Chapter 11
Sloan stood only a few steps outside the bedroom door, his body raging as his mind exploded with pain and failure. He had failed her. The one person who should have been his number one to protect, and he had fucking failed her.
“Fuck!” he cursed, his black eyes narrowing with the need for vengeance.
He hated leaving her. Hated it more than he could even process at the moment, but he’d been too damn close to losing control, and Becky didn’t need to see that.
Not from him. Never from him. He would never harm her, but the need to lash out, to destroy something, someone, was so strong he needed a minute to get his shit together before he went back to her.
The one thing Sloan had always prided himself on was his self-control. He had built his life on it, led Warriors with it and made decisions that others couldn’t because he never let emotion rule him.
That was before Becky.
Now every ounce of control he possessed was hanging by a thread, and that thread had her name written all over it.
He could still see the fear in her eyes, hear the way she rushed to tell him she hadn’t cheated, as if he would ever believe that of her.
As if she hadn’t already given him every piece of herself he never deserved.
His hand flexed, the cut across his knuckles burning, but he welcomed it. The pain kept him grounded. Kept him from turning around and tearing the fucking world apart before he knew where to start.
Someone had touched her. Someone had used her trust, her body, her fear, and turned it into something that had her looking at him like he may be the one who walks away from her.
Never.
Whoever dared to lay one finger on Becky would live to regret it. Then they would die in the most agonizing way Sloan could deliver, and God help anyone who tried to stop him.
Knowing he had to go to her, Sloan dug deep, pulling on every ounce of honor, duty, and self-control he had left.
Becky didn’t need his rage. She needed him.
Glancing down at his hand, he saw it was almost healed.
He wiped the rest of the blood on his pants, then turned back toward the bedroom door.
Walking in, Sloan didn’t see her at first, but then he heard the sound of her quiet weeping coming from the bathroom, and it hit him so hard he almost went to his knees. Instead, he rushed that way, stopping dead when he saw her on the floor surrounded by glass from the mirror he had broken.
“Becky!” Her name came out rough as his eyes dropped to the blood on her hand, then to the glass around her knees. “Jesus. You’re cut.”
She looked up at him, her face wet with tears. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered, and he could hear in her voice how much she meant those words.
“No.” Sloan stepped carefully through the glass and crouched in front of her. “Do not apologize to me.”
Her hand trembled as she held it close to her chest, blood slipping down her thumb. His jaw tightened, but he forced himself to keep his touch gentle as he reached for her. “Let me see your hand.”
She hesitated, then slowly gave him her hand. The cut wasn’t deep, but seeing her blood there, mixed with his on the towel, made something inside him go cold.
“I shouldn’t have left you in here with this.” His voice was low, controlled only because she needed it to be.
“You needed a minute,” she whispered through a sob. “I understand.”
“No, I don’t think you do. I needed to be better for you. I shouldn’t have walked out like I did, but I had to regain control of myself.” Sloan looked at her then, really looked at her, and the pain in her eyes gutted him. He knew she wasn’t really hearing him. “Becky, listen to me.”
She shook her head, fresh tears spilling over. “I know what you’re thinking.”
“No, you don’t.” He reached for her, carefully pulling her out of the glass and into his arms. She came to him with a sob that tore through him. “You don’t, because if you did, you’d know I would never think you cheated.”
Her body froze against his.
Sloan cupped the back of her head, holding her to him. “Not once. Not for one fucking second.”
“Sloan,” she cried, her hands gripping his shirt.
“I know you.” His mouth pressed against her hair as his arms tightened around her. “I know my mate.”
Becky broke then, her hands fisting in his shirt as she cried against him. Sloan held her, careful of her hand, careful of the glass, careful of everything but the rage still burning inside him. That rage could wait. Whoever had done this could wait. Becky couldn’t.
“I’m scared,” she whispered, the words barely making it past her tears.
“I know.” Sloan closed his eyes, pressing his lips against the top of her head. “But you’re not doing this alone. Do you hear me? Not one second of it.”
She pulled back just enough to look at him, and the pain in her eyes damn near took him under again. “What if—”
“No.” His voice was low, but firm. “No what ifs tonight. Tonight, you and I breathe. That’s it.”
Her chin trembled. “How can you be so calm?”
“I’m not.” Sloan brushed the tears from her cheek with his thumb. “I’m the furthest thing from calm, but you need me, so that’s what I’m going to be.”
Becky stared at him like she wanted to believe him, like she needed to believe him, but he knew fear still had its claws dug in deep.
Sloan shifted, lifting her carefully from the broken glass and setting her on the closed toilet seat before kneeling in front of her.
Carefully, his touch gentle even though every part of him wanted to tear something apart, he lifted her hand and took her thumb into his mouth.
He tasted her sweet blood as he ran his tongue along the cut.
Their eye contact never broke. Slowly he pulled her thumb from his mouth. “Are you hurt anywhere else?”
She shook her head. “No.”
His eyes moved over her anyway, taking in the tears, the blood, the way she held herself like she was trying not to fall apart again.
It gutted him. This was Becky. His Becky.
The woman who stood toe-to-toe with Warriors, put him in his place more times than he could count, and never backed down from much of anything.
Seeing her like this, so lost and terrified, was a kind of pain he hadn’t known existed.
“Please don’t cry,” he said, waiting until her eyes met his again. “We’ll deal with this, together.”
Fresh tears filled her eyes. “Together?”
“Always.” Sloan crouched in front of her, his hands resting on her knees. “You are my mate. Nothing changes that.”
Her hand shook as it moved to her stomach. “I don’t even know how I feel.” Her face crumbled, but he knew she was trying not to cry. “How I should feel?”
“There are no rules for this.” His voice softened in a way few ever heard.
“I’m terrified.” She looked away, tears slipping down her cheeks.
Hearing that his mate was terrified of anything tore through him with a rage that kept him silent. He was afraid to open his mouth in that moment because he knew she would hear his fury, and he didn’t want her to think any of it was directed at her.
“But...” Her fingers curled against her stomach. “There’s a part of me that already loves this baby, and that scares me too. Because I don’t know what I’m allowed to feel. I don’t know if I’m supposed to be happy or angry or disgusted or broken.”
Sloan’s chest tightened until it hurt. “You’re allowed to feel all of it.”
Her eyes came back to his.
“All of it,” he repeated. “There is no right way to feel after what you’ve been through.”
“What about you?” she whispered.
Sloan didn’t answer right away because he wouldn’t lie to her. Not about this. Never about this. “I’m angry,” he said finally. “Angrier than I’ve ever been in my life. But not at you. Never at you.”
Becky’s breath hitched.
“The child is innocent.” Sloan’s voice roughened as his eyes dropped to where her hand rested. “A part of you, and because of that, mine to protect.”
A sob slipped from her.
He knew what those words meant. Knew the weight of them.
He wasn’t saying them because it was the honorable thing to say or because she needed to hear it.
He meant every damn word. Whatever was happening, whatever truth waited for them in the morning, Becky was his.
And anything that came from her, an innocent life caught in the middle of this nightmare, would be protected with everything he was.
Sloan reached up, cupping her face in both hands. “Look at me.”
She did.
“Whatever comes next, whatever we find out, we will deal with it.” Sloan assured her however he could. “We are a team.”
When she remained silent, just staring at him with that lost look in her eyes, he knew she had doubts, and he understood. Words were easy. Promises were easy. Becky needed more than that, and he would give it to her. Every day. Every hour. For as long as it took.
“I mean it.” His thumb brushed over her cheek. “You don’t carry this alone.”
Becky leaned into him then, her forehead pressing against his as she cried, and Sloan held her there, breathing her in, letting her break because he would be strong enough for both of them until she could stand on her own again.