Chapter 2 #2
The impact knocks the breath from my lungs and sends me stumbling backward, my worn shoes slipping on the polished marble.
I'm going down. I know I'm going down, and all I can think is that this is it.
This is how my desperate plan falls apart, with me sprawled on the floor of a fancy club and then security scraping me off the marble.
Heat scorches my face. Screw that. My entire body flames with shame.
But then hands catch my arms before I face plant into the hard flooring. Large hands. Warm. Strong enough to steady me without effort, fingers wrapping around my biceps with a gentleness that contradicts their obvious power.
My glasses slide down my nose. I go to fix them, but before I can, the man steadies me and eases my glasses back where they belong.
"Easy, honey. There you go." The voice is low and rough, like gravel wrapped in warm steel. Something about it makes my stomach flip in a way that has nothing to do with fear. "I’m sorry about that."
I look up, and up, into eyes the color of storm clouds.
And my heart stops.
Drake Moses.
I swear he recognizes me the second I put his name to the face.
But just as quickly, his expression becomes unreadable.
Of course. Of course it's him. Because the universe has a sick sense of humor and apparently my humiliation isn't complete until I've literally thrown myself at my ex-boyfriend's older brother.
I haven't seen him in over three years, not since that awkward family dinner where Jonah paraded me around like a trophy.
Drake had been quiet, watching from the edges of the room with those same storm-gray eyes that I thought saw too much.
He'd shaken my hand, his grip firm and brief, and I'd felt something electric pass between us that I'd immediately buried because I was with Jonah and noticing his brother felt like a betrayal.
Now those eyes are fixed on my face, and I feel just as exposed as I did back then. More, maybe, because now I'm not the polished girlfriend in a borrowed dress trying to impress his family. Now I'm a bruised, desperate woman who just crashed into him looking like a complete disaster.
He's older than me by at least twenty years, but there's nothing soft about him and definitely nothing diminished by age.
He's built like a man who's spent his life fighting for what he has, all broad shoulders and coiled power barely contained beneath a charcoal suit that fits him like it was made by angels with a measuring tape.
His jaw is strong enough to cut glass, his cheekbones sharp, and there's a stillness to him that speaks of controlled violence waiting just beneath the surface.
Silver hair catches the dim light like moonlight on water, and I remember Jonah mocking him for it once.
Called him an old man, said he'd gone gray before forty because he carried the weight of the family business on his shoulders.
I'd thought it was cruel at the time. Now, looking at Drake, I think the silver just makes him more striking.
More mysterious. More everything his younger brother will never be.
I keep my expression neutral. Does he recognize me? I thought so. Now I am not so sure.
I push my glasses up my nose, a nervous habit, and wonder if he remembers the girl from that dinner table. I'd worn contacts that night, trying to look polished enough for Jonah's family. Now there's nothing between me and Drake's storm-gray gaze but smudged lenses and shattered pride.
My stomach clenches at the thought. I was nobody to him back then, just Jonah's latest girlfriend, one in a string of women his brother cycled through like disposable accessories.
There's no reason he would remember my face three years later, especially not with all the bruising. I am so far removed from the woman I pretended to be at that time in my life.
“Are you alright? I wasn't expecting anyone on the other side of the curtain."
"I'm fine." The words come out breathless, and I hate how small I sound. "I'm the one that is sorry. I wasn't watching where I was going."
As I speak, his gaze drops to my face, and something shifts in those storm-cloud eyes. They sharpen and focus on my cheek with an intensity that makes my skin prickle with awareness. I watch his jaw tighten. The stillness in him transforms into something harder and more dangerous.
"Who did this to you?"
The question is soft. But there's something underneath it, something cold and lethal that makes the hair on my arms stand up. His voice hardens in a way that suggests he's already planning violence on my behalf and calculating the cost of making someone pay for the bruise blooming over my skin.
My eyes shudder closed and I try to tell myself this isn’t real. I am locked in a nightmare and I only need to wake the hell up.
"I don't know what you mean." The lie is automatic, worn smooth from years of practice.
"Don’t lie to me. You know I’m talking about the bruises.
" His thumb brushes my cheekbone, feather-light, and I flinch before I can stop myself. The touch is barely there, gentle enough to be almost tender, but it sends electricity crackling through my veins like lightning seeking ground. "You tried to cover them, but I’m sorry to say it didn’t work. ”
He steps in and forces me back a step until my back is against the wall. He leans in and lowers himself until his eyes lock with mine.
“Someone put their hands on you. I want to know who."
His scent reaches me then, replacing the cloying sweetness of expensive perfume with something that makes my knees threaten to buckle.
Cedar and smoke and something warm like aged bourbon, wrap around my senses until I can barely remember why coming here was a terrible idea.
My body responds before my mind can stop it, heat blooming low in my belly, my breath catching in my throat.
This is Jonah's brother. Jonah's brother. I loathe the Moses name, I mentally remind myself.
The words echo through my head like a warning bell, but they can't seem to drown out the way my pulse races or the way my skin burns where his fingers touch.
“Was this my brother’s doing? Tell me the truth.”
Drake brushes his gaze over the discolored skin of my cheek and throat.
For one wild, desperate moment, I want to tell him everything.
I want to lean into his strength and let someone else carry the weight for once.
I want to confess about Victor and the debt and Gemma and the five years I've spent drowning while pretending I know how to swim.
I want to believe that this man with his storm-gray eyes and his gentle hands and his voice that promises violence on my behalf could actually save me.
The urge is so strong it steals the air from my lungs and makes my eyes burn with tears I refuse to let fall.
But he's a Moses. And I trusted a Moses once before. Jonah with his easy smile and his empty promises, and all he left me with was a shattered heart and the certain knowledge that men like him don't save women like me. They use us until we're empty and then they find someone else to drain.
His hand settles over my shoulder and then moves lower to grip around my upper arm.
“If he did, I’ll put the fucking bastard in the ground.”
“It wasn't your brother,” I answer firmly.
I don't know if Drake is anything like his brother.
Something in my gut says he's not, says the man who touches my bruises like it causes him physical pain couldn't possibly share Jonah's casual cruelty.
But I can't afford to trust my gut right now.
My gut has been wrong before, and the stakes are too high to gamble on my broken instinct.
I step to the side, breaking his hold on my arms, and something in my chest cracks a little at the loss of his warmth.
"I had an encounter is all." My voice comes out steadier than I feel. "I'm clumsy. It happens." I am talking about my life choices rather than my footing, but I don’t feel like explaining all that.
He doesn't believe me. I can see it in the way his eyes narrow, the way his jaw tightens, the way his hands flex at his sides like he's fighting the urge to reach for me again.
But he doesn't push or demand answers. Something about that kind of restraint makes my heart ache in ways I don't understand.
"If you need help, Ms. Bellrose," he says, and his voice is still rough, still dangerous, but there's something understanding underneath the controlled power. "If you ever need help, you can find me here."
I guess that answers at least one of my questions.
“Yes, I remember you.” He reaches out, but instead of touching my bruises he takes my chin between his fingers and lifts my gaze to his. “No one forgets a woman like you.”
Chills rush through me at his low admission.
I have a million questions as to what he means by that, but I swallow all the questions down.
It doesn't matter. None of this matters.
I'm here for Gemma, not to rehash the past with a man whose last name reminds me of everything I'm trying to leave behind.
"Thank you, Mr. Moses." The words scrape against my throat like broken glass. "If you'll excuse me."
I step past him, my shoulder brushing against his arm as I slip through the velvet curtain, and I feel his eyes on my back like a physical touch.
Watching. Waiting. The weight of his attention follows me into the shadows like a predator tracking prey, and I don't know if I should be terrified or comforted by that knowledge.
The corridor beyond the curtain is a study in darkness and decadence.
Matte black walls stretch before me, scattered with gold leaf that catches the dim lighting from overhead chandeliers like fallen stars trapped in midnight.
My worn shoes move silently over black marble as I move deeper into the belly of Scarlet Thorn.
The corridor is empty, and I send up a silent prayer of thanks to whatever god watches over desperate women doing desperate things.