Chapter 19
Jericho
I swear the scent that clings to her skin is enough to drive me insane. It took everything I had to take a step back and sit back down on the couch. It took even more control not to pull her on my lap and ask her if she remembered the way I liked how she would swivel her hips and grind down on me like she did before we made love the first time.
Nothing on the television can hold my interest when she's right beside me, but I don't let those wayward thoughts take over. Wanting to feel the warmth of her wrapped around my cock is biological, animalistic. It has nothing to do with how I perceive her value or importance in my life.
It isn't love or devotion. It isn't some feral need to remind her who worships the ground she walks on.
Everything is different from the way it was before, and there's no perceivable way to get back the time that was lost. Too much has happened. We're too different now to even make the mistake of thinking we could recover, and I don't know that I'd even want to if we were given a magic eight-ball.
Look, now I'm fucking lying to myself.
I was so obsessed with, so in love with Aspen Reese, I would've become Damien Gaines if that's what it took to have her father's blessing. Realizing that reminds me of just how toxic she could be for me.
Someone you love and vows to love you back shouldn't need you to change who you are in order for a relationship to succeed, but I know she wouldn't have had to ask. I would’ve been whoever she needed, and I'm not foolish enough to believe that she was attracted to me because I was different from the others who entered her father's home.
I heard the shit some of them said about her, knew what they wanted to do to her, and that only Ivan's threats kept them from following through with it.
I was the one willing to cross the line. I was a challenge, a reward of sorts for her.
"There's a shower here," I spit.
"Excuse me?" she asks as she lifts up the collar of her shirt, giving it a quick sniff.
"You were always in the shower," I say. "We've been here eighteen hours. Aren't you due for one?"
"I was always in the shower because you always got me dirty."
I fucking swear this woman will be the damn death of me.
It doesn't stop her eyes from darting to the only door she hasn't seen opened before, and she's spot on because that's the bathroom. Hell, if she doesn't need to shower then I know she needs to use the restroom, but she hasn't requested it either since arriving.
"You can lock the bathroom door, Aspen. I'm not going to wait until you get naked and go in there or anything."
She still doesn't look convinced that taking a shower is the best idea right now.
"I don't have clothes," she mutters. "It's worse to shower and put on dirty clothes than to stay unshowered."
"Fucking Princess Peach," I mutter, referencing the reason I started calling her Peach in the first place.
She might not have the evil inside of her that her father had, but the woman is fucking spoiled by the fruits of his wickedness.
I stand from the sofa and grab my go-bag, pulling out a thick t-shirt and a pair of thermal sleep pants.
"They'll swallow you up, but they're clean," I tell her as I hand them over to her.
She pulls them from my hand as she stands.
"I'll take a fucking walk, Aspen. You'll be safe. Just lock the door."
I head out the front door of the cabin, regretting the fact that I didn't grab my damn jacket before leaving but knowing I can't go back inside right after telling her she had privacy.
I stand on the porch for a long moment, pulling frosty air into my lungs, enjoying the burn of it. It's ten times better than the scent of her skin that has the ability to drive me insane.
My boots carry me to the tree line, nature calling after thinking about Aspen not having requested the restroom. I lean against a tree and piss, thinking it would be just my luck if a fucking bear came up and attacked me while I was outside with my damn dick in my hand.
I look around as I finish and tuck myself away without incident before continuing deeper into the woods.
Maybe I'll get lucky and fall into a ravine and have to lie there with a broken leg. I can't think of anything less that will keep me from thinking about her stripping her clothes off and climbing into that fucking shower.
And just like that, my mind wanders, and it's like I never left her orbit. After the way she smiled at me that very first time, watching me with her head dipped from under her lashes, she was all I could think about. The job and my mission to take down her father quickly became a side quest, because winning her affection became my main goal. I couldn't eat, sleep, or work without her on my brain, and I think my inability to focus on what was expected of me is what drew Damien's scrutiny in the first place.
I found ways to sneak off just so I could catch the sight of her. Although I didn't count the number of secret smiles she shared with me, I know if I think hard enough, I could pull every single one of them from memory. She swore I was on her mind as much as she was on mine. We were connected even when we were apart, and God, the first time she leaned forward and pressed her lips to mine, I don't think I would've been happier if I had won the lottery.
It was everything. She was my entire world. The Marine Corps, ICE, and the pledges I took when I joined both no longer mattered. She was the center of my universe and my mission became to rescue her, no matter the cost.
Yet it all ended with her silence and my broken heart.
I squeeze my hand into a fist rather than punching a frozen tree, because a trip to the emergency room for a fucking cast would really throw a wrench in things right now.
She compromised who I was right at the center of my soul, and she never had to open her mouth to ask me to do it. I handed my integrity over to her without question. I ignored the things that were going on in the house. I didn't document the drugs, or the guns, or the whispers that Ivan was considering getting into the skin trade. I never reported any of this back to my handler with ICE. I turned a blind eye when other members of our crew just disappeared, and I never thought to question what happened because doing so could mean I wouldn't see her any longer.
After that first quiet night we spent together, with her shaking in my arms because she was scared of what it would mean if she gave me her virginity, I knew she could keep that gift to herself and I'd still be willing to die to protect her.
Lost in memories of the past, I stumble when my boot gets caught on a bare root, making the possibility of my thoughts of ending up in a ravine even more likely.
Even now she fucks with my head and makes me lose sight of the real issues.
Eli is my number one concern, and Aspen is a means to get me into his life. I've already formulated a half-dozen arguments for when she thinks she has the right to tell me to stay away from him.
I swipe at a snow-covered branch to get it out of my way, but all it does is snap back, aggressively hitting me in the face, and that's the tipping point. With snow coating my face and the sting of pine needles on my cheek, I rip and tear at the branch as if it's the root cause of everything that has gone bad in my life.
It doesn't take long to realize I'm fighting a losing battle but the scurry of something deeper in the woods draws my attention. I find myself grateful to have the branch I was just fighting to cling to because my inability to control my temper in this moment has left me winded and exhausted.
I crane my neck, trying to hear, and then the sound of a blood-curdling scream meets my ears. The exhaustion I felt only moments ago disappears.
It feels like I've trekked into the woods a million miles with how long it's taking me to get back to her, praying that she saw a fucking spider or some shit rather than the worst possible thing that could fucking happen.
I realize as I inch closer to the edge of the woods that rather than it being some innocuous bug, the reality is much worse.
I crouch low, pulling the gun from my boot, unsure of how many men have piled out of the SUV that's currently idling in front of the cabin. The front door is kicked in, and they'll be alerted to me with the first shot that I take, but I can't waste another second.
I pull the trigger, and the man standing off to the side of the porch falls. When another steps out onto the porch, I take him down with my second shot, my breath puffing in front of me as I lock my attention on the SUV. If there's anyone in there right now, they aren't making it known.
Aspen screaming for a second time moves me further into action, and I rush toward the front of the cabin, stepping over the second man I shot.
A bullet whizzes past my head, and the only thing keeping me alive is how bad of a fucking shot he was. I shoot the third man, not wasting a second worrying about what could've just happened as I rush toward the bathroom.
I see red the second I step into the bathroom and see a man standing behind a very wet and very naked Aspen. She's trembling, her hand gripping the forearm he has wrapped around her throat.
"You okay, Peach?"
"I've been better," she whispers.
I keep my eyes locked on hers. I don't have to look at this man to kill him.
"He wants you alive," the man mutters. "But I don't think I'll get a chance to play with this sweet piece of ass with you alive."