Chapter 17
Chapter Seventeen
Ariana
The clock in the living room didn’t just tick.
It echoed.
Each sound ricocheted off the high ceilings of Henry’s house, bouncing down the marble hallway and settling deep into my bones. The French doors were cracked open, letting in the ocean breeze and the distant roar of the waves rolling in and out with the tide.
It was almost daybreak. In less than an hour, the sun would start to rise over the horizon.
And Henry still wasn’t home.
Blake offered to stay with me when I made it clear I had no intention of going to sleep.
But I could tell he wasn’t all that comfortable on the couch, so I sent him to the pool house to take some painkillers and get some rest, leaving me alone to worry about whether I’d ever see Henry again.
I understood his need for answers. Hell, I even respected it.
I may not have known Henry long, but there was one thing of which I was certain.
He would burn down the world for the people he loved.
But now, as I sat alone in his living room, staring at the darkened foyer, I was torn between being worried and just outright angry.
It wasn’t the fact that he chose to put his life in danger that upset me.
It was that he kept me in the dark after promising he wouldn’t.
The sound of an engine cut through the ocean waves crashing in the distance, and my heart leapt in my chest. But I refused to get my hopes up.
I’d lost count of how many times I’d heard what I thought was a car, only for it to be something else. A boat on the water. A distant rumble of thunder. The low hum of wind blowing through the palms.
Then I heard a faint beeping, like someone entering their code into the keypad.
I shot to my feet, my pulse increasing with every step I took toward the foyer.
Finally, the door opened and Henry slipped inside.
But it wasn’t the same Henry he was when he kissed me goodbye this morning.
His button-down shirt was stained with blood, the dark red stark against the white material.
His right eye was nearly swollen shut, blooming purple and blue across his cheekbone.
The scar I’d stitched up mere weeks ago had split open, a thin line of red streaking down his temple with even more dried blood staining his mouth and jaw.
He didn’t notice me at first. Just stumbled through the foyer in the direction of the wet bar in the living room. I watched as he grabbed the bottle of scotch and drank straight from it, swaying on his unsteady legs as he swallowed gulp after gulp.
“Care to tell me where you’ve been?” I asked once he set the bottle back on the surface.
He whirled around, the sudden movement making him lose his balance, and he slammed into the wet bar.
I rushed toward him and slipped an arm around his waist to help steady him. His body heat seeped into me, momentarily soothing my anger and frustration.
“You need to sit.” I guided him toward the couch, and he collapsed onto it with a harsh grunt.
“You’re so good to me,” he slurred. “I don’t deserve you.”
“You’re right. You don’t.”
His mouth twitched on one side. “You’re mad at me. Aren’t you?”
I parted my lips, so many thoughts on the tip of my tongue.
How I’d paced this room until I’d worn a path in the rug.
How I’d imagined turning on the news to learn his body was found in a shipping container at the port.
How I’d spent hours struggling to breathe through the helplessness that clawed at me.
But he was barely conscious.
If I told him everything right now, he wouldn’t remember.
I needed him to remember how his rash decision affected me.
“I’ll get the first-aid kit,” I announced, ignoring his question.
Spinning on my heels, I headed toward the bathroom and retrieved a small kit, along with a few towels and washcloths. Then I slipped into the kitchen and filled a bowl with warm water.
When I returned, he was no longer upright but lying on the couch, an arm over his eyes.
“You need to sit up so I can look at you.”
He groaned, but started to push himself up anyway. As he did, he winced in pain.
“Where does it hurt?” I asked, worried he had some hidden injuries.
He blew out a laugh. “I think the better question might be where it doesn’t hurt.”
“Maybe I should take you to the hospital.”
“No.” He shook his head. “No hospitals. You wouldn’t be able to come with me. And I don’t want to be away from you.”
My heart warmed, and I had to remind myself I was supposed to be mad at him.
“You are such a stubborn ass,” I muttered under my breath, reaching for his shirt and hastily unbuttoning it.
“You that hungry for me, baby?” A lazy grin tugged on his mouth, which ended up being a lopsided smile because of how swollen it was.
“Right now, I’m definitely not hungry for you,” I shot back sternly. “But seeing as how you felt the need to put yourself in a life-threatening situation, I need to check you for other injuries.”
The fabric peeled away from his skin with a faint stickiness from where the blood had dried. But that wasn’t what left me momentarily speechless. His torso was now an abstract canvas of bruises — dark purple and sickening yellows spreading across his ribs and abdomen.
“Henry…”
“It’s fine,” he assured me. “I’ve dealt with worse.”
I gaped at his bruises, tears welling in my eyes as I thought about what he must have endured to come home looking like he did, fear mixing with worry and pure anger.
“You are such a goddamn idiot.” I poured some hydrogen peroxide onto a cloth and pressed it against the open wound on his forehead.
He grimaced, sucking in a sharp breath.
“You’ve got quite the bedside manner there, Nurse Ratched.”
“If you wanted to be handled with kid gloves, maybe you shouldn’t have gone to see the fucking Bratva,” I snipped out, pouring more alcohol onto a fresh cloth and pressing it to the open cut on his bottom lip “You should be happy you’re injured. Otherwise, I may have just killed you myself.”
“That’s it, baby. I love it when you talk dirty to me.”
I threw down the rag and forced an eyelid open, checking his pupil. Based on the size and his overall demeanor, I’d guess he had a mild concussion.
Without another word, I stood and headed to the bathroom, grabbing the small waste bin before returning to Henry and shoving it into his hands. “In case you need to throw up.”
He studied me through his barely opened eyelids. “You’re mad at me, aren’t you?” he asked again.
“I’m not mad,” I responded, although I wasn’t sure how true that was. I was so much more than mad. Angry. Livid. Irate. “I’m more…disappointed.”
He groaned, resting his head against the back of the couch. “That’s worse than you being mad. Can’t you just yell at me? Tell me I’m an inconsiderate prick.”
“I’m not going to yell at you, Henry. But what you did tonight?” I fought back my tears. “It was stupid. And what made it worse is that you didn’t tell me. I had to find out from Blake.”
“I didn’t want you to worry.”
“But I did worry, Henry. Plus, that’s no excuse for keeping me in the dark.
I just spent the past ten years of my life married to a man who dictated what I was allowed to know and not know.
” My voice trembled despite my best efforts to temper my emotions.
“What I was allowed to feel. What I was allowed to think. And tonight… Well, it made me feel all that again.”
“I was just trying to protect you.”
“How did that work out for you?” I gestured to his bruise-riddled body.
“You’re safe. That’s the important thing.”
“But you weren’t, Henry. You weren’t safe. Do you want to know what I did over the past few hours? I imagined your body floating in Biscayne Bay. Or dismembered in some shipping container. Or being ripped apart by fucking alligators.”
My voice echoed against the rafters.
So much for saving this conversation for another day.
“I… I’m sorry,” Henry said, his voice cutting through the silence. “I guess… I’m not used to having people worry about me.”
“Well, get used to it. Because I do worry about you,” I retorted. “And tonight?”
My throat tightened as the hours I spent overwhelmed me all at once. The ticking clock. The dark house. The way every passing car made my heart stop.
“I don’t ever want to feel that again,” I managed to squeak out.
He reached for me and brushed his knuckles against my cheek. I didn’t care that they were bruised and bloodied. They were rough and warm and everything I worried I’d never feel again.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t think it would—”
“You can stop there,” I interjected, but I didn’t pull away from his touch. I couldn’t. Not after spending hours convinced I’d never see him again. “You didn’t think.”
He pushed out a long sigh as he dropped his hold on me, his eyes fluttering closed.
“It was the only option if I wanted to know if what Victor said is true. If Sarah might still be alive.”
I wet one of the washcloths and brought it up to his face, cleaning away some of the dried blood on his face. “Was he telling the truth?”
He opened his eyes, briefly meeting my gaze. “It appears so.”
I had a feeling he was, but hearing the confirmation hit me with a strange combination of relief and fear.
“Do you know where she is?”
“No. According to Mikhail, their role was only in acquisition and transportation. Victor would give them information about the girl. The Bratva was responsible for acquiring and delivering to him. But he sold some of them and the Bratva would transport to Victor’s buyer.”
I arched a brow. “Who?”
He released a frustrated breath. “Only Victor knows. He’s the one who handled all the communication.”
My shoulders fell. “And I killed him.”
“Hey.” He straightened, clutching my face and forcing my eyes to meet his.
“You did what you had to. If you didn’t kill Victor, he could have killed you.
And the idea of not having you in my life?
” His Adam’s apple bobbed up and down in a hard swallow, his voice wavering. “I can’t stomach it, Ariana.”
“But now you’re back to square one again.”
“Not necessarily,” he replied, sinking back into the couch once more, obviously unable to sit up for longer than a few seconds at a time.
“What makes you say that?” I grabbed a bandage and leaned closer, securing it over his eyebrow. Luckily, none of his scars were deep enough to require stitches. But he’d definitely have some bruises to show for the night he spent with the Bratva.
“I now know about Victor’s connection with the Bratva. Know more about how his operation worked. Know Victor sold Sarah to this buyer. And sold you, too.”
I swallowed hard, a chill trickling down my spine at just how evil my husband was.
At just how close I’d come to losing what little I’d managed to hold on to.
“Why?” I asked. “It doesn’t make sense. I was essentially a prisoner in his house. Why risk the added scrutiny?”
“I have no idea.”
“And this guy… Victor’s buyer. Do you think he’s still hoping to…purchase me?”
“I don’t know. But I swear to you, Ariana…” His voice was low and deadly, even through the fog of his concussion. “I won’t let anything happen to you. I’m going to find this guy. And I’m going to make him regret the day he was ever born. For you. For Sarah. And for any other woman Victor sold him.”
I settled back on my heels, pushing a few tendrils of his hair off his battered and bruised face. “Just promise me one thing.”
“Anything.” He attempted to peer at me through heavy eyelids.
“No more secret meetings with the Pakhan. If you’re going to do something completely reckless, you tell me. Don’t keep things from me because you’re trying to protect me or don’t want me to worry about you. I’ll always worry about you. That’s what people who love each other do.”
He sighed, a lazy smile tugging on his lips. “Say it again.”
I kneeled taller, inching my mouth toward his. “I love you. Even though you really pissed me off tonight.”
“Hold on to that,” he said sleepily.
“To what?”
“That anger.”
“Why?”
“Because once the world stops spinning, we’re totally having angry sex.”
“Angry sex?”
He nodded. “Definitely. I don’t want to miss out on the opportunity for a hot and heavy hate fuck.”
I laughed despite myself.
One thing was certain. It was impossible to stay angry at this man. Even though he frustrated me to no end, I still couldn’t help but feel this overwhelming warmth fill me from the inside out.
I leaned closer, brushing my lips against his. “I have a feeling you’ll find other ways to piss me off in the future.”
“You’re probably right about that.”
I pulled a blanket over him before settling back onto the floor.
The sounds of the ocean breeze rolled in and out through the French doors.
The clock kept ticking.
But for the first time all night, I could finally breathe.