Chapter 5 #2
"I was eighteen when I joined the military right out of high school," Slash said without turning around. "Angry kid from a shitty neighborhood who thought violence was the answer to everything. Took years of training and discipline to teach me the difference between destruction and protection. Special forces isn’t easy. Not everyone can hack it. I was lucky. I met a man who saw beyond the hurt and challenged me. He knew I could do it. He knew my past wasn’t my future. I worked hard. The lessons I learned weren’t all physical.
I learned about honor, discipline, and leadership.
I learned how to work as a team, think about someone other than myself.
I found out about sheep, wolf dogs and wolves.
I decided I would be a guard dog and threw myself into the lifestyle. "
Nicole approached cautiously, like he was a wounded animal that might bolt. "Slash?—"
"In Afghanistan, I watched my mentor die protecting people who didn't even want our help. I couldn’t get to him. I couldn’t protect him.
I failed him. I watched entire villages get destroyed because I wasn’t fast enough or strong enough to save them.
I cradled the bodies of innocent children that I just couldn’t protect.
” His hands clenched into fists at his sides.
"But I also watched what happened when we pulled out.
When we left people to fend for themselves against enemies they couldn't handle alone. "
"I'm not in Afghanistan," Nicole said softly. “I’m right here. You’re right here. You aren’t too late.”
"No, you're not in Afghanistan." He finally turned to face her, and the raw pain in his eyes made her chest ache. "You're a woman who's been hurt by a man who was supposed to protect you. Who's learned to see control as something that hurts instead of something that helps."
Nicole's throat tightened. "Brock used to say he was protecting me too. That’s what he claimed to be doing. When he wouldn't let me see my friends, when he monitored my phone calls, when he—" She broke off, the memories were too painful to voice. The first time he punched her.
"When he isolated you," Slash finished. "Made you dependent on him. Made you feel like you couldn't survive without his approval."
Nicole nodded, tears pricking at her eyes.
"That's not protection," Slash said firmly. "That's ownership. And if you can't see the difference between what I'm offering and what he did to you..." He shrugged, the gesture somehow devastating in its casualness. "Then maybe you're right. Maybe you are better off handling things alone."
The words hit her like a slap. "You're giving up? Just like that?"
"I'm giving you what you want. Your independence. Your right to make your own mistakes and face the consequences alone. Not protecting you. We will physically protect you and Kayleigh. But if you want me not to pursue you, not to Daddy you–”
"That's not what I want," Nicole interrupted, desperation creeping into her voice. "I don't want to be alone anymore. I don't want to make all the decisions and carry all the weight and lie awake every night wondering if tonight's the night he finds us."
"Then what do you want?" Slash asked, his voice gentling slightly.
Nicole looked out over the vast landscape, searching for words to explain something she barely understood herself. "I want someone I can trust. Someone who protects me because he cares about me, not because he wants to own me."
"And you don't think I'm that man."
It wasn't a question, but Nicole answered anyway. "I don't know. I want you to be, but I'm scared. What if I let you take control and you turn out to be just like him? What if I lose myself again?"
Slash was quiet for a long moment, then stepped closer. Close enough that she had to tilt her head back to meet his eyes.
"You want honesty?" he asked.
Nicole nodded.
"I am controlling. I do expect the people under my protection to follow my rules.
And yeah, when someone I care about is in danger, I get possessive as hell.
" His hand came up to cup her cheek, thumb brushing away a tear she hadn't realized had fallen.
"But I will never, ever hurt you to get my way.
I will never use your feelings for me as a weapon against you.
And I will never make you smaller to make myself bigger. "
"How do I know that?" Nicole whispered.
"You don't," he admitted. "Trust isn't something that can be proven with words. It has to be earned, day by day, choice by choice."
Nicole leaned into his touch despite herself, starved for gentle contact. "And if I can't give you that trust? If I'm too broken, too scared?"
"Then I wait," Slash said simply. "However long it takes."
The simple statement, delivered without drama or ultimatum, broke something open in Nicole's chest. "You'd really wait?"
"Little girl, I'd wait forever if that's what you needed."
There it was again, that endearment that should have offended her but instead made her feel cherished. Protected. Valued in a way she'd forgotten was possible.
"I don't want you to wait forever," she said quietly.
"What do you want? Do you want to continue to be strong all the time, or do you want to let me carry you for a while?"
She had to think about that. What did she want?
This was so fast. She’d only known him for two days.
But, she remembered what the others had said.
Their instalove relationships. She knew Savannah liked him.
There was no denying she was attracted to him, but what did she want?
Him to step back and protect her only physically?
Keep her from being found and killed by Brock? Or more?
If she chose to let him protect all of her. Her heart, her soul, her body… Could she give over all control and at what cost? And for how long? And what happened when Slash inevitably got tired of playing protector to a broken woman and her needy child?
"I don't feel very strong right now." She finally admitted.
"You can be a strong woman and still submit.
Strength isn't about not feeling scared or overwhelmed," he said quietly.
"It's about feeling those things and doing what needs to be done anyway.
You got your daughter away from a dangerous situation.
You reached out for help when you needed it.
You trusted strangers because your sister asked you to. That takes incredible strength."
"Is that really how you see me?"
"I see you as a woman who's been fighting battles alone for too long and would be so much happier if she let someone in," Slash said. "But yeah, strong as hell."
"I don't know how to do this," she whispered.
"Do what?"
"Accept help. Let someone else make decisions about our safety. Trust that you're not going to hurt us or abandon us when things get complicated."
Slash was quiet for a long moment. "I want to find him and let him know exactly how I feel about men who hurt women."
"It started small," she said, not sure why she told him her story . "Comments about my friends being bad influences. Suggestions about how I could dress better, be better. I thought it was sweet that he cared so much about me."
Slash made a sound in his throat that might have been a growl.
"Then it got more specific. He didn't like me working late, didn't think I needed to talk to my sister so often, thought I was spending too much money on things for Kayleigh.
" The words came easier now, like lancing an infected wound.
"By the time I realized what was happening, I was completely isolated.
No friends, no support system except him. And then..."
"Then he made sure you knew what happened when you angered him," Slash finished when she trailed off.
Nicole nodded, not trusting her voice.
"Physical?" he asked, his voice carefully controlled.
"Sometimes. But he was smart about it. Never anywhere that would show, never in front of Kayleigh. And he was always so sorry afterward, so convinced that if I just tried harder, loved him better, he wouldn't have to get upset with me."
"That's not love," Slash said, and there was something dangerous in his voice now. "That's ownership. That's a predator systematically destroying someone's sense of self-worth, so they'll be easier to control."
The clinical way he described it, like he'd seen this pattern before, made Nicole look up. "You sound like you know a lot about this."
"Seen it before," he said simply. "Domestic violence, coercive control—it's universal. Same patterns whether you're in suburban Colorado or rural Afghanistan. I’ve never hit a woman, Nicole. I’ve never raised my hand in anger towards one. I have spanked a few asses in my life. Never out of anger. Never overboard. Never out of anger. If we end up in the type of relationship your sister is in, and you give consent, I will spank you. I will never slap your face. I will never punch you. I’m not like Brock. "
"I don’t think you are like Brock, at all. I think you're a good man," Nicole said carefully. "And I can't be your redemption," she continued. "Just like you can't be my salvation. That's not fair to either of us. Those expectations are massive."
They stared at each other, both of them raw and exposed in ways that made Nicole want to take back every honest word she'd spoken.
"So, what can we be?" Slash asked finally. “I don’t do halfway. I won’t give you an ultimatum. I can be a good friend to you, if that’s what you need. I can protect you and keep you safe until you go home.”
“Or?”
“Or I can be more. I can be your Daddy. You can try it out. See what you think. See if we fit.”
“You aren’t a pair of new jeans,” she joked.
“No. I’m definitely not. But I wouldn’t mind getting into yours.“ He wiggled his eyebrows in the most outlandish way. Nicole couldn’t help but giggle.
“I have been curious about Daddy Dom relationships. Savannah has told me a lot. I’ve read. I’ve gone to the BDSM Club in Denver. But, I’ve never tried one in real life.”
“Think on it, okay. I don’t need an answer now. I would like to kiss you. Would that be okay? Can I kiss you, Nicole?”
“You’re asking me?”
“I’m big on consent. When you are mine? I’ll kiss you as often as I want.”
“You didn’t say if.”
“What?”
“If I’m yours. You said when.”
He stepped closer. “Damnit Nicole. Can I kiss you?”
Nicole's affirmation died in her throat, the sound folded away by the sudden closeness between them. So close that she could see his five o’clock shadow.
Her fears felt ridiculous and small when measured against the thump-thump of her own heart.
She had meant to be sensible. She had meant to be fair. Instead, she surrendered.
His hand found the small of her back first, anchoring, grounding.
The other cupped her face as if he were memorizing it.
His thumb brushed the edge of her cheekbone, fingers tangling in the hair at the nape of her neck.
A current ran up through Nicole’s body, electric and warm.
He smelled like oil and cedar and something crisp and clean, aftershave, perhaps.
It was shockingly domestic and entirely dangerous.
When his mouth touched hers, it was both question and answer, a punctuation that unraveled the last of her defenses.
The kiss deepened slowly and deliberately, an exploration with intention.
Her hands rose without thinking, one finding the broadness of his shoulder, the other sliding up to rest against his chest where she felt the steady thrum of him beneath fabric.
He responded as if he had been waiting for this exact moment with pressing, meeting, giving and then claiming and aggressive.
Time distorted. Minutes stretched. The world narrowed to the press of lips, the heat of their lips, the press of his palm at the base of her neck as if to keep her safely there.
Nicole let herself be pulled under. There was no script here, no promises beyond the present, and that was the point: consent, choice, the fierce clean certainty of now.
Her thoughts slid away until there was only the language of mouths and hands and the simple, furious joy of being wanted and choosing to be wanted back.
When Slash finally eased away, neither of them broke the contact entirely. Nicole could still feel the imprint of his lips along hers. She realized with a small, honest thrill that for the first time in a long time she was willing to consider what “or” might become.