Chapter 16
Chapter Sixteen
KRUGER
I hang up my phone and turn as I hear the office door open.
I scan Delphi and grin when I see she’s still wearing her torn top. “I take it Legs didn’t leave anything behind?”
“I need to talk to you, and I need you to listen to me before you go off halfcocked.”
Instantly, I’m on alert. “What’s wrong?”
“Can you sit?”
I fold my arms across my chest. “Delphi…”
She sighs, but she closes the door behind her and stays in front of it, crossing her arms. “I’m going to ask you to trust me.”
I wait for the rest, but when nothing else comes, I cock my head to the side, not liking what I’m reading from her. Not one little bit.
“Of course I trust you.”
Her shoulders relax, but she doesn’t move from her spot. “Okay, good. I think I know who broke in the other day.”
“What? What the hell are you talking about?” My mind whirls in a dozen directions until it snaps to Delphi. “The apartment? They left something in the apartment?”
I storm toward her, but she holds her arms out to stop me. “Listen to me, Kruger, goddamn it. I’m putting my faith in you. Please don’t let me down.” The unspoken again hangs between us, making me swallow. But her words are enough to burn through the rage and hold me in place for a moment.
“Explain.”
“If you snap at me again, I’m going to beat you over the head with my cast. I’m getting it off tomorrow, so I don’t care if it breaks.”
I put some distance between us, not trusting myself right now. Not because I’m worried I’ll hurt her. I might be quick to anger, but I’d never put my hands on her with the intention of causing pain.
“I’m sorry for snapping, but not for worrying about you.”
“That’s fair, but please listen and hear me out before you overreact.”
I narrow my eyes and grip the desk.
“You’re right, they did leave something in the apartment.”
“What the fuck was it?”
“Themselves.”
I don’t get it until she bites her lip, and a red haze starts to slip over my vision. “There’s someone in the apartment?” I snarl.
“Yes.”
I move toward her again, so she hurries to continue. “He’s just a kid, Kruger, and he’s hurt. He’s hiding out, not trying to steal anything. He’s just trying to keep himself safe.”
“Move out of my way, Delphi,” I grit out, knowing how easy it is to manipulate a bleeding heart.
“If you lay a hand on him, Kruger, whatever this is between us is done.”
I freeze, my chest heaving as her words whip at my skin like barbed wire. “You’d choose him over me?” A part of me realizes how fucking juvenile I sound, but I can’t help it. Is it too much to ask for me to want her to give a shit?
“Seriously?” She throws her hands up in the air, almost clipping herself in the face with her cast. “He’s a boy who has been beaten black and bloody, and he’s terrified.
He sobbed in my arms and didn’t make a single fucking noise.
But that silence might as well have been a scream because my soul heard it, Kruger.
You keep expecting me to accept you for who you are and forgive you for the shit you did.
I’m supposed to get over what happened and adjust my expectations, huh?
Why? Because it suits you. Why is it always the woman who has to change and adapt?
“That night you dropped me off on the outskirts of the city. Did you even think about what would happen to me?”
I swallow, my brain trying to keep up with the direction of the conversation when my anger is clouding everything.
“I didn’t have any money, Kruger. I left the house in a panic. I didn’t bring my phone, my wallet, or even a fucking jacket. All I had were my keys, which would have been fine, but you wouldn’t let me take my car.”
My thoughts drift back to that night, when her arms were wrapped around herself to ward off the cold, but I was too raw to process everything.
I was cruel to her, but I needed her gone.
Even then, I wasn’t convinced of her guilt.
But I knew she was in danger if she stayed because there were plenty who were more than happy to extract their pound of flesh.
I open my mouth but then close it again.
“I slept under the bridge that first night. I was so fucking cold, I thought I was going to die. If it weren’t for some old homeless guy willing to share his blanket with me, I probably would have.
It took me days to walk home. I learned to sleep in the day when it was safe and warmer and keep moving at night.
Eventually, I made it home. Only home, and everything I had, was gone. ”
“Delphi…” My voice comes out as a guttural groan.
“There’s more. I just can’t…not right now. I’m asking, no, I’m begging you to please, for once, believe me, trust me, be the man I need you to be.”
I take a deep breath. If I don’t give her what she needs here, it’ll break the fragile bond that’s been growing between us. I move into her, wrapping my hand around the back of her head, and pull her to me. “Okay, chestnut. I’ll follow your lead.”
She pulls back and looks up at me with tears in her eyes. “Thank you.”
I lean down and kiss her forehead. “Come introduce me to the kid.”
She steps aside and opens the door before taking my hand and leading me up to the apartment. I itch to grab my gun, because I know better than to walk into an unknown situation, but those tears in her eyes hold me back. She trusted me with this. I can’t let her down, not at the first hurdle.
She walks me inside. I scan the room, noticing the trash on the table that wasn’t there the last time I was here. She leads me back to the bedroom, making me grit my teeth. But when we walk in, I don’t see anyone.
She lets go of my hand and walks farther into the room. “There you are.” She moves around the bed, which is when I notice the mess it’s in and the blood. I follow behind her and grit my teeth when she drops to her knees in front of a figure huddled in the corner.
“Hey,” she murmurs, reaching for him. As soon as he feels her hand on his arm, he jolts, his head snapping up. He relaxes when he sees Delphi, until his eyes land on me. His face bleeds white, and his eyes dart to the door.
“Not gonna hurt you, kid,” I tell him gruffly. Taking him in, I can see someone has already beaten me to the punch. “Get him up on the bed. I’ll go grab the first aid kit.” His eyes don’t leave mine. “You hurt her, and I’ll make this look like child’s play. You get me?”
He nods as Delphi glares at me.
“Good, so we understand each other. You got a name?”
The kid swallows, looking like the last thing he wants to do is share it, and that’s okay, I get it.
“Alright, Bud, don’t strain your brain. I’ll be back with some shit to clean you up with.”
I leave Delphi to get him up and move to the bathroom, where there is a first aid kit. Usually, I wouldn’t take my eyes off Delphi in a situation like this, but I’m not sensing a threat from this kid. Hell, given his current state, Delphi would likely be able to put him on his ass herself.
When I walk back in a few moments later, the kid is sitting on the side of the bed with Delphi beside him.
She’s not touching him, but she’s offering him support just the same.
She talks about the fact that it’s supposed to rain later and that traffic was busy in town today. And as she talks, he settles more.
While she has him distracted, I move to the kitchen and grab a stack of clean kitchen towels along with a bowl of warm water. When I walk back in, he seems calmer, but he watches every move I make as if he’s waiting for me to lash out.
“I’m going to clean you up and we’re gonna talk, man to man. You don’t bullshit me, and I’ll see what I can do to help. You lie to me, though, and I’ll send you back to wherever it is you came from.”
I won’t, but he doesn’t need to know that. If Delphi had lasers for eyes, I’d be dead right now. But this isn’t the time for bullshit. I need to know if whatever trouble this kid is in will spill over onto Delphi.
He licks his split lip and winces. I crouch in front of him and take the towel, dipping it in the warm water before using it to clean him up.
“Who did this to you?”
He fists his hand but doesn’t speak.
“Kid…” I warn.
Delphi moves closer, sliding her hand over the boy’s. He looks down at it, his eyes widening in wonder, and I can’t help but feel something inside me soften toward him. The kid is clearly touched-starved.
“We won’t let anyone hurt you. It would hurt me. And do you really think Kruger would let that happen? No, he really, really doesn’t like me being hurt.”
“Was he mad about the grenade?” the kid asks quietly, his eyes lifting to mine once more.
“Furious,” I answer. “And scared out of my fucking mind.”
“Language, Kruger,” Delphi chides, making me roll my eyes.
“Kid’s not six. Bet he hears a shit-ton worse at school.”
The kid nods, his lips twitching a little.
“I don’t care,” she says stubbornly.
“You got kids?” he asks, looking from me to Delphi.
A look of pain crosses her face before she shakes it off.
“I lost a lot of babies, some before I even knew I was pregnant,” she answers softly.
She fiddles with her wrist, which is when I notice the cuff is missing.
“The last time, though, we were so close. We found out he was a boy and called him Samuel. It was said to mean ‘God has heard’ and I really did think he’d heard my prayers this time. ”
She reaches up to swipe at a tear that sips free. I freeze, unsure of what to do or say. I knew she’d had troubles in the past, with early miscarriages, but this…This is not something I knew.
The kid moves in closer to her, almost protectively. And damn it, I didn’t want to like this kid, but I can’t help it.
“He came too soon,” she chokes out. “His lungs weren’t developed enough.” She shakes her head. “He never took a breath, but I swear, while I held him, we lived a lifetime together.”
“Jesus, Delphi.”
“That’s why I stopped coming around the clubhouse. First to hide the pregnancy until we knew everything was okay, and then after…”
“You were grieving.”
She nods. “So many babies, and I never got to bring one home. At least I had photos of Samuel and his footprints. I needed them to know he wasn’t just a dream.”
“Can I see them?” the kid asks gently.
She wipes her eyes but shakes her head. She looks at me briefly before she drops her eyes.
“There was a fire…by the time I made it there, everything was gone,” she tells him in a tortured whisper.
I realize then the magnitude of what we did, of what she lost. I get up and make it to the bathroom just in time to throw up.
No wonder she hates us all. I throw up until there is nothing left. I reach up and flush it away, wishing I could do the same with my sins.
And then she’s there, like a fucking angel, living in a world so dirty and soiled. It makes me want to roar to the fucking heavens. She presses a cold washcloth to the back of my neck before wiping my face with it.
“I’m so fucking sorry.”
“It was a long time ago.”
She doesn’t say it’s okay because it’s not. How can she even look at me right now?
“Let’s get you up I’ll see if I can find a spare toothbrush.”
I grab her arm. “I didn’t know. None of us did. We wouldn’t have—”
“Yes, you would. If your president ordered it, you’d do it.”
“He wouldn’t have ordered it if he knew. Blade—”
“Knew.” She shuts me up with one word.
“What?”
“L—Snake told him. He missed church a couple of times, so he had to get permission for that. He told Blade in confidence. And for all his faults, as far as I know, he kept it quiet. I don’t know what changed that night.
Perhaps he didn’t believe Snake and thought it was some elaborate master plan, or maybe he had simply forgotten.
But he knew the real reason I hadn’t been coming, and he sent you to burn everything down anyway. ”
I smooth my thumb over her scared wrist. “That’s when you did this?”
She nods. “I had nothing left. No reason to stay.”
She pulls away and digs in the cupboard, finding an unopened pack of toothbrushes and some toothpaste.
“I’ll go clean the kid up. Take as long as you need.” She’s gone as I stare after her, wondering what the fuck I’m supposed to do now. I felt so damn sure I had the answers to everything. All I needed was to build a strong foundation between us so we could weather any storm, and we’d be okay.
I guess it doesn’t matter how strong the foundations are when you build your house on sand. Eventually, everything will come tumbling down.