Chapter 66
Rip’s lips move against mine in a dance of melding souls, but my mind wanders dangerously. Back to the look in his eyes. Like something died at the sound of her voice, and ghosts rose from the grave, haunting his existence.
Not to mention, he went limp while inside me.
That may not have concerned me if Rip and I hadn’t been monitored throughout every encounter. I know he doesn’t care about being watched or listened to during sex.
No, this has to do with her.
It pains me to pull away from his tender kisses. They are so few and far between.
“What’s bothering you?” he whispers.
I shouldn’t bring this up, it’s really not my business. “Who is that?”
“My head of security.” His eyes are wary. I’m treading a line I maybe shouldn’t cross, but I want to know him, even if I don’t like what I hear.
“What else?”
“Nothing,” he sternly replies.
“Rip…come on, I’m not an idiot. I recognize jealousy when I see it.”
“If you see it, then why bring it up?”
I second guess myself. Hard. But when I look at him, really fucking dig into him, I see them. The cracks I’ve bore witness to so few times before. The panic, the fear, the tormented look that glazes over his depthless eyes, yanking him away from me.
That itch awakens, crawling like an insect under my skin, ravenous for retribution. Tingling at my fingers, it urges me to act.
It would be so easy.
I’ve been silent for too long, lost in my thoughts.
“What’s on your mind, flower?”
It’s now or never, I may not have the guts to ask again. I channel that anger with Shantel, and use it to steel my spine. “If I ask you something, will you be honest?”
His expression immediately drops, panicked gaze darting between mine.
Don’t back down. Even if I hate that his falling expression is because of me.
His gulp of trepidation is audible. “Yes,” he rasps.
Immediately, I regret this. But I know how it feels to have every trace of arousal dry up because of someone else. It happened when I realized it was Sam in my bed, not Ripley.
I won’t be able to fucking breathe if what happened to me, happened to him, and she’s obsessed with keeping him in her hellish orbit.
I hate that I don’t know whether to keep my hands on him or not.
I don’t want him to feel caged, but also don’t want him to think I’m repulsed.
I don’t even know how to word this properly.
What do I do with my face? My body? I’m pissed off and worried, trying to exude support and safety, while resisting the urge to run after Shantel and beat her face with the bat that’s hidden under the bed.
“We used to fuck around,” he offers as a half explanation, hoping to placate me.
“That’s not what I was going to ask.”
“Then spit it out, Rose, you’re freaking me out.”
“Whatever you say, I’ll believe you,” I offer.
I’ll know if he’s lying. Though, either way, I’ll have the answer.
“Did she do something to you? Something you may not have liked…may not have…wanted?” I feel like such a fucking idiot as soon as the words are out of my mouth.
The chances of a man being assaulted are probably slim, but it can happen.
Even by someone they’re seeing, or fucking around with—as he put it.
Ripley looks away from me, glaring at the fucking door like it’s personally offended him.
In that moment, I know I’m right.
If he outright lies to my face, it’s because I haven’t done my part to make him feel safe. Like he can share anything with me, no judgements.
Given our situation, it’s been kind of hard to build a foundation that wasn’t based on sex and human contact. I’ve shared more with him than anyone before. I only want him to feel the same, but not if he’s not ready.
He bolts from the bed, making a beeline to the door. Not bothering to answer the question I no longer need an answer to.
“Don’t you dare fucking leave.” The words rumble out of me in a tone that freezes him in his steps.
Rip whirls on me, the air around him thrumming with rage that spans a lifetime. “Why? It’s my fucking house, I’ll do what I please.”
I know a diversion when I see one, he’s trying to sidestep the subject.
Shantel wants us to fight about her, inject her name into every conversation as a way to keep her in his thoughts and drive a wedge between us.
She’s hoping when we inevitably fight, he will go to her for comfort and companionship.
Where she’ll welcome him with open legs, listening intently with a string of ‘I told you so’s’ a mile long.
The words almost pour from my lips as a way to keep him here, show him how fucking vile she is.
But he knows that.
I refuse to give her any more power over him than she already has.
I’ve dealt with abusers of every variation my whole life, and I know how to handle them.
Rip won’t have to fight this battle alone.
He scoffs, annoyed with my silence, hand reaching for the knob.
“Because I don’t want you to,” I finally say, determined not to bring that bitch in anymore than she’s already infiltrated.
“Why?”
“Why do I want you to stay?”
“Mhmm.”
“What a ridiculous question.”
“Answer it.”
“Because I care about you, and feel bad for upsetting you.”
“Really?”
“Yes, is that so hard to believe?”
He doesn’t move an inch, but he’s not leaving either.
“Look, I’m sorry if I said something I shouldn’t have.” My hands knot nervously in my naked lap as a chill rattles through me. “I just thought something, and I shouldn’t have pushed.” I lift my eyes to his when I hear his bare feet shuffling across the room.
“What did you think?” He looks down at me, dark strands of hair framing his face in the hottest of ways.
“When you went limp it reminded me how the same happened to me, and why.”
“Your dick went limp too? When?”
“Fuck sakes,” I groan, falling back into the mattress.
Well at least he’s making a joke, I suppose.
He crawls onto the mattress, lying next to me with his head on my abdomen.
My fingers absentmindedly comb through his hair, twirling it around my finger while my gaze diverts to the bedside table, the dried monkshood sitting atop it.
“I only want you to trust me. Let me in, just a little bit.” He has, but in the smallest of ways.
I assumed it was because we were being monitored and he didn’t want Maximus gaining information on him, so I never pushed.
It’s different now though. This is his home, he should feel safe here.
I can only feel that the issue is me.
I understand I have more faith in him because of our situation, and I’ll need to find a way to have him feel the same security I do.
“I’ve had a rough life,” he murmurs, and I still. Holy shit.
His fingers tickle across my skin, head slightly shaking to encourage mine to keep moving.
“When she took from me, broke my rules, she became no better than any other person. And it sucks because she’s Bucky’s sister.”
I suspected it, basically validated it in my own mind, but hearing it confirmed from his own lips, in the defeated cadence of his usually strong voice, makes me so fucking angry I could strangle her right here and now.
“Ow, Rose. Let go!”
His hand taps mine, threaded through his shaggy hair and fisted tight in rage.
“Sorry.” I fake a laugh. Looking back to the flowers, I can’t think of a more fitting death for the bitch who raped my saviour.
His heart probably stalls in a panic every time he sees her, reliving whatever the hell she did to him.
She deserves to have hers race in a panic before it stops in her chest, and she drops like a steaming pile of shit from a horse’s ass.
Just a simple heart attack, such a shame for someone so young and fit.
“Flower?” he murmurs, placing a soft kiss to my abdomen.
“Hmm?”
“What’s love feel like?”
The question raises so many of my own that I don’t dare voice.
The silence lingers while I think of a response.
I love my sister dearly, and my father too, I suppose, despite how much of a dick he can be.
I’m sure I adored my mother as any child would, but I don’t remember enough to recall the feelings she would have brought forth with her presence.
“I don’t know.” My answer is honest. I can’t recount any previous relationship that measures up to this one, and the things Rip makes me feel.
“Me either.”