21. Chapter 21
Chapter 21
Maybe I was weak, but I couldn’t let go of him, and I didn’t want to. Maybe it was wrong of me to clutch onto his shirt, pulling it to my nose to inhale his expensive scent and override the aroma of fear and unwanted sex. Maybe it was wrong that I held on tighter as Trix rallied up the stairs, not bothering with the stairlift and moved in, attempting to take me from a man who had never admitted he cared for me.
But it didn’t feel wrong as his hands spread over my body, one covering my back, the other weaving through my hair. It didn’t feel wrong as he held me to him, nuzzling into my neck and humming while he let me cry into him.
None of it felt wrong.
And I felt...safe. For the first time in years. In the arms of a murderer.
I pulled Feebee into me, turning my body and staking my claim as Nonna reached for her. She meant well...Nonna. She cared. Her golden heart cared about all of us, and I loved that about her. But not enough to let her take Feebee from me. In that moment, neither God nor angels would pull us apart.
Her grip tightened on me, her little fingers pulling at my shirt again. It almost felt like she was trying to rip out my heart. I hummed to her, trying to soothe her when I couldn’t verbalize promises of things being okay.
Our faces touched, my stubble grazing her teary cheek. A sob wracked through her parted lips, swollen from unwanted kisses and crying, and it hit me down to my bones. I felt a million feelings rushing around inside of me, and not one of them was guilt about how I felt for her or what I’d done to the cunt who thought it was okay to hurt her.
Ding, dong...
The sound of rushing feet moving downstairs pulled me to mine. Ethan—who hadn’t heard anything from the distance of the office—came charging in, wondering where the fuck we’d all disappeared to. His phone glued to his ear, he was still calling Damiano, whose phone had fallen from his jacket pocket and was now vibrating across my foyer’s shiny floor.
“Holy...fuck...” Ethan’s phone joined Damiano’s, and he rushed to pick it up and examine the damage before the blood trailing from Damiano’s head injury covered it in grime. He looked up at us. Feebee in my arms and Nonna at my side as we stared down at him, careful not to fall through the broken safety rail.
“I...uh...uh…I think the artist is here.” Ethan’s head flicked from the door to me, his eyes wild, his face growing sweaty and flustered.
“Maybe lead them around the back, darling, and not through the house,” Nonna said, her hands gripping the wooden rail close to the splintered part of the wood. She wasn’t afraid of death or blood. She was used to it from her youth with my grandfather and all the assholes he ended.
Ethan nodded. “I’ll stall them. Offer them some drinks.”
I pulled my keypad from my pocket and sent a message to the speakers above his head. “Do whatever you have to do to make the deal. I’m not leaving her.”
A stutter of breath tickled my neck. She was grateful, and it pulled my hand back to her body.
“Thank you,” she whispered so quietly. I was surely the only one who had heard it.
“But, I...I can’t,” Ethan fretted from below.
“You can. You will. I’m not coming.” My robotic voice was stern, but it didn’t convey the emotions I felt.
“Mercer, I can wait with Feebee.” Nonna turned to me, her arms reaching out as if she’d be able to support the weight of another person.
“No. Thank you. She stays with me. She wants to be with me. And nothing in this world will take me from her right now,” my speakers told them all, and Feebee didn’t object.
The doorbell rang again, and I sent my last message.
“You can do it. Don’t let me down.”
I didn’t wait for another objection, knowing all too well Ethan’s parting lips were ready to voice one. I walked to my room, anger and devastation controlling my speed, and I left my cousin to do my work, knowing Nonna would help in any way she could.
In silence, I walked through my room and straight into my bathroom.
I left my keyboard behind and walked us into the shower. I tested the water with my hand before I let it rain down over Feebee.
I sat in the puddle growing below me and ripped her broken nightgown from her body. I tossed it behind us, not wanting anything that scumbag had touched to be anywhere near her. The wet satin hit the wall and then dropped to the floor with a soggy thud.
“I knew you’d come. He said you wouldn’t, that you didn’t care. But I knew you would. I know you feel something...deep inside, even if it’s not for me.”
Her words hammered a crack into my heart, and where the ice had formed around it, it shattered.
She stayed on my thighs but peeled herself away from my torso. My jacket replicated the soggy thump of her dress as I let her push it from my shoulders. She needed my clothes off, this being too similar to the last time we were in here. Her fingers popped the buttons of my black shirt, revealing more of my heaving chest. The dark color hid her blood, my blood, and Damiano’s, but the water revealed it when it fell to the shower floor. Her heart raced, fearing his germs on her body again, so I lifted her legs as I stretched for the shower head. Sitting back down, I found her fingers in her hair, wrapping around strands and pulling out enough to clog my drain.
Taking her fingers in mine, I studied the gashes on her palm. Luckily, none were deep enough to need stitches. But they did need washing, so I did that for her. I then guided them elsewhere, to my neck, for her to hold on tight while I bathed the rest of her.
I washed the cuts on her face, my fingers gentle with soap and water, before squeezing out some shower gel and using my hands to rub it into her body.
She didn’t resist, and she didn’t fight me. Her fingers stayed on my body, keeping busy by drawing circles on my shoulder. The pain in her eyes was horrific, but her breathing was controlled. Long, deep breaths had her small breasts meeting my skin on each inhale.
I guided her back until she was off my lap, and she tugged at my pants.
“Take these off, please.”
The quiet request almost knocked me down until I realized why she wanted that. She didn’t want the power imbalance of being naked with someone who wasn’t. Not today.
I obliged, not wasting another second to strip off my clothing.
Her pretty eyes lit up with terror over my body’s natural response to her naked one.
The semi was uncomfortable, but it was only because she had been in my lap, and her body did something to my senses I couldn’t control.
Lowering down after discarding my clothes, she was already dragging herself back to create distance between us. I wouldn’t let that happen today. I pulled her forward in time to prevent the shower from pelting her bruised face.
My ass hit the water as I sat. I parted her legs—fading muscles catching right below my fingertips—and placed one over each of my hips.
I glanced down, and the shocking state between her legs immediately had my attention zooming in for a second look. My eyes widened in horror. While I had no intention of making her uncomfortable, fate intervened.
How bad had that fucking creep hurt her!
“Don’t look.” Her hands swished the water, washing red stains from her thighs.
Steam from the hot shower allowed me to convey a message on the shower room glass. Grateful I didn’t need to get my keyboard from its balancing position on my towel rail.
I’m going to need to check you over. I promise I won’t hurt you. I have medical training.
She read as I wrote, her eyes watching the letters fade away almost instantly.
She turned back to me, her head heavy with so many thoughts as it landed on my shoulder. Her fingers moved again, this time drawing patterns on my legs. Patterns she wouldn’t dare admit were in the shape of love hearts. I tried not to focus on that, too.
“I know. Your nonna told me. You’re a doctor, which explains why you don’t know shit about art,” she teased, trying to humor herself.
But I couldn’t laugh, though I saw the joke.
“I’m okay. It’s a period,” she said quietly. “It started this morning. I don’t have tampons or pads.”
I nodded and hoped she understood I would take care of that.
Her whole body tightened in my grip, bracing against the cramps in her abdomen.
I let her nails dig into me, and in return, I ran my hand over her back softly, giving her compassion.
My eyebrows pulled down, and I saw the blood surrounding us, the metallic smell catching my attention.
I used my hand to move the red stain—and the large clots of blood that caused her cheeks to pink with embarrassment—from us.
I tilted her head to the glass and wrote another message. My chosen profession was why I’d taken an interest in her well-being. Yeah, let’s blame it on the profession.
Endo?
“I don’t know.”
She didn’t know if she had endometriosis.
“I haven’t had any tests.”
What the fuck did she have at home? No tests for brutal periods. No wheelchair for moving around the house. No wonder she hadn’t mentioned wanting to go home. All that was waiting for her was neglect. But neglect was better than abuse, I guess. And that’s all she’d had here.
Maybe she hadn’t mentioned going home because she was afraid I would walk in and murder her father accidentally on purpose. In the most violent way I could think of.
I needed that thought out of my head and to stay at bay, which was almost impossible…until Feebee looked at me. She wiped at the blood still loitering at my nose with the gentlest fingers. Then, her small body was twitching in my arms again.
I wrote her one last message, making a promise.
I’ll look into it for you.
As soon as my soon-to-be medical room was gutted and furnished, I wanted to help her receive the medical care she needed. I hadn’t told my family of my plans to gut out half of the downstairs and turn it into a private medical practice. It was always the plan…then shit happened and postponed everything.
They liked me as an art dealer and thought art was less stressful. Fuck, it was rarely not stressful. But I had grown to enjoy my job. I wouldn’t leave art behind for good, letting all the great paintings I could acquire dampen in dusty corners. I would just have to divide my time.
It was the only way. While I loved my job, I still felt like a part of me was missing when I wasn’t surrounded by medical tools.
I missed helping people.
People like Feebee, who crouched closely, one arm around me, her other around her stomach.