to know everything about her. And particularly why the fuck your father thought there were angel wings beneath your skin. But he locked down his emotions, and, against the pillow, his head moved in a nod. When she’d rolled, he’d pulled his hand away from her.
“Wrens are small birds, but they sing such a beautiful song. My mom…” Pain seemed to stop her voice. A tense moment passed. “My mom could identify any bird based on the way it sang. We’d walk through the woods when I was younger, and she could always call out the birds before she saw them. Just by hearing them. She loved birds. And the wren? It was one of her favorites.” She tugged the covers to her chest. “The wren is a symbol for all kinds of things…determination. Happiness. Change.” A low exhale. “And trickery. At least, in Irish myths, it was. When Uncle Milo found out that I liked the name Wren, he said it was a good choice for me, and then he told me this old Irish tale.”
Milo O’Shaw would know plenty about Irish tales.
“He said that, once upon a time—I mean isn’t that how all stories start?—well, once upon a time, there was this contest. All the birds got together because they wanted to see who would be king. The winner was going to be the bird who could fly the highest.” She swallowed. He heard the soft click. “I don’t have wings,” she suddenly said. “I couldn’t fly. I could never fly away.”
Baby, you are ripping out my heart.
He had to touch her again. His fingers skimmed over her cheek. And when he touched the wetness of a teardrop, pain knifed through him. “Wren…”
“So the birds…” Brisk. “The birds were having their big contest. The king would be the one who could soar the highest in the sky. And, of course, the big, bad eagle took off. He was so confident because he knew how powerful he was. He knew he was stronger than all the others, and the eagle soared so very high, and he thought that he’d won. He’d thought no one would ever beat him.”
Jake brushed away her teardrop.
“But what the eagle didn’t realize was that the little wren had hidden on his back during the flight. And even as that eagle was claiming his victory, the wren crept from the hiding spot and flew above the eagle. The wren won. The wren tricked the eagle and won.”
“You faked your death. You got a new identity. You got away from the bastard. You won.” Hell, yes, the name fit her. His beautiful and strong Wren.
“Uncle Milo and I knew we were tricking the powerful hunter, and yes, Wren seemed fitting. But I didn’t know that I would win against him. I was always terrified. Always sure he’d come back and kill me.”
Over my dead body.
“That’s why, at first, things were so hard for me. I trusted no one. I was afraid every moment. I wasn’t with Uncle Milo in the beginning. The Feds tried to put me with what they said was a ‘normal’ family, only I’m not normal so that didn’t work out so well for me. When I’d wake up screaming or when I didn’t want to—to attach , as one long ago psychiatrist called it, they got scared of me.”
“They were worried about you?—”
“No, they were worried I was too much like my f-father. I heard them. I know what they believed. They said I didn’t love. That I couldn’t connect. That I was too cold and closed off and that I made them nervous. The mother said she couldn’t sleep at night because she was afraid of what I might do to her real children.”
His back teeth ground together. “You wouldn’t hurt anyone. ”
“You might want to tell that to the man I stabbed today. Twice.”
“You mean the man I killed?” He needed to see her better. Damn the darkness. “You fought back because you’re a survivor. Not because you’re a monster.” What should she have done? Let the bastard kill her? Uh, hell, no.
“My…f-father, he, um, thought I wasn’t like him. Said that maybe I had wings beneath the skin. Maybe I was an angel sent to lift up the devil. But he cut me, and there were no wings there, and he left me bleeding and I couldn’t make a sound because I was so afraid that if I did, he would come back and finish killing me.” Her words came too quickly.
His rage built too strongly.
“He had two victims. Always two, that was how he worked. His MO. That last time, the, um, the male was…he was dead, but his wife was still alive. She’d been trying to escape, you see. She’d left her partner. Left him right before he died. My fa—the killer always said that people leave each other. They turn on each other in the darkest moments.” A shuddering breath. “She’d gotten away and was running, but the killer caught her and dragged her back, and I found them, just as he sliced her throat.” No horror. No terror. Just flat.
When fear and horror must have nearly ripped her apart so long ago.
“I screamed and I broke and I…attacked him. I’d tried to stop him before. This wasn’t the first time. But he was always so much stronger. Told me that I was wrong, he was right, and that they deserved everything that happened. Because they were weak.”
Jake wanted to pull her against him. To stop the words he’d asked to hear, because each one was like a knife stabbing into him. Wren had been through hell, and he’d never known. All of these years, he had never known. He’d put a careful distance between them, believed she was involved with his brother, but the truth was, Wren had been facing hell all by herself.
Never again.
“I jumped on his back. He was so much bigger, but he didn’t expect me to fight so hard. I jumped on his back, and I held him as tightly as I could, and he let her go while he grabbed for me. I screamed for her to run, and she did. He whirled. Threw me down and…” A ragged exhale. “He said I was the first one who’d allowed someone else to escape while I stayed behind. That I’d sacrificed. That I had to have an angel inside me. He was…so excited. Almost proud. Then he flipped me over and sliced into my shoulders. I didn’t cry out. I’d…learned he liked that.”
He wanted to kill the bastard. Slowly. Painfully.
“But there were no wings beneath my skin. Just so much blood. Blood all over me. And then he let me go. He left only to…he ran out and he came back with her. He caught her again. She was so still in his arms. She hadn’t gotten very far. She was alive, but he’d cut her more. Sliced so deeply into her neck this time. He put her in front of me, and I covered her throat with my hands as I tried to help her and he just— he left us like that. ”
Emotion broke through those last words. So much pain.
“Wren…” My beautiful Wren.
“I didn’t make a sound. I didn’t cry out,” she said once more. “I-I’d learned he liked that. Did I tell you that already? I’m sorry. I-I don’t mean to repeat things.”
She could repeat anything she wanted. “You never need to apologize to me.” Sure as shit not for repeating something about a memory that must have savaged her.
“I was still in that spot, still trying to stop her from bleeding so much, when Honey and Uncle Milo burst in. Only, he wasn’t my uncle back then. He was just one of the Feds who swarmed with guns drawn. My father was gone, and I was a broken bird who didn’t know how to sing anymore. I was Wren.”
“You aren’t broken.”
“I didn’t speak for three weeks. Trust me, I was plenty broken.”
Screw it. He hauled her against his chest. Held her as tightly as he could and?—
“I don’t want your pity.” She shoved against him. Harder than he expected, and, stunned, he let her go.
She scrambled to the other side of the bed. Wren had hauled the sheet with her. Clasping it to her chest, she threw out a hand and turned on the lamp.
He blinked against the sudden flood of light. “Wren?”
“Don’t look at me with pity.” Anger hummed in her voice. “I made it through that nightmare. I survived. I was the only one he attacked who actually survived. Don’t pity me. Pity the victims that I didn’t save. Pity them and their families. Don’t pity me. I don’t want that from you. Not you, understand? I need you to want me. To still see me as a woman you desire and not just some freak’s daughter?—”
He surged toward her. Caught her chin. Kissed her. He took her breath and gave her his. He claimed her mouth. Thrust his tongue past the sweetness of her lips. Claiming . Jake made sure she understood… Mine. “I will always want you. I’ve wanted you since we were sixteen years old, sweetheart. That shit isn’t going to stop just because I find out how amazingly strong you are.”
Her head shook. “I’m not. ”
“Yeah, you are.” Another kiss. Because he needed it. And maybe so did she. “You survived hell. And I hate that you had to endure that nightmare. So do I feel fucking sorry for what you experienced? Yes. Do I want to find your father, hunt him down, and make him pay for every moment of pain that he gave you? For every second of terror? For every breath you took that held fear? Damn straight, I do.” One more kiss. “Here’s the thing, I would want to kill anyone who hurt you.”
“Jake…”
Another kiss because this was his Wren. “Nothing would ever make me stop wanting you. That’s just not possible. You need to understand that now.”
She let go of the sheet. Grabbed his shoulders. “Since…we were sixteen?”
“Um. This gorgeous girl saved my ass from a brutal hit by a truck. We fell on the pavement together. My ice cream went all over her, and all I wanted to do was kiss her.” Which he did. Right then.
Then he lifted his head because there were a few other things to say. Things she needed to hear.
“You didn’t kiss me back then,” she reminded him, confused. “You yelled at me that day.”
Yep. “Because a sixteen-year-old boy can be a damn idiot. The prettiest girl in the world had just saved my life, and I was embarrassed as hell.” More than that. His whole world had been realigning in that moment. “I’ve never been the smooth talker, Wren. My brother always knows what to say. I just know how to make other people scared or uncomfortable the longer they are near me. That would be my superpower of being a prick, and it was in full effect that day.”
“Jake…”
“I’ve wanted you for years. That wanting has only gotten stronger as we grew older, and I learned so much more about you.”
Her long lashes flickered. “Bet you never imagined you’d learn all this, huh? Surprise, surprise.”
No, not in a million years would he have imagined this. “I told you that I killed for the first time when I was twenty-two.”
Her head moved in a slow nod.
“Did you stop wanting me when you learned what I’d done?” Jake asked.
“I, um, just had sex with you so…clearly no.”
“Then know that—clearly—I will never stop wanting you. Just not going to happen.” He needed to reveal his past to her. It wasn’t fair that she’d cut herself open for him, but he hadn’t told her more about his life. “I killed for the government. They sent me after high value targets. Bastards who were twisted and depraved and who had plans to hurt an awful lot of people.” Specifics couldn’t be shared, not even with Wren. Some secrets had to be taken to his grave. “I got in close. Eb and I handled the missions. We did whatever was necessary. Sanctioned by the government, sure, but death is death, and we were very good at delivering death.” A pause. “Knowing I can kill so easily, does that change how you feel about me?”
“No.”
“Why not?” He really wanted to know. “You should be scared of me.” Something he’d feared for a long time.
But she smiled at him. That sweet, heartbreaking, Wren smile. “I told you, I have my own darkness. I more than have it. I’m just good at disguising it from most people.” The smile wiped away. “I didn’t want to be relocated again when I moved here at sixteen. I wanted to stay with Uncle Milo. I wanted to stay in this life with these two annoying boys who became my friends. This one boy in particular—the growly one—he was always watching out for me. Catching me when I fell.”
He tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “I will always catch you.”
“You know all my secrets, and you’re still touching me.” So husky.
His forehead rested against hers. “You know what I’ve done, and you’re still fucking me.”
“You’re the only person I want to fuck.”
He lifted his forehead from hers, just a little. “Is this where you say you were saving yourself for me?” He tried a smile, wanting to lighten the load she carried even though he was far from being a joking kind of man. “Because, sweetheart?—”
“Yes.” No joke. No load lightening. Just that. “Yes,” she said again. “I was waiting for you, Jake. No one else would do. The minute I knew I was free of the past, I went straight to you. I wanted you, and you were the best first lover that I could have ever?—”
Her words stopped because he was kissing her. Feverish and wild. But her words played in his head on an endless loop. I was waiting for you, Jake.
How was a man supposed to stay sane when his woman said that to him? Not that he’d ever been the sanest when it came to Wren. But this…
This…
His hands curled under her delicate jaw. Her taste maddened him.
He was going to fuck her again. And again. And again.
And never let go.
But…she was pulling back. Her breath sawed in and out. “You…still want me, Jake?”
“How can you even ask?” His dick was so big and thick that she had to see it bobbing toward her. Had to feel it.
“I was there when they died. I was there for his crimes. He said I’d be just like him and when I stabbed that man today…” Now she didn’t just pull from him. Wren rose and left the bed. She wrapped the sheet around her body as she paced across the room and toward the window. “It didn’t feel wrong. I shoved the blade in him a second time without hesitating. My father—he would have been proud of me. Proud. Because he always told me that I was more like him than anyone else in the world.”
He wanted her back in his bed. In his arms.
“I lied to you.” Her hair trailed over her shoulders. “I lied to everyone. And I’ve done it for years. Those women who think they are my friends? They would run if they knew the truth. They wouldn’t want me being close to them. My clients at my business would be horrified. And you…” Still near the window, she angled her body toward him.
He was still in bed. But when she broke off, he tossed aside the covers, and, naked, he stalked to her.
Her shoulders stiffened. Her chin notched up.
He stopped right in front of her. Close enough to touch. As he always wanted to do. Touch. Take. Claim. “Do I look horrified?”
“Of all the people in my life, I always thought you would be the most likely to understand me. Everyone else pretends the world is this bright and happy place, but you’ve always known darkness is there.”
But he wished it could be a bright and happy place for her. “Do I look like I’m running?” Hadn’t he already covered that he would only run to her? “And does it look like I don’t want to get close to you?”
Her lashes fluttered. “Jake…”
“I will never run away. I will never be horrified. Not by anything about you. And I will always be between you and any danger.” Didn’t she get what gutted him? “It’s my fault you are in jeopardy now. It’s my twisted past that is hurting you. It’s me. If anyone should be running, dammit, baby, it is you. You should be running as you try to get far away from me.”
But she shook her head. “I will never run away from you.”
“Maybe you should.” If she knew all the things he wanted to do with her. The way he wanted to keep her, forever.
“I will never be horrified,” she said, giving his own words back to him.
Are you sure? “I killed a man today.” Right in front of her.
She put a hand over his heart. “Thank you for saving my life.”
Always. He would do anything to save her.
“But you don’t need to stand between me and danger.” Wren wet her lips. “I’d rather if the choice ever comes up, how about you save yourself?”
Screw that. His hands curled around her hips. Clutched the soft sheet and wished it was her skin. “How about I just eliminate every threat? That work for you?”
“I don’t want you hurt. I-I saw couples. I saw the ones my father took, their bodies when he was done, and I…” She stopped.
He now understood so much about her. “You don’t believe in love, do you, sweetheart?” He was deliberately not calling her sunshine because she didn’t like that nickname. Even if that was exactly what she was to him. Fucking sunshine. Always would be. Sunshine in the darkness.
“They said they loved each other. He made them turn on one another—they abandoned the ones they swore to love the most. They hurt each other. You can’t count on love.”
Were those her words? Or her father’s? Jake wanted to swear that he would never leave her. Because he wouldn’t.
Because he loved her.
But she wasn’t ready for the stark truth that he’d hidden for so long. And if he told her now, she might run away. So he’d tread carefully. Slowly. A bulldozer wasn’t going to work in this situation.
“You can count on me,” he finally said as the silence stretched between them. “My past is trying to hurt you. I won’t let it. I will do anything necessary to protect you.”
“By pretending to be involved with me?”
His hold tightened on her waist, and he lifted her up. Her eyes widened, and she grabbed onto his shoulders.
“Sweetheart…” Jake smiled at her.
She inhaled.
“We are involved. No pretending necessary. Danger brought us closer. Brought down every wall that had been between us. There is no lying. Just truth. You’re mine, and I’ll protect you. No one will use you as some pawn against me or my brother.” He turned and carried her back to the bed.
“Jake…”
He lowered her onto the mattress.
“This will be the second night,” she whispered. “Not gonna qualify as a one-night stand any longer.”
“You were never going to be just one night for me.” He turned off the light. Climbed in bed beside her.
Her warm, soft body pressed against him. “Then what am I?”
End game, sunshine. End game.
He kissed her.
Makayla slid out of bed. Her fiancé rolled onto his side, but his eyes didn’t open. His breathing remained deep and even, and she carefully tiptoed out of the bedroom.
The big bachelorette weekend had not gone as planned. There had been blood and death and now…
She crept down the hallway. Turned to the right. To the room where she’d been storing her wedding dress. Her hand trembled as she turned on the light. The flood of illumination filled the room, and the glow fell right on the white, satin dress as it waited inside its plastic, protective covering. The fancy dress fit for a princess.
Her breath rushed out. She’d dreamed of her wedding for so long.
A month out. One month to go until the big day.
The thick carpeting swallowed her steps as she made her way across the room. Her fingers trailed over the plastic bag. Then she reached for the veil she’d carefully arranged on the nearby table. Not the cheap veil she’d worn at Milo’s bar—the fake, party one she’d put on Wren’s head for just a quick moment.
No, this one was the real deal. Ridiculously expensive. Gossamer and?—
Slashed?
She frowned at the cuts in the veil. “What in the…”
The door closed behind her. A soft click. She’d…she’d left the door open. Tom must have woken up, and if he saw the veil like this, he would freak out.
She spun around and shoved the veil behind her back even as she pasted a smile on her face. “Tom, I…”
It wasn’t Tom.
He rushed toward her even as the veil fell from her fingers.