Chapter 61 #2
“We were young, the relationship wasn’t stable.” I kept my tone flat because if I let it tilt toward emotion, it would take me with it. “She’s gone too. The same car accident.”
Sloane inhaled once, slow, controlled. Then her voice lowered as she said, “I’m so sorry. I can’t imagine what that was like.” Her hand slid up my forearm, careful near my wrist. “But why are you sitting here holding yourself like you’re waiting for impact?”
I looked at her.
“This is why.” I let the words out slowly. “Because I didn’t just come home injured.”
I hesitated, not wanting to drag her into my hell. “They didn’t just keep me.” My voice stayed level, but my hands curled into fists on my thighs.
“Who is they?”
“Hamilton, but the man he works for. He goes by the name the Pied Piper. He’s a notorious serial killer and a monster that makes the rest of the monsters look like fucking angels.”
Sloane went still. Focused. The kind of stillness that came right before violence.
Her hand tightened on my arm, then slid up to my shoulder, grip firm, like she was anchoring herself as much as she was anchoring me.
“I’ve heard his name. Not often, but here and there while looking into cases. Most of the time any leads to him disappeared.”
“That’s because he controls some law enforcement.
” I rubbed the back of my neck. “He used me, Sloane. He was behind the rabbit tattoo. He placed Hamilton in my life to navigate me into special programs for the gifted. When I was in recovery at the rehab facility, I was also with him. The headaches I get sometimes, it’s my brain trying to remember the memories he erased.
The flashes of me being strapped down, a man in the corner of the room.
It was him and his staff. They … He took my sperm. ”
Horror twisted her beautiful face. “They took it?” Her voice dropped. “Without you—”
“Yeah.”
She closed her eyes for a beat. When they opened, they were wet and bright, fury sitting right under the surface.
I forced the next words. “He told me what they were going to do with it. What they’re already doing.”
Sloane’s fingers dug in. “Ryker…”
“They’re making children. I saw row after row of bassinets with babies.” I took a deep breath before I spoke the next words that fucking gutted me. “My children. My sons. He said it like it was a business plan.” I gritted out.
Sloane went completely still. Her mouth opened slightly, then closed. I watched her process it, the horror moving across her face before she locked it down and came back to me.
A sharp breath left her. She looked away for half a second, then looked back at me like she refused to let me carry it alone. “Keep talking. I’m here.”
“When he finally let me come home, it wasn’t a gift.” My posture tightened. “It was a deal. A price.”
Sloane didn’t blink. Her hand stayed on me, firm and possessive now. “What price?” she asked.
“They took everything.” The words came out flat because if I let them have any shape, they’d break something I couldn’t fix in front of her.
“The Pied Piper had me go under. Both testicles. Removed.” I looked her in the eyes because she deserved that much.
“He put prosthetics in, so I’d look normal.
Feel normal. But there’s nothing left to work with, nothing to extract, nothing any doctor could use to give me a future he didn’t already own.
I’m sterile, Sloane. Permanently. Completely. ”
The words landed heavy and final. Sloane’s expression crumpled.
Just for a second—a crack she couldn’t contain.
Her eyes filled with tears and spilled before she could stop them.
She reached for my hands, both of them, and brought them to her mouth.
Her lips pressed against my knuckles, her hands shaking.
Then she lifted her head, and the grief had burned into something else entirely. Her expression changed fast. Shock first, then rage so bright it almost looked painful. “No, they don’t get to decide that.”
“They already did.” My voice stayed steady because hers was starting to crack and one of us had to hold the line. “They took my right to ever have my own children. They took my choice. They did it to make sure I could never build a life they didn’t control.”
Sloane’s breath shook. She leaned in, careful of my pain, and pressed her forehead to mine.
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered, and the words sounded scraped raw. “I’m so fucking sorry.”
She pulled back enough to look me in the eye. “They don’t get to keep you. Not after this.”
A slow breath left me, and it felt like my ribs had been holding something back for days.
“I’m going to call Cami.”
My fingers closed around her wrist. “No.”
Sloane frowned. “I’m not asking for permission.”
“It’s not safe. She can’t know.”
“Ryker, I’m not telling her everything. I’m telling her you have injuries, and I need antibiotics for you. That’s it.”
I held her wrist a second longer before I let go. I didn’t have the strength to fight her.
Sloane stood, walked into the kitchen, and dialed. Her voice stayed low and measured as if she were talking around landmines.
“I need a favor. Ryker is home but he has injuries.” A pause.
“Rope burns. Skin broken. I don’t like how angry the skin looks.
He won’t go to the hospital.” Another pause.
“No, I’m not at liberty to give any more details.
I just need something to prevent infection.
” She glanced at me. “Thank you. We appreciate it.”
She ended the call and came back into the living room. “Cami’s going to drop something off.” Sloane sat beside me again. “She’ll keep it quiet.”
“Okay.”
Sloane put her hand on my chest and kept it there.
I covered her hand with mine. “You should hate me.”
She looked at me. “For what?”
“For not telling you about Gavin. For letting you fall for me without giving you the whole truth.”
Sloane’s hand stayed on my chest. She didn’t pull it away. “I’m not mad you didn’t hand me your whole past on a silver platter. This is new. We’re still learning about each other.”
My lungs eased a fraction.
She tipped her chin up. “But I hate that you carried it alone. I hate that you thought you had to.”
I didn’t have an answer that didn’t sound pathetic.
“Thank you for trusting me with it,” she whispered. “Even if it hurts.” Then she said the part that mattered most. “And I’m not leaving.”
I held still, careful with my body, careful with my breathing.
“I don’t know how to be normal.”
“Don’t.” Her mouth brushed mine. “Just be here with me.”
I slid my hand behind her neck and held her there. “I’m here.”
Sloane kissed me again. When she pulled back, her attention remained on me.
“We heal here.”
I nodded, and it felt like the first real decision I’d made in days. “We heal here.”
And for the first time since I’d walked through her door, my body believed I wasn’t going to be dragged away again.