Chapter 9 Lena
LENA
“Oh my God.” Tears burn the back of my eyes, hot and humiliating. I blink them away.
There’s only so many times in one day I can show weakness to the man stalking me.
Though, if I’m being honest, I’m glad I’m not on my own right now. Even if my relentless shadow is an overbearing, tyrannical giant.
Rem wasn’t going to bring me home, but I insisted.
I think I was in shock after being manhandled by that Russian guy.
One minute I was doing my job, pretending to care about the ridiculously rich patrons who come to the symphony performances, pouring drinks, smiling, and being the utterly forgettable waitress behind the bar.
The next, I was being manhandled by yet another enormous bully while Rem and the man in question lobbed verbal threats over my head.
After the Russian guy slammed my side against the bar, I had to use all my focus to stay upright and keep from throwing up the granola bar I wolfed down at the start of my shift. I didn’t have the capacity to track what Rem and the Russian were saying, let alone figure out the subtext.
By the time the symphony performance started I was so lightheaded I just wanted to go home, I didn’t really care how I got here.
Apparently, my home wasn’t what Rem had in mind when he and Johnny hurried me into the car.
It quickly became obvious that we were heading in the opposite direction of my place.
I told them to turn around. They said no.
I said they couldn’t ignore the demands of a bleeding woman, especially when Rem is at least partially responsible for said bleeding.
Johnny was driving. Rem was in the backseat with me. I saw them exchange an intense look in the rearview mirror, Johnny only pulling a U-turn after a brisk nod from his boss.
They didn’t want to take me here. Now I have to wonder if this is why. Wonder if they knew what was waiting.
Behind me, Rem curses but I can’t tear my eyes away from the total destruction of my apartment.
Bullets didn’t do this. People did.
My sofa cushions have been slashed open, the stuffing strewn on the floor. Lamps knocked over, bulbs broken. Books ripped down from their shelves. Kitchen drawers ripped off their runners, contents dumped all over the cracked linoleum floor.
My bedroom is just as bad. Worse, even. Whoever did this went through my underwear drawer and threw my bras and underwear all over the floor. I pick up a pair of white undies and feel the tears threaten to return. There’s a muddy footprint stamped into the thin fabric.
“Who would do this?” I whisper, stepping over a pile of shredded sweaters and returning to the main living space. I can’t bring myself to see if my favorite fuzzy yellow one is amongst the wreckage.
“You really don’t know?” Rem watches me pick my way through my tiny apartment, his gaze a physical weight on my face.
“You’ve been shot at, threatened at your place of work, and now your apartment has been destroyed, all in the span of twenty-four hours.
You must’ve really pissed someone off, Lena.
You really want me to believe you have no idea who? ”
Glass crunches beneath my foot. I bend down, retrieving a broken picture frame.
The photo inside is of me with the Haywoods, taken ten years ago.
Something about that broken photo breaks me and I lash out at the closest target, jabbing the wrecked frame in Rem’s direction.
“You forgot my aunt dying and her house burning down. Oh, and being held hostage overnight by strangers,” I shout at him, voice shaking.
“I am very aware of how horrific the past day has been. It’s happened to me, asshole.
And, no! I have no idea what the hell is happening or why my entire life is falling apart like this.
What did I do wrong?” I scream, waving my arms, ignoring the ever-growing pain in my side.
“What could I possibly have done to make someone what me dead? Huh?”
I’m in front of Rem, slamming my fists into his chest, photo forgotten on the ground. “Maybe it’s you! You showed up at the same time everything fell apart. The fire, getting shot, that crazy Russian—it all started when you appeared. This is all your fault.”
I’m sobbing now, pride be damned. Pounding my fists against the heavy wall of his chest and absolutely losing it. “You knew my place was destroyed. You and Johnny knew, didn’t you? That’s why you didn’t want to bring me here.”
My devastation is surpassed by intense rage and, unable to hold it in, I slap Rem across the face. He closes his eyes, grinds his jaw, but otherwise doesn’t react. Somehow, that makes me angrier.
I slap him again, harder. My hand comes away stinging. “You did this, didn’t you?! You weren’t satisfied with scaring me half to death, with getting me shot, with locking me away like some captive, and following me around town like dog shit on my shoe.”
I step back, too many emotions hitting me at once.
Rage, fear, devastation, utter hopelessness.
No, not utter hopelessness. It doesn’t get to that level until I trip on something behind me.
I look down and see my violin case. My heart claws up my throat as I bend down and carefully open the lid.
What’s left of my composure breaks when I see what’s inside.
My violin, neck snapped clean off the body, strings dangling in a twisted mess between the two halves. The main portion is crushed, the bridge collapsed, the sound post stabbing out from the cavity. It’s broken beyond repair. Which is appropriate, because I feel exactly the same way.
I don’t realize I’m screaming until Rem hoists me off the ground and crushes me to his chest. The ringing in my ears is so loud it erases all other sound.
But my screams reverberate against my ribs, radiating out of me like a nuclear explosion.
Only to meet their match in Rem. His body absorbs the sound, his strength keeping me in one piece when it feels like I’m going to explode apart.
Minutes pass before I’m able to quiet down.
The world slowly returns, and I find myself wrapped up in Rem.
I was oblivious to him picking me up and setting me on the kitchen counter, but that’s where I am, my arms around his shoulders, head tucked against his neck, my legs wrapped around his hips, one of his hands cradling the back of my head as he rubs my spine with the other.
I’m hit with an unmistakable sense of déjà vu. The feeling of safety is the same, the familiar smell of cedar and sandalwood and man threading through my lungs.
He’s held me like this before. Last night, when I was sleeping. Weeping.
Twice now this tyrant has comforted me as I’ve completely fallen apart and the fact that I feel safe in his arms makes me more wary of him than ever.
“You can let go,” I say, my voice muffled against his superfine wool coat.
“You’ll have to first.”
I tip my head up and we’re so close I can see gray streaks in the eyes I thought were near-black. The eyebrow over one of those eyes quirks up. He’s waiting for me to unlock my legs from around his waist so he can step back.
I do.
He doesn’t.
Instead, his hands drift to my sides, his touch gentle as he carefully lifts my vest and shirt to look at my bandage.
The activity of the day has taken its toll; blood has soaked through the gauze as well as my co-worker’s shirt.
He mutters something in Italian, and I have to stop myself from starting at his mouth.
“You’re not making this easy, you know.”
“Hmmm…?” Trauma really does affect people differently.
My brain, apparently, handles it by turning to absolute mush, happily blocking out everything but the bob of his Adam’s apple, the threads of tattoos curling at the base of his throat.
Mouth dry, I lick my lips, all in an effort not to lick him. “What am I not making easy?”
His fingers are hot points on my skin. “Keeping you in one piece, Haywood. We need to change the bandage.” I feel his thumb skim my stomach. Can’t repress the shiver that follows. His voice is lower, rougher when he asks, “Do you have a first aid kit anywhere in here?”
“I do. I did. Under the bathroom counter.”
“Stay put.”
I do, too tired to fight, too tired to move.
Rem told Johnny to stay in the hall, so for at least one moment I don’t worry about what might be outside trying to come in.
It’s hard to worry about anything else when my own personal predator is stalking back toward me, mini first aid kit dwarfed in one large hand.
He tugs at my shirt collar with the other. “We need to take the vest and shirt off. So we can clean and re-dress the wound.”
“Okay.”
Rem steps back, confused. “Okay? That’s it?”
“That’s it. Why?”
“Five minutes ago, you would’ve happily stabbed me to death if you’d been able to get ahold of anything even remotely sharp. You constantly do the opposite of what I tell you, you fight me tooth and nail at every opportunity. But now it’s just…okay?”
He’s right. My logic is non-existent. But so is my will to move. Exhausted, my body hurts too much for me to turn down an offer of help, even from him. “I have to twist to put the bandage on myself. Twisting hurts. So, yeah…okay.”
Rem’s expression gives nothing away as he undoes the three buttons closing my vest. Gently but efficiently, he slides it off my shoulders and down my arms.
My shirt buttons are next. Rem keeps his eyes on his work, long fingers slipping tiny buttons through their moorings.
He works from the top down and it’s only when his hands hover above my breasts that I remember why I’d been particularly grateful for the ugly black uniform vest today.
When I got to work and stripped out of the clothes Bianca gave me, I realized I’d somehow gotten blood on the bra.
I wouldn’t— couldn’t—keep it on, so I ditched it along with everything else before putting on my co-worker’s spare shirt and vest.