Chapter 20
“Niamh,” She writhes in my arms, jostling my body and my ribs. Pain is a throb that matches the frantic beats of my heart, but I don’t care about that right now. I’ll deal with whatever damage happens once I have her calmed down. “Sweetheart, it’s me!”
But it’s like she doesn’t hear me, her nails claw into my arms and chest in her attempt to escape.
She’d been gone longer than usual, and when twenty minutes turned to thirty and then forty, a sense of dread had spurred me on.
My brothers had followed quickly after, but they’re both somewhere else in these woods.
We’d split up to look for her with the plan to meet at the falls, but Niamh found me first.
What had scared her so much that she was sprinting through the forest in just her bikini and a towel? She doesn’t even have her usual swim bag with her. Her skin is pale, eyes wide and full of terror.
“Niamh, baby,” I tighten my arms even further, her body pinned to the ground beneath mine, “Look at me. Look at me.”
Her body freezes, goes completely still as she finally brings her eyes to my face and she sees me. “Roman?” There’s a raw scrape in her voice.
“It’s me, sweetheart. It’s me.”
She swallows thickly, her breathing still too quick, chest heaving. Water still clings to her, there’s a pool of it in the dip between her clavicles, and caught at her lashes or maybe those are tears.
“Was it you?” She croaks.
“Was what me?”
“In the woods, someone was watching me.” She rushes out her words, “They were at the falls and then —”
“Did you see them?” I demand, “What did they look like?”
Shit. I should have known something like this was going to happen. The quiet around here doesn’t stay quiet for long. It’s always something. The past always has a way of catching up with us, unfinished business, vendettas and revenge. The ring on Niamh’s finger is a target.
“It wasn’t you?” Her eyes are glazed, more tears pooling along her lower lash line. Her plump bottom lip trembles as she searches for her answer on my face, throat working to swallow.
“It wasn’t me,” I assure her, grunting in pain when she moves beneath me. I’d forgotten for a moment about my ribs and bruising, my narrow-minded focus on her and her alone. The pain meds are good, but not that good.
“Oh, God!” She cries, “Your ribs!”
“I’m okay.” But she’s shaking her head, disbelief and horror replacing the fear on her face.
“I ran right into you!” She gasps, “Roman, you have broken ribs!”
“I don’t care!” I snap out, “I don’t care, I only care about you right now. Are you hurt?”
“Me!?” She scoffs, “Are you insane!?”
“Maybe.”
“I’m fine!” She hisses back, “We need to get you up. Can you stand?”
“I broke a rib, not a leg.” I release a breath and finally loosen my arms, pushing up with the palms of my hands so I can settle onto my knees.
The burn in my chest and back has my breath coming in short bursts, my vision going foggy at the edges as I work myself through the wave of pain.
It doesn’t feel like I’ve done anymore damage; it’s still just that steady ache that’s been present since I came off Pippin.
“Roman,” Niamh gets to her knees in front of me, “Why did you do that?” Her hands are on my face, and then my neck, touching, assessing until they come to a stop on my side with the broken ribs. It’s a butterfly touch, a whisper of her hand as she runs her fingers over the hurt.
“You were scared,” I grit out like that solves everything.
Truthfully it does, I’d throw myself into the fire if it meant I didn’t have to see that look of terror in her eyes ever again.
She is meant to be safe here, I am meant to keep her safe.
Her thumb moves in circles over the fabric of my shirt, a soothing touch to ease.
Lifting a hand, I cup the side of her face, needing to feel to know she is okay.
I can’t see any obvious injuries on her, just remnants of her fear and pale skin.
A breath stutters from her lips, shaky, but her shoulders loosen, and she subtly leans into my palm, eyes closing for a fraction of a second as if allowing herself a moment to ground herself.
I want to drag her to me, pull her in and wrap her against my body.
“Sweetheart,” I rasp, my thumb trailing to her bottom lip, running along it, the pillowy softness searing the pad and reminding me what it felt like to be kissed by her.
“Let’s get back,” She suggests, gently pulling back, “I’ll help you.”
I dip my chin in agreement and allow her to help me to my feet.
She puts my arm over her shoulders and holds on, but I keep my weight off. She’s so much smaller than I am, she won’t be able to get us both back. With her this close, that wildflower scent of hers wraps around me, mixing with the warmth and softness of her body.
It takes longer than usual to make it to the ranch, but once inside, she leads us through to the living room before she helps me lower onto the couch and then spins, reaching for the meds I left on the table.
“How many do you take?” She demands, picking up the different bottles to read each of the labels.
“I can’t take them yet.” I lean back, studying her, the way the ends of her hair curl now they’re wet, how her muscles flex as she moves. Looking at her is far better than focusing on the pain throbbing through every inch of my body.
I’d do it again.
Catch her again.
Despite the agony.
“What do you mean you can’t take them yet!?” She pins me with her icy stare.
“I can have them every four hours. I took them two hours ago.”
“Ice!” She blurts, “I’ll get you ice.”
She doesn’t give me a chance to respond as she dashes into the kitchen and rummages around in the freezer, pulling handfuls of ice cubes out to bundle into a towel.
“Where does it hurt?” She lowers next to me and waits for me to show her. With a sigh, I lean forward and gesture to the ribs just below my shoulder blade. Tenderly, she places the ice there and holds it. “It’ll take a minute.”
The ticking clock fills the silence between us.
“We need to call the sheriff’s office,” I finally speak.
“What for?”
“Someone chased you through the woods, Niamh.”
“Someone tried to run you over,” She deadpans.
“Who told you that?”
“Silas.” She moves the ice to get a better position, but it is helping a little, the cold taking away the edge of pain.
“That son of a bitch.” I knew he’d mentioned something but didn’t realize he’d told her everything.
“Why is that a problem?” She asks, “Should I not know?”
“I don’t want to scare you,” I admit.
“Do you think it’s the same person?” She pushes.
Yes.
How do I tell her? How do I explain to her what happened all those years ago? Everyone in this town heard about the accident; it was splashed across every newspaper and on every local news station.
Beloved mother and ranch owner dead in horror crash.
A tragedy, they claimed, a horrible, horrible accident.
Everyone here on this ranch, though? We know better.
“Roman?” She leans around me so she can meet my eyes.
I can’t meet them, if I do, I’ll have to admit I come from a monster.
My father hasn’t been a part of our lives for a very long time, but he was there throughout my younger years.
He raised us before our grandfather took over; we witnessed his anger and his violence, was subjected to it time and time again.
But that man was smart, he had people on his side, false alibis.
When he hurt us, he made sure it wouldn’t leave a mark or was in places people couldn’t see, and if we talked? Our mother would take the fall.
He had us under his thumb.
He wanted more; he always wanted more. His greed drove him, his need for control and power and money. I’m not even entirely sure what my mother saw in him in the first place. He never hid that he was a monster — or maybe he did until my mother had no choice but to stay. Three boys, a ranch to run…
Ultimately, it got her killed.
There was no accident, but we could never prove it.
My father had pestered my mother for years to sign Knight Falls Ranch over to him.
It had been our grandfather’s, but he’d handed it down once she got to age, and she had been running it successfully for years before she met our father, with Pops helping in the background.
They married, had me and my brothers, but then he started. Kept saying how it wasn’t right that she was the one in control, how it was her name on the letters and on the deeds. How it was her money.
I remember vividly how angry he would get when she said no. It went on for years and eventually he wore her down, forced her to take out a will, just in case. But my mom was the smartest woman I knew. She lied.
She told him he would be sole beneficiary should the worst happen; that seemed to appease him for some time.
We all believed it too. My grandfather was pissed to the point that they didn’t talk for at least a year after she had signed those papers. We didn’t know she had lied or faked it.
My father settled in the years that followed after that. Little did we know he was just waiting.
It happened on a quiet mountain pass road.
There was ice, but we’re all experienced here when it comes to winter driving, and she was driving alone.
We didn’t find out about the crash until the morning.
According to reports, she hit a patch of ice, and her car careened off the side of the road and down a steep incline, only coming to a stop when it crashed into a tree at fifty miles an hour. They say she died on impact.
At first, we believed the reports until it came to her last will and testament, and her lie was revealed.
She never left the ranch to my father.
She made sure it would go back to her own dad, regardless of his age. She knew.
My father had exploded; he destroyed half the house in his rage.
“That fucking bitch.” He’d yelled. “All that and for nothing! She left me nothing!” He’d gone after my grandfather, demanded he hand it over to him, but of course that didn’t work.
“You think I can’t get to you too, old man?”
I’d been standing on the other side of the door when he’d said those words, words that had chilled me straight to the bone. Anger and violence had never been my go-to. I didn’t fight unless I had to. I didn’t resort to violence, but I saw red in that moment. I had no control over it.
“Get to you just like I got to her. This place is mine.”
The door had slammed so hard into the back wall from the force of me ramming through it that several framed pictures mounted had fallen and shattered.
In the next moment, a simple blink of an eye, I had my father pinned to the wall by his throat.
His eyes bulged out of his head as his hands wrapped around my wrists to get me off, but I was fueled by more than just anger.
It was revenge. Pent-up frustration of what we all had to suffer from him.
“Roman,” My grandfather had attempted to pull me off, but he couldn’t. I wanted to hurt this man like he’d hurt us for years, like he’d hurt her.
“You killed her,” I’d growled, grief as strong as the anger wrapping around my heart.
My grip loosened, and my father was able to rip free of my hold while my grandfather pulled me back and held on tight.
He straightened his clothes and wiped a hand over his mouth before he smiled right at me.
There was nothing but cold calculation and cruelty staring back at me.
“Prove it,” He smirked. “This place is going to be mine, boy.”
No amount of money could get the investigation reopened for my mother’s death; no one believed the story, not when my father put on a fucking good show of grieving her.
He tried fighting the will to get the ranch, but it was solid and there was nothing he could do. I should have known it wouldn’t be that simple, that even now when her body is nothing but bones in the ground, he’d never stop. And I’ve just made it easy for him to get to me.
When he married the widow from the ranch across the street, I thought it was his way of getting what he wanted. It was a ranch, sure not nearly as lucrative, but she gave it to him like he always wanted. Part of me knew it was to stay close, to always be able to watch.
He hasn’t been able to reach me or my brothers, not without getting caught. We have always been prepared, but Niamh…
Fuck.
I should never have pulled her into this. I should have let Silas take the ranch, we could have figured something out when it came to the day-to-day running of this place. Worked out a better plan, a way around the clause.
“Hey,” Niamh’s voice brings me back to the present.
She’s since moved away from the side of me and is crouching on the floor between my parted knees.
Concern has her arched brows pulled low, eyes flicking between mine.
I don’t know how long she has been there or how long I was locked in those memories.
Fuck, she’s so pretty.
Not in a delicate way either but like a storm that rolls down off the mountains, or the sharp thorns on a rose bush.
I didn’t want her; I didn’t want this, and I certainly shouldn’t still knowing what I do.
But I’ve been given a single taste, a small tease, so how am I meant to stop wanting more?