Chapter 32
Chapter Thirty-Two
Henry
I woke to the scent of her. Faint traces of lavender and powder, like something half-remembered from a dream I didn’t want to leave.
Ariana lay beside me, a single leg slung over me, the sheets barely covering the slope of her hip. Her hair was a tangled halo of gold across the pillow, a few strands brushing my jaw as she breathed soft and slow against my throat.
I still struggled to wrap my mind around the fact that I was sharing a bed with Ariana Kane.
No.
That wasn’t who she was anymore.
That bastard didn’t deserve to have his name attached to her. She was just Ariana now. Just her.
Just… mine .
Yesterday morning, I had a plan. A call to Salvatore to follow up on whether his contacts in Miami had heard anything.
Maybe a new thread to pull on the man who attempted to take her.
At the very least, I thought I’d spend the day watching the fallout from her disappearance unfold.
Watch Victor beg for the safe return of his wife on every major news network that would have him.
I didn’t do any of that.
Instead, I spent the majority of the day in bed with Ariana, memorizing the feel of her skin and every sound she made when she came undone. It was certainly a first for me.
I’d never spent an entire day in bed with someone before. Never relaxed. Never trusted enough to let my guard drop.
But yesterday, with Ariana, I did. It was one of the best days of my life.
Not just because of the sex. Though Christ… The sex. It was good. Better than good. Mind-blowing. Thought-erasing. Body-numbing.
Every time she touched me, it felt like a salve to a wound I didn’t think would ever heal.
Every time I touched her, it felt like a promise.
But that wasn’t what undid me.
It was the connection. The way she looked at me like I was something more than the sum of the blood on my hands. The way she listened. The way she gave herself to me completely.
I didn’t know what to think of it.
I was supposed to hate this woman.
Was supposed to use her to get revenge for what happened to Sarah. The wheels were already in motion. First I’d take his wife. Then I’d dismantle his entire empire.
Yet, that had been the last thing on my mind since the second she kissed me. Since the second I saw the truth staring back at me through her bruises and scars.
My fingers drifted to the curve of her hip, tracing the edge of a scar puckered against soft skin. She stirred slightly, but didn’t fully wake.
“That one was from a wine bottle,” she murmured, her voice husky from sleep. “I was too slow to move out of the way.”
I squeezed my eyes shut, my jaw clenching at what she endured at the hands of her husband, but I pushed it down. If she was willing to talk about them, I was willing to listen.
“What about these?” I asked, brushing a series of identical scars near her ribcage. Evidence of the pain she survived. Of the war she fought when no one was looking.
She inhaled, slow and steady. “Cigarette burns. He tied me down and used me as an ashtray because I mentioned he smelled like smoke. It wasn’t even meant to be critical. But that didn’t matter. He still reminded me of my place. Of his control.”
I didn’t speak. Didn’t trust myself to. I couldn’t let her see how difficult it was getting to refrain from hunting him down and using him as an ashtray, as a knife sharpener, as a dummy for target practice. The only thing that helped was knowing his time would come. I’d make sure of it.
I continued running my fingers along the scars on her flesh, eventually tracing the abomination he carved into her recently.
Because of me. Nothing she said would make me think otherwise.
I didn’t care that he’d simply traced over scar tissue that he never allowed to fully heal.
It was still my fault Ariana was forced to endure that.
“The first time he cut me was after he caught me talking to one of his board members during some art auction,” she explained without me asking.
“I was just trying to be friendly, fit in as the wife of Victor Kane.” I could hear the venom in her voice as she spat out his name.
“I’d seen hints of his anger before. You don’t get to be a successful businessman without making a few enemies.
But I’d never seen him like that.” Her voice trailed off and I pulled her closer, kissing the top of her head.
“The second the door to the house closed and he dismissed our staff for the night, he dragged me to our room. Said I needed a reminder of what I was to him. Then he carved that word into me so I wouldn’t forget.
So no one else would ever want me if I left him.
But he’d never let me leave him. That night, he made that perfectly clear. ”
“Did you ever think about it?”
I wasn’t going to ask why she didn’t leave. I knew why. I witnessed it firsthand myself. For many people trapped in an abusive, manipulative relationship, there was only one way out, and it wasn’t through the front door.
She was quiet for a long while as she shifted onto her back, staring at the ceiling. Outside, snow drifted lazily through the early morning light, a few rays of sun peeking through the heavy blanket of clouds.
“Not really. Not in the way you mean. I may have fantasized about it. About cutting off his dick in his sleep. Watching him bleed for once.”
A dark sound rose in my chest, half laugh, half growl. I kissed the top of her head, inhaling her scent. “You’ll get your chance,” I vowed.
She lifted her eyes to meet mine. “What do you mean?”
“Exactly what I said,” I replied without a hint of hesitation. “He’ll pay for this. An eye for an eye, Ariana. Everything he made you endure, I’ll do the same to him. He doesn’t get to walk away. Not from this.”
I waited for her to push back. Tell me not to do anything rash. But she didn’t.
She just curved back into me and rested her head on my chest. “Thank you.”
I pulled her closer, relishing in the feel of her in my arms as I reflected on everything I’d learned over the past few days. Everything I hadn’t wanted to feel. Everything Ariana had survived. She didn’t realize how truly remarkable that was, not when so many people didn’t survive her situation.
“I killed my father,” I told her before I could stop myself.
Ariana didn’t speak. Just waited for me to continue.
So I did.
“He was military. Did two tours of duty in the Middle East. The second one changed him. He wasn’t the same man who left. He was cold. Calculated. A solider without a war… So he made one.”
Her hand found mine, and she intertwined our fingers, offering me comfort. I never let people in. Not like this. Never shared pieces of myself with anyone else. I was happy leading a solitary existence. It was easier this way.
But spending time with Ariana, getting to know who she was, learning about her demons made me want to share the darkest parts of myself with her. Just like she’d shared the darkest parts of herself with me.
“He moved us from the house in suburbia, where I spent the first six years of my life, to this place.” I waved my hand at our surroundings. “Took my brother and me out of school.”
“Your brother?” she asked softly.
I gave a small nod, my throat tightening. “Spencer. He was two years younger than me.”
She didn’t say anything. Didn’t press for me to embellish. She just held me tighter, easily picking up on what I didn’t say.
“Dad insisted we didn’t need anything except what he taught us — survival, obedience, discipline.” I laughed, bitter and sharp. “So that’s what he did. He taught us how to survive with nothing. I was only eight the first time he tested me.”
“Tested you?” She furrowed her brow. “How?”
“He blindfolded me and dropped me in the middle of the forest during a snowstorm with nothing but the clothes on my back. Told me to find my way home.”
“Henry…” Ariana exhaled, her voice shaking.
“It was the first of many tests he put me through. And when Spencer was older, he did the same to him. Except Spencer wasn’t as strong as me. One day…” I trailed off, my throat tightening as the memory replayed in my mind.
“Yes?” she prodded, albeit cautiously.
“One day, Spencer never came home from one of his ‘tests’.”
Ariana’s hand flew to her mouth. “Oh, god.”
“I tried to talk some sense into my father. Plead with him to let me go help him. But he refused to listen. Said he needed this to become a man. But he was only ten. So I tried to sneak out that night to find him. My dad heard and made sure I couldn’t help him.
And taught me a lesson for disobeying him with his belt. ”
“The scars on your back…” she trailed off, not finishing her question. But she didn’t need to.
“I couldn’t move for over a week after that. By then, Spencer had died from hypothermia.”
She was quiet for a moment before asking, “What about your mother?”
“She’d already checked out by this point. She wasn’t really living. Just existing. Spencer’s death was the final straw for her. I found her body a few days later in the barn. She shot herself.”
Ariana pressed a trembling hand to her lips. “I’m so sorry.”
“After that, I knew I needed to do something so I didn’t end up like her or Spencer.”
“What did you do?”
“The next time we went out hunting, I shot the bastard. Fed his body to the wolves. Then I got in his truck and drove to the nearest town about an hour from here. Went into the gas station and asked the man there for help. He’d heard about the family living up on the mountain and did everything to help me. ”
“How old were you?”
“Twelve.”
She gasped. “You were only twelve?”
“After all the shit my dad put me through, I felt like I was thirty. Maybe older. I had to grow up real fast out here. Which is why I should have done something sooner. Should have stood up to my father before then. If I had, maybe?—”
“Maybe what? What could you have possibly done? You were only a kid.”
“It doesn’t matter, Ariana. I may have been a ‘kid’, but I knew exactly what he was.
Saw how horrible he was to Spencer. Saw how my mother slowly faded away with each day she was forced to live under this roof.
Under his rule. I was the only person who could protect them. Who could save them. And I didn’t.”
“Because he whipped you bloody and raw for even trying.”
I shook my head. “I should have tried harder. But I didn’t. I gave up. Because of that, Spencer froze to death. And my mother took her own life.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“Yes, it is. If I’d just?—”
“Henry…”
Ariana pushed up and crawled on top of me, straddling my waist. She leaned toward me, her hands on either side of my face as her eyes locked on mine, fierce and steady.
“It’s. Not. Your. Fault.”
“Ariana…”
“Say it.”
I tried to look away, but her hands held firm.
“Say it’s not your fault,” she demanded when I remained silent. “I did it for you. It’s your turn.”
I heaved out a sigh and said, “It’s not my fault.”
“Is that the best you can do? Try again, and actually mean it this time.”
“It’s not my fault,” I repeated a bit louder.
“Again.”
I rolled my eyes, but did as she asked, repeating the words again. Then again. And again.
Each time, it got easier. Each time, it felt more like the truth.
Just as it did for Ariana yesterday when I made her do the same thing.
And just like Ariana was so overwhelmed with emotion yesterday that she kissed me, I did the same thing, gripping the back of her neck and pressing my lips to hers. But this kiss felt different than before. It wasn’t desperate or wild. It was tender. Full of quiet ache and impossible softness.
She positioned herself over me, guiding me inside her, inch by incredible inch. I closed my eyes, savoring the stretch, the connection, the way her breath hitched against my mouth.
We moved slowly. Like we had all the time in the world. No tomorrow. No yesterday. Just skin and sighs and the press of sweat-slicked bodies beneath tangled sheets.
I traced every scar. Every mark. Worshipped each one. She gripped my shoulders, moaning softly, her eyes fluttering closed as she rode the edge of something deeper than carnal want.
“Keep them open. I need to know you’re here. That you’re with me.”
She followed my command, keeping her eyes glued to mine as she continued to rock her hips against me.
When she whispered my name, it wasn’t just a sound. It was my salvation.
I cupped her cheeks, her expression twisting as I brought her closer and closer to the edge.
This wasn’t about satisfying a craving or giving into my urges. It never had been. I knew it from the first time our eyes met, even if I didn’t want to admit it.
This woman was mine.
And God help anyone who tried to harm her again.