Chapter Thirty-Five Alejandro
Chapter Thirty-Five
Alejandro
“Are you okay in there?” Audrey’s voice floated through the closed bathroom door.
I opened up and stepped out into my bedroom, shirtless, jeans riding low on my hips. “I thought I locked that.”
“You forgot,” she said, already halfway into my room like she owned the place. “And I opted not to knock.” She stopped a foot away from me. “How’s the wound?”
“Which one? The one on my back where that woman stabbed me multiple times?” I tapped a finger above my bandage. “Or this new one?”
She didn’t answer right away. Instead, she erased the space between us, resting her hand flat against my chest, right over my heart.
My pec muscle involuntarily twitched beneath her touch. “My wounds don’t seem nearly as bad as yours must be.”
“My heart feels ripped out. Like it’s not even in there anymore. I feel numb. Is that normal?”
“You should never feel that way.” And now I was angry all over again at Mitch, and now at a real dead man—Will Hobbs—for making her feel this way.
She trailed her fingers down the center of my chest, soft and slow, like she wasn’t even aware she was doing it.
When she reached the ridges of my abs, she followed the line to the waistband of my jeans, teasing just above the edge of my boxers.
“Underwear.” Her voice was glass, fractured and on the verge of totally breaking. “We keep circling back to that topic.”
“Oh, we do, do we?” I rasped as she skated her finger along the band of my boxers, my abdominal muscles tensing at her touch.
I caught her wrist, halting her before things went somewhere they couldn’t go again.
“You’re in shock. That’s why you’re reaching for something else. But this isn’t what you want or need. Not now, at least.”
That call with Trevor changed things for them, didn’t it? It had to.
“Mitch would’ve never ended up marrying you had my ex not introduced Trevor to Will Hobbs.”
Her expression cracked, and I saw it hit her—the sting of hindsight.
“And then you and Trevor would still be married,” I added, voice rough. “Chase wouldn’t have been caught in all this. His family wouldn’t have been torn apart.”
“How do you know what happened in Afghanistan is why we ended up getting divorced? I told Ryder that, not you.”
I released her wrist and stepped around her, grabbing my shirt.
“I saw it in your eyes on that call. His too.” I yanked the shirt over my head, the movement pulling at the wound in my side.
“It’s not hard to figure out that kind of trauma screws with a person, especially when it was his decision to go in the first place. ”
“Oh.” Her small voice had me turning around. “I know what you’re doing.”
I frowned. “And what’s that?”
“Pushing me away. Putting up walls.” Her voice trembled. “After that call, you regret what happened between us, don’t you?”
Yes. No. I wasn’t sure what I was doing. Right now, I only knew I needed to soldier forward and lock down my emotions for everyone’s benefit.
“He’s jealous of you, you know. Mitch.” She fidgeted with the hem of her shirt, reminding me of when she’d lifted it to help me better see the pink lace between her legs.
“He was fine with me going to Trevor’s after the break-in, because he knew nothing would happen between us.
It was what he wanted, clearly. But those photos he sent of us were personal.
They were a warning not to fall for you.
A reminder I was his wife. Until death do us part. ”
“Audrey,” was all I managed, unsure what to say after that.
“Mitch sees you as a threat,” she continued anyway.
“And if he’s had people watching me, he probably figured out Ryder’s my brother after I visited our dad and was rejected.
That’s why he didn’t accuse me of anything with him.
But you? He saw something. Maybe at Christmas. The way I was looking at you, perhaps.”
I stared at her in shock. Did she realize what she just admitted? And did I hear her right? “Are you saying you felt something for me when we first met?”
She let go of her sweatshirt, nodding. “I didn’t want to. I told myself no more falling for anyone, but being around you . . .”
I removed what was left of the space between us and gently held her chin, needing to look her in the eyes.
“Who knows, Mitch may have even tapped my phone. He’d have learned a lot about my feelings for you if he read the texts with my best friend.”
I’m really going to kill that man.
“But I’m starting to think this isn’t just about revenge or a payday. I think he wants more than just for me to open that vault.”
Yeah, me too. And it was destroying me to think about.
“Mitch wants to take me away. From Chase. From everyone. So he can keep me for himself. In his mind, I still belong to him like a piece of property he owns.”
“I’ll never let him near you.” I brushed my thumb along the line of her lips. “You hear me?”
She didn’t acknowledge me, only let go of a strangled breath.
“He’s obsessed with me, isn’t he? I think he has been since the moment we met.
” She hesitated, then added, “Something tells me he’s the reason Hobbs sent Trevor on that mission.
He wanted Trevor out of the picture.” She paused before whispering what I felt in my bones to be true: “He did it so he could make me his wife instead.”