The Four Stages of Loving Dutch Owen - Debra Kayn Page 0,78

learn her mother was sitting in jail and assume a relative out of the area had taken custody of Marla Marie.

All he'd thought about was himself. He never wanted his crime of kidnapping her to see the light of day.

"I was hiding in the shed when the police came that day." She looked around the small space and hugged her middle. "It's where I'd escape to when my mom would have men at the house. I didn't like being around them. It was scary when they started doing...drugs, I guess."

His head pounded, knowing what men were capable of doing to a young girl.

She'd made the shed her safe place. Throughout the years, he'd struggled with making her adapt to living with Rachel and Skull, and she begged to go home to find her mom. It wasn't her mom she wanted. She wanted to return here and hide in the shed because that's how she dealt with the heartbreak of him going back out on the road, riding for WAKOM Motorcycle Club.

She wanted to go where she knew no one could hurt her.

She wanted to go where she felt safe.

He looked away, feeling the fool. His throat closed, feeling powerless to fix her past.

She'd always lived life on the outside, looking in.

He only wished he'd found her sooner and protected her from the pain.

Looking at her, standing in the shed, spilling her heart in the one place she felt safe, he wanted her by his side.

"Do you know how much I love you?" The words ripped from his throat, raw and strong.

Her gaze intensified, straining her whole expression. "I do."

"I promised to never leave you, and I won't."

"You can't control what happens," she whispered. "You live a dangerous life. You could go back to prison anytime you ride away from me. You don't tell me, but I know."

"You'd still have me even if I go to prison again."

She stepped forward. "You could die when you're away from me."

"I'd still find a way back to you."

She walked out of the shed. "That's not possible."

He took her in his arms. His hands shook. "I'd find a way, Marla Marie."

She gazed into his eyes. "That day at the prison when you sent me away, and I was never supposed to come back to you. You told me that you forced me to love you."

He remembered.

"That's not true." She sniffed. "The love I have for you consumes me, Dutch. I know I'm a little extreme at times compared to you, but I never want to lose you. I never want you to leave me because that love we have for each other makes me feel better than anything."

He cupped her face, wiping the remaining tears off her cheeks with the pads of his thumbs. Her gaze, open and honest, strengthened him.

"Your mom taught you that you're responsible for how people love you by always leaving and putting you second in her life. You're not responsible, Marla Marie. You think you're too damaged and broken to receive love, but you can choose to love me as much as I love you."

"I do."

He kissed her softly, inhaling her scent. "I'm going to burn down the fucking shed." He held her in front of him. "We're going to fill every cupboard in the house with food. Hell, turn the extra bedroom into storage and put whatever you need to feel safe in there. But you're not going to push me away."

"I'm not—"

"Jesus, Marla Marie." He kissed her forehead, holding her firmly. "I'm never leaving you."

He kept his lips on her forehead, wanting to shake her until she understood what he'd do to prove how he would change her whole world for her.

"I love you."

"I love you, too." She wrapped her arms around his waist, leaning on him.

Kissing her again, he looped his arm around her shoulders and walked her back to the house. She may never lose her fear of being left. But he'd be right beside her in case she needed him and to assure her that she wasn't alone.

She would never be alone again.

Chapter 35

THE EVENING SUN CAST a glow over the house. Marla sat on the front step, the cell phone in her hand. Dutch was due home at any minute.

He'd called twice to update his location as she knew he was on the last leg, coming from Spokane to Moses Lake.

Nine days to finish his business for WAKOM Motorcycle Club crawled by with a slowness that tested her strength. Yet, his phone calls bolstered