Chapter 36
THIRTY-SIX
Hush
I watch Danika sleep. Her copper hair pouring down over her breasts. I love to watch her. Watch her small breaths. Knowing she’s here and alive. She’s at peace when she sleeps. Her beauty and serenity wearing off on me and I crave it like a sick fuck.
Hours pass and I’ve been fighting like hell to get out of these ties for most of them. Wet liquid runs off my wrists, assuming it’s blood and not sweat. If only I can get free, but then what? I wouldn’t be able to protect Danika. Not like this. Not without knowing the numbers were up against.
Fuck.
I thrust upward, creating a loud noise from the chair lifting and then falling.
Danika jolts awake and I curse myself for letting my anger get the best of me. The marks on her throat taunt me like a nightmare and I can’t wait to get my hands on that fucker. Her cheek reddened, too. He dared put his hands on what’s mine.
I’m going to fucking kill him for it.
Yes, I’m claiming her. She just doesn’t know it yet. She’ll be mine forever, whether she wants to be with me or not. She’s mine to protect. I just hope she’ll forgive me. I don’t blame her if she tells me to go fuck myself after what I’ve done. The abandonment she must have felt.
“How long did I sleep?” her voice raspy, dry, and full of suffering.
“Not long enough. You need to rest.”
“What I need is you.”
A lump forms in my throat, gratitude beyond anything I can compare rams into me. How can she be so forgiving? “You shouldn’t say that. I hurt you.”
“You’re hurting.” She’s stern in her words. Yes, I was hurting. I still might be, but it’s different now. It’ll all be different. “Where did you go when you left?”
I stare out at nothingness, not dare meeting her eyes. “I went to see Gracie.” I flick back to her, and pain coats her expression.
“Oh.” But her tone isn’t bitter, it’s an understanding. “I think that’s good.” But still, her smile doesn’t quite reach her eyes as she looks down.
“Hey. Up here, butterfly.” She does and I continue, “I haven’t visited her since she died.” Real sympathy flashes over her now. “I couldn’t face her. I was too ashamed. But it was more of a goodbye.” I swallow back the emotions. “I told her about you.”
That earns a smile from her at least. A sad one though.
“It’s okay. It’s all okay now,” I tell her in reassurance because it damn well is. “Danika. I have something else to say to you.”
“You don’t need to say anything—”
“No. I do. I need to tell you this.”
She pauses but then finally agrees. “Okay.”
“Back on that cliff. When you said Gracie wouldn’t want me to take my life.” I swallow, trying to breathe my way through this.
“And I meant it.”
I nod. “I know. And I told you that’s a reason I’m still here.”
“Yes.” Her voice shakes, and her lips part slightly.
“There’s another reason.”
She studies me, while her tied body rips me into shreds. “What is it?”
“You. Even before we met, deep down I knew you were out there. I can’t explain it. I can’t begin to understand it. But I knew.” I inhale deeply. “I knew inside my heart. The heart I thought was no longer beating and shattered but destroyed.”
Tears cascade down Danika’s cheeks, and she winces as they touch the open cut on her left side.
“And now that I’ve found you, I’ll be damned if I’m letting you go. You were right. In some crazy way, Gracie did bring us together. She knew I would need you.”
Silent sobs come from her, and it pains me.
“Don’t cry, my beautiful butterfly. Please don’t cry.”
“They’re happy tears, Liem. Because I fully believe she brought me to you, too. She knew I would need you. The universe knew.”
I close my eyes, feeling her words deep inside my core, letting them warm my soul.
“The pain I felt after so many years of losing her... it’s not what you think,” I say as her eyes narrow in confusion.
“Yes. I hated myself thinking there was something else I could have done to save her that night but I… I carried around another guilt.” My chest tightens.
“I still loved her with every fiber of my being… but I wasn’t…
I’m not in love with her anymore.” My eyes burn, the tears flowing like rain.
“And it destroyed me inside. I had already let her go and I hated myself for it.”
She tilts her head, but I look away ashamed.
“Oh, Liem. You’re allowed to move on. You’re allowed to fall out of love. Yes, you still love her, but it’s natural for that feeling to fade over time. It’s nothing you deserve to hate yourself over. She wouldn’t want that.”
I take a breath, letting my cries dry up, allowing this to be the last time I cry for Gracie.
“I know that now. You helped me see that. And I love you for it. I love every part of you, Danika. Your strength. How you care for others. The courage you’ve shown after the pain you’ve endured.
You’re the bravest person I know and I’m the luckiest man alive to be able to love you. ”
Her lip trembles as more tears flow. “I love you, too. I loved you since the warehouse, but I didn’t know it yet.”
I close my eyes listening to her words replay inside my mind. A soft song warming every part of me. “I need you. When we get out of here. I fucking need you.”
She bites her bottom lip, and I surge with fire for her. And only her. But it’s the distance she starts to create that worries me.
“Eyes on me. Keep your eyes on me.”
Danika lets out a shaky breath, her lip trembling along the way. “We need more time together.”
My chest tightens and I clench my jaw in pure insanity. I’m getting us out of here.
“Liem?”
The pain from my wrists heightens as I begin to pull at the binds again.
Somehow, I was able to loosen them before which gives me an advantage.
If I can get to the knife inside my boot, I can cut Danika free.
It’s desperation. The need to save her. I couldn’t save Gracie, but I’ll be damned if I let Danika die. I won’t fail her.
I shove away the thoughts as my biceps flex, feeling the veins pulse and protrude in my arms. I give everything I have as I pull with violence, letting out a deafening yell which bounce off the basement walls.
With one last stitch of effort, my hands come free, and I’m left finding myself staring into a pair of blue eyes. Danika looks speechless as I steady myself trying to catch my breath.
Knowing they most definitely heard that, I reach for the knife tucked inside my boot and in one swift upright motion, I cut the ties that hold my ankles.
I don’t waste any time getting to her.
She watches me, eyes wide. “That Hulk performance you just pulled, was not only impressive but incredibly hot.” Her voice is breathy, and her cheeks gather up a tint of rose.
A small amount of amusement replaces the fear inside. I glance down at her lips, and my dick twitches. With having zero intentions to linger, I can’t help myself, I cup her jaw, taking in the same breath and then I crash my mouth to hers.
The need to feel she’s here with me is so real.
Her moan escapes and I instantly regret the kiss because now all I want to do is taste every inch of her.
I pull away first, her reddened lips swollen and her eyes still closed. “Hold really still for me, okay?”
She nods, finally meeting my stare.
With footsteps shuffling above us, I hurry and free both her wrists and ankles. The marks left on her beautiful skin makes me want to kill every fucker in this building.
“Can you walk?” I help her to a stand as she gently rubs her battered wrists.
“Let’s get the hell out of here.”
I smirk, taking her hand in mine as we approach the stairs. “Stay behind me.” I creep first, keeping close to the wall as we ascend one step at a time.
Footsteps sound near and before I know it, the door whips open but I kick it shut ramming a guy’s face in.
I give a good three second count as he screams in pain and then we go for it.
Not knowing what’s on the other side makes me more cautious considering I have Danika with me. I’m usually reckless, not giving a damn what happens to me. But things are different now.
Two men approach first, and we circle one another like sharks. Baiting the other. I watch every move, every twitch they make and wait. Nothing else catches in my periphery so I keep my focus glued on them.
“You’re not leaving here unless it’s inside a body bag.” One of them laughs as he spits on the floor near his boot.
“Not happening. You’re going to live,” the voice inside tells me.
“Fuck yeah, I will.”
The one furrows his brows with slitted eyes and then he lunges, but I easily dodge him, bringing a knee to his chest watching as he falls over with the wind knocked out of him.
Arms aggressively wrap around my neck from behind, but I throw an elbow to his stomach and hurdle him over me as he lands on his back with a grunt.
This woman needs to train her men better.
I instantly search for Danika, and my stomach churns when I see a man go to grab her, but she throws a leg up catching him in the groin and jabbing a fist to his nose. He falls over in a cry of pain, and the one side of my mouth turns up. I’m there in seconds, my hands all over her.
“I’m fine. I’m not hurt.”
I exhale a sigh of relief, grabbing her hand. “Come on.” I practically pull her with me as I head for the only exit sign.
“We’re inside a parking garage,” Danika shouts from behind me and her voice bounces off the deep walls and short ceilings.
We are except it looks like it’s been abandoned for years.
Quite the hideout.
When I go to try the door, it’s locked. “Stand back.” With sweat dripping off my brow and dirt and grime sticking to my skin, I muster up whatever strength I have left and kick the fucking door in.
It doesn’t budge on the first try but on the second, it flies open splintering on the way, and we’re hit with a burst of blinding sunlight.
The roar of motorcycles grows closer as I tuck Danika into my side slinking into the tall unkept grass.
“You think it’s your club?” she whispers next to me as we’re both crouched down and waiting.