The Villain (The Vigilantes #3)

Chapter 4

Chapter Four

Dare

Darius—I miss you. I miss Mom. I wish I could tell you I was settled, but I haven’t even really unpacked. I’m sure my roommate thinks I’m either a vampire or just plain crazy since I spend every spare minute in the art lab and come back covered in paint. I wish I could tell you I was excited, but all I can think is that I shouldn’t have left Mom. Not that she would’ve let me stay, but she’s not doing well, and…I wish you were here. I wish we were eating grilled cheese and finger painting and I wish I could hear you tell me one more time that it’s all going to be okay.—Always, At hena

Nice to meet you.

Athena had no idea who I was. I almost couldn’t wrap my head around it, but it had been almost two decades. A lifetime, really, considering everything I’ve been through since then.

Even if she could see me, I no longer looked like the eighteen-year-old boy who’d kissed her one last time on that very lawn. Injury and trauma made it so my voice no longer sounded like that boy either—the boy who’d promised we’d be together in the end. For all our sakes, it was better she didn’t recognize me because anything she recognized would be nothing more than a fossil of someone I used to be. Someone I no longer was.

“She needs rest, Dare. I’m serious. Don’t push her too hard,” Rorik said as soon as the elevator doors shut.

The Sherwood Garage compound had two personas: what was seen and what was unseen.

What was seen—what was public—was the motorcycle garage where we took on all kinds of high-end projects. It was the massive garage bay, expensive and rare motorcycles stationed throughout the pristine floors in preparation for various work. It was the club room with its TV, bar, and pool table. Ty’s office filled with computers and monitors, and last, the kitchen.

What was unseen was everything hidden beyond the garage space in the woods—the connected cabins tucked into the thick forest where we lived. There were six of them. One for each of us, plus an additional guest cabin for any friends in need of shelter.

That sixth one was where Athena should be right now. Instead, I’d set her up in mine. Another indication I should let Rorik check out my head for injury or temporary insanity .

“That was exactly what I told her.” I huffed and punched the button for the main level.

This elevator was what connected the seen and unseen, descending from the back of the garage to an underground tunnel that branched out to the individual cabins.

“I know.” His stare didn’t flinch.

“Don’t look at me like that.”

“I’m not looking at you.” But he saw me, and that was the fucking problem.

Rorik saw the way I looked at her. He saw the way I went to her, the way I held her hand, and the way I promised I would fix this. I was only doing the right thing, I wanted to argue, but he wouldn’t be blindedby the symptoms of duty, not when he saw the disease underneath. The disease of guilt and the disease of desire.

The guilt I could take, but the desire…my jaw locked tighter. I’d get over it—I had to. My desire was what had cost Ryan his life—what had almost cost all of us our lives. There was a reason I’d sworn off women since his death; I wasn’t going to let myself make that same mistake again.

“You didn’t tell her who you were.”

“No, I didn’t.” I held my breath, releasing it a second later when the elevator door opened. I managed a mumbled thanks and a promise to update him on Athena’s condition tomorrow before stalking away from him and toward Ty’s office.

I already had to answer to my brother, I didn’t have the energy to answer to Rorik, too.

I opened the door to the smaller room, prepared to find Harm and Ty inside working. Instead, I came face to face with my adopted sister.

“What are you doing here?”

Robyn DuBois was the fifth and final member of our motorcycle club. She hadn’t been Special Forces, and she wasn’t exactly a big fan of motorcycles, but there were none of us who fought for justice—who fought for the weak and wounded and betrayed—like she did. The work we did was dangerous, but the way Rob hunted criminals bordered on reckless.

“Good to see you, too, Dare.” Rob smiled and rose from her chair to greet me.

Clothed in all black, her swash of bright red hair cut through the darkness like fiery vengeance through the shadows. Sometimes, that rich red was the only thing that gave away the true depths of the fury at what had been done to her parents—to her.

“I heard you got a letter,” she said as she hugged me.

So that was why— Remington .

Lately, the notorious traitor had involved himself in our club’s business, targeting some of the criminals we were after. It was strange—like we were missing some bigger picture. But Rob seemed to be the most unsettled by it. Sure, he was a criminal—the kind we hunted who’d escaped justice for far too long—but for Rob, it felt like more than that. And there were times, like now, where it felt like the two of them were planets in the same orbit, rotating around the same sun, but in a path of collision.

“What else did you hear?”

“The letter brought you to a ghost.”

I frowned. “Yeah. Something like that.” I banded my arms over my chest and looked at Harm before settling my gaze on Ty.“Where’s Rhys?”

“He left with Merritt for the day.”

It was a small miracle that I wouldn’t have to endure Rhys’s probing stare, too, when he learned the truth.

“How’s Athena?” Rob probed, hoisting herself back onto the table where she’d been sitting.

I glanced at my brother, his heavy look warning me that harder questions were coming.

“Blind. Confused. Afraid.” All the things she should be. “She doesn’t remember anything about the explosion—doesn’t even remember being at her house.”

“And she doesn’t remember you?”

Here we go.

“No, but it’s been a long time, and she can’t see me.”

“But when you talk to her…”

“If a voice was that identifiable, The Masked Singer wouldn’t be a damn show,” I ground out. “Can we move on?—”

“Are you going to tell her?”

Dammit . Guess not . “No.”

“Dare—”

“Is it relevant to her safety? To our duty? To anything? ” I ground out, the frustration and anger of the last twenty-four hours draining into my voice. I hadn’t done anything—ate, slept, moved— because I wanted to be there when she woke up. As though it mattered. For some reason, it mattered to me. “Unless you can prove that telling her who I am will make her safer, this discussion is over.” My fist balled against my side, and I looked to Ty, hoping I could count on him for a rational discussion. “Did you get the security feeds? Any update on the bomb or who planted it?”

“I went back yesterday to return the truck you borrowed, and local PD was at the scene with Hadrian,” Harm began and stepped forward, extending his hand with my motorcycle keys, which I quickly took.

“Good.” The band around my chest loosened a little.

Hadrian Mills was an explosives expert and was currently employed by Armorous Tactical, a large, elite private security company just outside San Francisco.

“He said, based on his initial sweep of the scene, it looks like it was an amateur bomb. Something about the pattern and radius of the blast,” Harm continued. “He also said he’s pretty confident the bomb was remote detonated, but he won’t know for certain until he examines all of the debris and will call with an update when he does.”

“Doesn’t make sense,” I said gruffly and dragged my hand along my jaw until I found the ridge of my scar. “Why not trigger the bomb when she was back in the car?”

“Maybe killing her wasn’t the bomber’s intent,” Ty suggested.

“Or there was a timer,” Rob said.

“Hadrian thinks it was a remote?—”

“A remote that triggered a timer,” she interrupted and shot me a glare that warned me to let her finish. “Think about it. Amateur bomb with a remote detonator?” She shook her head. “The transmission radius was probably small—forty? Fifty feet?—from the trigger to the bomb. If he couldn’t trigger the bomb from farther away, the only other way to compensate and give himself time to get away before the blast would be to have it activate a timer.”

“So, Athena exits her house and heads for the car. The bomber starts the timer, thinking she’s getting right into her car and giving himself time to get away…”

“But then you stop her,” Harm finished. “Even if the bomber could disarm it, he would be too far away at that point, possibly to even realize his plan was going awry.”

I grunted. It was a solid theory, but I wouldn’t be satisfied with anything less than certainty. “What about the footage?”

Ty answered this time. “Doorbell cam from across the street only saves the last forty-eight hours, and the footage is pretty limited. There’s a good shot of Athena’s car, so I can tell you no one planted the bomb while she was at home, so either it was planted before that window or?— ”

“It was planted somewhere else,” I finished, tracing my scar again until I caught Rob staring, and I quickly lowered my hand.

“There are a few other cars in the footage I can track down, but the camera is still blind to a good portion of the street,” he said and then winced at his word choice. “Sorry.”

“Yeah,” I said, staring at the video feed of the house on the screen. The wreckage of the car had been removed, but there was a giant stain of soot on the asphalt and a radiating spray of ash on the lawn. Except where Athena had been. There, the grass was still green and bright.

She’d always left everything around her brighter and for the better—except me.

“What are you thinking?” Rob asked, capturing my attention.

I tensed and told her what I should’ve been thinking about. “That this all has to do with Ivans.”

“Interesting.” Her face completely masked her thoughts, which only made my suspicions about them run rampant for a second.

“Not interesting. Logical.” I met her stare. “What other reason would someone have to target her? For what gain? Ivans is the only thing that makes sense.” Though her relationship with him still didn’t.

“If someone wanted to blow Ivans up, then why not put the bomb on his car?”

“Maybe they couldn’t find or get access to his car. Maybe whoever did this only wanted to send a warning—” I broke my stare from Rob’s and swallowed down a curse. Shit. I shouldn’t be arguing about this. I should fucking know better. I quickly pivoted to Ty. “Unless you found out something about her that I don’t know? That would put her in danger?”

I’d been with Rorik, scrutinizing everything he did, every breath Athena took, until she’d woken up. I was sure by now that Ty had done at least a cursory background check on my high school girlfriend, and sure he found years—a lifetime—of things I didn’t know about her.

His eyes briefly flicked to Harm, and my fist tightened. Jesus Christ, I didn’t need to be protected from Athena’s past. Sensing my sentiment, Harm nodded, and Ty shaded in the last two decades of her life with bold strokes.

“She graduated with a fine arts degree. Got married to a Brandon Martins and moved to Sacramento.”

Married . The air whooshed from my chest, and I swayed back. She’d gotten married. The idea was like a second detonation, but this one was contained inside me. Of course, she had. What the hell else did I expect from her? From the world? Athena Holman was a gold mine. Brains. Beauty. Beneficence. Any man who let her go would be the biggest fool.

“Not too much of note there until she filed for divorce a year ago. Took about six months and looks like it was pretty bitter. Brandon ended up with everything,” he continued, and I fought to maintain my composure.

Bitter? And he’d taken everything? I didn’t know who this guy was or what happened, but I already hated him. Nothing about Athena would ever be bitter, and knowing her, she wouldn’t have fought for anything; she would’ve given it all up to make the other person happy because that’s what she always did— put everyone else’s happiness before her own.

“Utility bills started being paid at her current address six months ago.”

“Her mom’s house,” I said low.

After a second and a few clicks of his mouse, he nodded. “Yeah. She inherited it…eighteen years ago.”

“What is she doing here?”

“Part-time work at museums…” He trailed off, scrolling ov er the screen. “Looks like she’s starting to show and sell her artwork. She has a local gallery show coming up in about a month.”

“But nothing to indicate a connection to Ivans or GrowTech?” My pulse thudded heavily.

“Nothing except that photo, but I’ll keep looking. Her artist gig is pretty freelance, so it’s hard to track down where she’s been and when. If we knew Ivans’s new alias…”

“We have to ask her, it’s the fastest way,” Rob chimed in.

A surge of protectiveness whipped through me. “No.” I glared at her. “She needs to rest. Doctor’s orders.”

“Enough.” Harm broke in. “Until we have more information, all options are on the table. We’ll see what Hadrian has to say about the bomb, check on video footage in the development and traffic cams leaving the development. In the meantime…” He trailed off and looked at me.

“Rorik said she needs to rest.”

“I understand, but right now, she’s our best shot—our only lead. All we need is his name,” my brother countered firmly.

“I’ll sit and talk with her,” Rob offered, sliding off the table and looking between us. “Might be easier for her to open up to me anyway. Not being able to see…I’m sure she’s feeling very vulnerable right now.”

I swallowed my gut reaction to protest. I knew Rob would be gentle—careful—with Athena; one of my sister’s many projects in San Francisco was sheltering women—victims of violent men in power—and then bringing their abusers to justice. I didn’t doubt her compassion—it was as boundless as her vengeance. The problem was I wanted to know the answers, too.

“Fine, but I’m coming with you.”

“Dare—”

“She just woke up to the news that she’s blind because her car fucking exploded. I don’t think random new people confronting her is fucking ideal,” I ground out.I also wanted to know what Athena’s relationship with Ivans was—how far her involvement with him went—and I wanted to knowfor all the wrong reasons.

Rob’s brow lifted, and I should’ve felt good—relieved—when she then nodded; instead, I was afraid I was only proving the very thing I insisted wasn’t true: that Athena was here because I still cared for her the way I once did .

“Okay.”

A few minutes later, I’d grabbed the evening meds Rorik instructed me to give her and was whipping up a grilled cheese sandwich in the kitchen. It was quick and easy—and they’d been a favorite of hers back then.

“Smells good.”

I didn’t turn when Rob joined me.

“I’m almost done, and then we can go.” I flipped the sandwich in the pan one more time, wanting the bread to be golden.

“You put her in your cabin, not the guest one,” Rob said, not bothering to make her change of topic a smooth one.

“My cabin is more open—easier to get around.” The excuse was lame; the layout of all the cabins wasn’t much different between them, but compared to the guest cabin, my space was a little easier to navigate.

“Because you hardly have any furniture.”

I gritted my teeth. Since all of uslived more or less at Sherwood, except Rob, though she still had her own cabin, we didn’t really frequent each other’s homes. There was no point. We had the rec room and communal kitchen in the clubhouse. I couldn’t remember the last time anyone else had been inside my cabin until Rorik, Harm, and I had brought Athena there earlier.

I’d ignored my brother’s hard look when he realized I only had a bed and a single chair to break up the modest space.

“Like I said, easier to get around.” I slid the grilled cheese sandwich onto a plate and covered it with a piece of foil. “Let’s go.”

I moved around her and went to the elevator, jamming my finger onto the button.

“Dare…”

Dammit. Air hissed through my lips, and the door opened.

“You should tell her the truth.”

“Why?” The word fired like a warning shot. “It doesn’t matter who I am.” In fact, it would only make things harder—worse. “It’s bad enough asking her to trust strangers, let alone asking her to trust someone who hurt her; it’ll be easier for her this way.”

Rob lifted her chin, having no intention of leaving this conversation alone. “For her, or for you?”

My spine snapped straight, and I replied with a low, firm voice, “It doesn’t change what I’m doing…or what I’ve done.”

“You’re afraid of her…of what she meant to you.”

“It was a long time ago. We were practically children.” Not even close, but for the sake of this conversation, it had to be.

“So, you feel nothing for her now? Nothing but duty?”

I turned and loomed over her five-foot, fire-haired frame. “I feel nothing. Period.”

That made her eyes widen. A small crack in an otherwise impenetrable facade.

“If you felt nothing, you wouldn’t have brought her here.” Her accusation was hardly loud enough to top the elevator doors sliding open, yet even the smallest noise resounded in a hollow space, and so her words boomed in a loud echo around the empty cavern of my chest.

Sherwood was a secret—sacred for a reason. Not the garage itself, but the real work we did here, and anytime any of us brought an outsider in, it risked exposing the lawless way we exacted justice. I’d criticized the others for doing so in the past, and here I was, without a second thought, to bring Athena here for her safety.

“Dare—”

“Wonder again why I won’t tell Athena the truth, and I’ll start to wonder what it is about Remington that brings you running the second he’s involved,” I interrupted before she could ask anything else—saying the only thing I could think of to get out from underneath her microscope.

Remington.

Rob’s steps faltered, and her nostrils flared. “I came because there was a lead on Ivans and a fucking car bomb. Not because of Remington.”

I held her eyes for a long second. So stubborn and strong, but there was a kernel of hurt buried behind it all. A hurt that had nothing to do with what happened to her parents or how long Ivans and Wenner and Belmont had gone unpunished. A hurt I recognized:betrayal . I was the only one who understood it, which was why I couldn’t bring myself to ask her to explain it.

We reached my door moments later, and I punched in my code, unlocking access to a lengthy hall shrouded in dim light. We walked in silence to the end, where a short staircase led to another door.

The pressure in my chest built as I gave a soft knock so we wouldn’t scare her, and then I let us inside.

My breath released in a rush when I saw her lying there. Wounded. Vulnerable. And even though she was safe, I felt no relief, only the hollow hunger of anger left in my gut and the self-loathing for thanking God she couldn’t see me—couldn’t see the way I’d burn down the world to punish whoever had done this.

“Hello?” She made a soft noise and then pushed herself up to sit. In my bed.

“Athena?” I rasped, my voice getting farther and farther from its normal tenor each time I saw her—each time the strain on my body got worse. “It’s Dare.”

After Rorik had sedated her back at Covington, he’d called in a favor from a local nurse and friend of the Covington team, Gwen McIntyre, to come in and help clean Athena up. Gwen had gently and diligently sponged away much of the dirt and ash, and then exchanged her equally dirty and torn clothes for a loaned pair of red scrubs.

The glorified pair of pajamas were the only burst of color in the space. Everything else in my cabin—which wasn’t much—blended into varying shades of gray. Black bed frame. Gray sheets. White towels. A lone black chair in the corner that was dragged in from the kitchen.

“Hi.” She reached for her face and then let her hand instantly fall—like she’d forgotten about the bandage for an instant.

Her head dipped, and I felt the whole weight of it on my shoulders. A lock of hair slid over her shoulder, and tension rippled through me. The ash in her hair was the last remaining remnant from the explosion. Soot streaked the waves of sunshine, and I wanted nothing more than to wipe it away.

“I brought you a sandwich if you’re hungry,” I offered, approaching the bed cautiously but with enough noise for her to follow me .

“Thank you.” Her tongue swiped over her lips, and a bolt of heat went straight to my groin.

I reached her side and gently placed the paper plate on her lap. “Grilled cheese.”

Her lips parted, and I caught the slight dust of pink on her cheeks underneath the bandage. “Thank you.” If it was still a favorite of hers, she kept it to herself. Of course, because I was a stranger.

She slid her hands along the sheet, needing to feel her way to the sandwich, and a fresh dose of world-burning rage packed inside me.

“I also brought someone else with me—a friend,” I murmured, feeling my sister move closer.

“Hi, Athena. I’m Rob. I’m a private…investigator from San Francisco. I specialize in working with women who are hurt or…in trouble.”

Athena swallowed, her fingers retreating into a fist, before she nodded. “Hello.”

“Dare has brought me up to speed on what happened. How are you feeling? Are you comfortable?”

“I’m…okay.” A whisper of a small smile appeared. “I understand it could’ve been much worse, so I’m grateful.”

I tensed. I didn’t want her damn gratitude. Didn’t deserve it. But to explain that to her was impossible.

“I know you’ve been through a lot, but I was wondering if I could just ask you a few questions, if you’re feeling up to it,” Rob said, her voice taking on an almost melodic tone. I rarely heard her talk except in that unyielding, matter-of-fact, and relentless way—but that was because when we talked, it was always about work. About club business. About the men who’d killed her parents.

But this was a different Rob. A persona that felt like warm velvet, soft and soothing in the way it encouraged trust .

“Of course.”Athena’s hand furled and unfurled like she was checking to make sure the rest of her still worked. “I’m a little groggy from the medication, and I don’t…I’m sorry, I don’t remember much about that morning.”

“Don’t apologize, and don’t worry, I’m not going to ask about the explosion.”

I took a long, deep breath, slowly letting myself come around to this…questioning.

“Could I…could you take off the bandage over my eyes?” Athena murmured and then let out a sad laugh. “I know it doesn’t really make much of a difference, but I’d just—I’d like?—”

No. It was my knee-jerk response, but Rob answered quicker. “Of course, we can.”

My head whipped, and I glared at my sister as I explained, “Since your brain isn’t reading the signals from your eyes, the bandage protects you from accidentally physically damaging your eyes. You could stare straight at the sun and not realize.”

“But since the sun already started to set and we’re inside,” Rob began, approaching me and ignoring the daggers in my gaze. “I think we can remove it for a few minutes while you eat.”

I didn’t care how rational an argument my sister made, I wouldn’t risk?—

“Thank you.”

Athena’s soft gratitude broke me—the desperation consuming it. Like it was the first breath of air she’d taken since she’d woken up. And I wouldn’t be the one to rip it away.

I stared Rob down for one long second and then muttered, “I’ll remove it for you.”

It was one of the more idiotic things I’d done, but when it came to taking care of Athena, I couldn’t stop myself. It was guilt and duty, I told myself. That’s all. Guilt for the way I’d treated her and the foolish belief that caring for and protecting her now made up for it.

I turned and placed my hand on her shoulder to let her know I was here. She didn’t even flinch. Because she trusts you. The irony there tightened my jaw to the brink of snapping, and I quickly buried the anger—easy to do when the feel of her quickly consumed my thoughts.

Heat flooded underneath my fingertips in a familiar yet unmistakable warning: don’t touch. But I had to. I shouldn’t, but I had to because the thought of anyone else touching her—even Rob—created a much darker version of the same warning from somewhere deeper inside me. Don’t. Touch.

“Athena, do you have any idea who would want to hurt you?” Rob asked gently as I undid the hook on the bandage.

“No, I don’t.”Athena shuddered slightly as I started to loosen the wrap. This close, I could see the flutter of her pulse against her neck. “I don’t know many people here; I just moved back to the area. I’m an artist—a struggling artist. I don’t have family or money…”

Fuck. It took everything I had—every bone, every muscle, every artery, every vein, every nerve, and every single breath—to not pull her into my arms. The weight of watching her bear something like this alone almost crushed me.

But to comfort her would be wrong, too.

The rules were simple around Athena. What was wrong was wrong, and what was right was also wrong. I shouldn’t touch her, but I couldn’t let anyone else touch her. I should stay away, but I needed to be close to protect her. I should tell her the truth, but she deserves better than an apology.

“What about your ex-husband?”

Athena sucked in a sharp breath and instantly choked on it.

A curse welled on the tip of my tongue, and my head whipped to my sister, about to lash out, when Athena spoke and stopped me.

“Brandon? No. I mean—no. I can’t imagine…”

I looked back at Athena, watching the crease in her brow appear as I reached the last layer of the bandage. I hesitated for a split second. There was a chance some of her sight had returned. Slim—very slim. And I would face the consequences if it did.

“He wouldn’t do this. He’s not…he wouldn’t even know how to…”

I pulled the bandage off and rolled it in my hands. Dammit. I forgot Rorik had taped gauze over her eyes, too.

The bandage was one thing. I didn’t have to touch more than her hair to unwind it. But this…I forced my exhale out and reached for the one end of the tape—right as Athena lifted her hand.

Our fingers collided. Like matches and gasoline, a riotous unwieldy flame burst through me. She pulled away, but the whole of my arm seemed to have already turned to ash.

“I’m sorry.”

I grunted and focused on my task, acutely aware that Rob stood at the end of the bed, assessing every move and breath and sound of mine for evidence to support her claim.

“But you are getting a divorce, correct?”

My finger flinched as it pressed to her skin so it wouldn’t hurt when I pulled the tape. Married. She was married. I still couldn’t process it. As though, all these years, she’d only belonged to me—like a star in the sky only I could see.

“Yes,” Athena said and nodded, making my fingers brush more of her skin than necessary. Or recommended.

“And was the divorce amicable?” Rob asked, even though she knew the opposite to be true.Even though the answer was written all over Athena’s face .

“No.” The word was a defeat. A loss.

“Turn toward me,” I murmured, breathing deep as her head tipped in my direction so I could work the tape around her left eye free. This time, I moved faster.

With the second patch gone, I made the mistake of lingering for a split second to stare at her upturned face. Even with the cuts and scrapes and the scabbed gash on the edge of her chin, she was still the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. Too beautiful. Unearthly beautiful.

And then her eyes opened.

Athena’s bright blue stare collided with mine— just like that morning. My breath stilled in my lungs like I’d stepped on a land mine, unsure if moving was safe or would send me to pieces.

“Thank you.” Her soft voice released the danger, and I felt myself breathe again; she still couldn’t see.

It was the most unnerving thing I’d ever experienced—to have Athena look at me and know she wasn’t seeing me. To know I could stare at her, drink my fill of her cloudless cerulean eyes, soft cheekbones, and the perfect bow of her pink lips, and she had no idea. I’d be disgusted with myself if how much I enjoyed it wasn’t matched by the pain it caused me.

I never thought I’d see her again—I never planned on it. And here she was. In my life. In my home. In my bed. Hadn’t fate had enough fun with my life?

“You should eat.” I pulled away and moved the grilled cheese closer.

The band around my chest tightened again as her hands crawled toward the plate like twin spiders, needing to feel their way to her dinner.

I didn’t realize I was holding my breath until she took the first bite, and the look on her face—the soft sound that barely escaped from her lips—was enough to make me feel like I couldn’t survive on oxygen alone.

“This is delicious,” she murmured after devouring half of it in just a few bites. “It’s just like—” Her head dipped for a second. Just like the ones I used to make us. “I’m sorry. I haven’t had grilled cheese in a long time. I think I forgot how good it is.”

Right. Air hissed through my lips.

“So, your ex…” Rob trailed off, her stare vacant like she hadn’t just layered in one more subtle reminder.

“Brandon?” Athena felt for the napkin and brought it up to wipe her mouth. “I don’t think Brandon would hurt me. He took everything—will have everything once the divorce is finalized. He’s…done enough.”

Done enough. What the hell did that mean? What had he done? Why had she filed for divorce?

I jerked my head away, focusing on the nearby door to the bathroom because the rush of rage through my veins was so acute I couldn’t see straight. I didn’t want answers, I just wanted to murder the asshole who made her look and sound this way.

As if that wasn’t the pot calling the kettle black…

“Sometimes even everything isn’t enough for someone who wants to hurt you,” Rob said, reaching for the necklace she always wore around her neck.

We all had things that helped us remember. Mementos that grounded us to the person or thing that drove our purpose. For the rest of us, it was tattoos of Ryan’s dog tag number; his loss inked permanently to our flesh. For Rob, it was the thin gold band on the chain around her neck—her mother’s wedding ring.

It wasn’t odd that she wore it; it was odd that this conversation made her reach for it.

As soon as Rob realized I was watching her, she let the chain go and continued. “Is there anything in your new life that Brandon wouldn’t like? People supporting you? A new relationship, maybe? Since the divorce isn’t finalized?”

My eyes widened for a split second. Smart. This was why Rob was so confident about talking to her; the way she was going to get answers about Ivans was so subtle. I was impressed. But only for an instant before I had to brace myself for the answer.

“Not really. Not seriously,” she murmured, unable to see nor hide the color that deepened in her cheeks. “There was a man I met at a show I did a few weeks back. We’ve gone out a handful of times, but it’s not…official.”

“Would Brandon be angry if he knew you’d been on dates?”

“I…don’t know. Maybe?”

She struggled to fathom the possibility. Then again, the ability for people to be cruel was something Athena always struggled to see, even back then. It was one of the things that drew me to her. She always looked for the good—for the positive. Maybe it was the artist in her, finding the beauty in everything, but I’d never met someone who had the capacity for compassion like her.

“What’s his name?”Rob asked calmly, like this wasn’t the piece of information we’d been looking for for months. “We want to make sure he’s not in any danger.”

He wasn’t in danger, he was the danger.

Athena paused, and a veritable pin-drop silence descended.

“Richard,” she said. “Richard Iverson.”

Rob and I turned to each other when Athena began to eat. Ray Ivans. Richard Iverson. We assumed he was using another alias with the same initials, and we were right. Blood pumped in my ears.

We were right. And we had a name .

“And what does he do?” Rob asked while I immediately fired off a silent message to Ty with the alias.

“He’s an investor and an art collector.”

And conscienceless doctor and jewel thief and murderer.

“Very nice. Charming,” Athena continued with a small smile. I hated that his memory made her smile when mine would surely bring her to tears. My own damn fault, I knew. “Kind. Generous. He wanted to invest in my art—a gallery even.”

Rob paused, giving Athena a break to take a few more bites of her sandwich.

“Were you going to let him?” I asked, earning a glare from Rob that practically shouted, Not important.

Except it was important to me.

“Yes—no.” She stopped, her brow furrowing. “I mean, I’m not even close to opening my own space yet, but I was happy to have investors in my work. I’m just starting over—starting out, so any support was welcome.”

“How did you meet him?”

“Actually”—Rob interrupted before Athena could answer and pointed a warning finger at me—“we just need to know if you have a contact number for him?

“Yes—no.” Athena’s shoulders slumped. “I had his number in my phone.”

Which was in the passenger seat of her car and completely eviscerated in the explosion.

“That’s okay. Do you know where he lives?”

“No—ahh.” She broke off with a small cry and reached for the side of her head.

I let out a low snarl in Rob’s direction; we’d asked too much too soon.

“It’s okay.” Rob moved around me. “Here, let me take your plate.” When she reached for the dish, she also placed a comforting hand on top of Athena’s, and when she squeezed, the tension melted from Athena’s face.

“I’m sorry.”

“Please, don’t apologize. You’ve been through so much and have been so helpful already. We’re done with questions for the night.” Rob shoved the plate at me like I was the problem. “We have your medications for you to take, okay? And then we’ll have to put the bandage back over your eyes.”

Now, it was my turn to shove something at Rob—the bandage. I’d touched…enough for one night—enough to fuel my fantasies for another couple of decades. God, just the feel of her soft skin was enough to have me crawling out of mine with desire. I thought years without had killed this hunger. I was so fucking wrong.

“Do you think…I’m sorry,” Athena started and then broke off with a shake her head.

Goddamn, I wanted her to stop apologizing. And then I wanted to kill whoever it was that instilled in her this idea that she was always at fault—always the problem.

“No, please.” Rob sat on the edge of the bed, still holding Athena’s hand, and I realized this was right—having someone to comfort her, to be able to be there for her, to be close to her—that was the right thing to do. Not having a man protect her who was tortured by every moment in her presence. “What can I do?”

When Athena replied, her voice was softer, and I could tell by the way her head turned and tilted that she wasn’t sure where I was standing and hoped it wasn’t close enough to hear.

“Would it be possible for me to take a shower?”

A shower.

Her.

Naked .

In my shower .

Naked .

My processing capability devolved into that of a four-year-old. Short strings of stark reality hitting me like bullets from a gun. Athena. Naked.

Rob turned and looked at me, and I wished I could disappear. I wished I hadn’t heard her—and more, I wished I wasn’t the one who had to agree to it. But I’d made myself the gatekeeper to Athena’s recovery, only deferring to Rorik when he was on the premises.

“Carefully,” I croaked, feeling like the executioner sending the guillotine for my own neck, and then left before I heard any more.

I’d made my bed— with the woman I’d once loved in it— and now I had to figure out how the hell to never sleep again.