eventually. Then I would’ve asked Vance to go with you for any meetings or negotiations while I was away.” Her grandmother was already on her deathbed back then.
Her cheeks colored with embarrassment or guilt. I didn’t know which. “Vance told me you asked him to look after me while you were deployed.”
Inhaling through a wave of anger toward my brother, I nodded. “I did.” Before the fuck had taken advantage of her.
Her eyes welled. “I need to apologize, one more time, for me. Then I promise I won’t bring it up anymore.” She inhaled. “I’m so very sorry. I should’ve known it wasn’t you that night.”
I didn’t want to hold her accountable, and I didn’t want to fucking punish her anymore like I did before. I just wanted to be inside her. I wanted to claim the fuck out of her.
Except I couldn’t completely own her, not yet. She was right to bring this up. I couldn’t fully dominate her and get her complete submission until I absolved both of us of the past. “Apology accep—”
Her hand shot up and covered my lips. Dripping water, she pressed. “No. You have to hear the rest.”
Hunger surged, mixing with the last of the adrenaline still coursing through my veins, and my cock hardened to the point of pain. This woman, pressing her hand over my mouth, silencing me, this was the grown version of my Songbird, and it woke something deep.
I no longer wanted to caress every inch of her body and show her how grateful I was as I washed her hair and dried her off. I didn’t want to carry her to bed and make love to her. I wanted to grip her hair, restrain her hands, and feed my cock down her throat.
I wanted to hear what song she would sing for me when I was too deep for her to swallow.
But her hand was still pressed against my mouth, and I was perversely enjoying it.
With a nip of my teeth, I caught her wrist. “Continue.”
Inhaling sharply, her gaze cut to my mouth before coming back to my eyes. “A couple of weeks after you deployed, I was in the studio and Kyle showed up.”
Without thought, my grip on her wrist tightened. That exact scenario was one I’d wanted to protect her from even before she’d signed. She’d been a seventeen-year-old siren in a woman’s body. She was beautiful then and she was stunning now, but her innocence ten years ago was compelling.
Reading my reaction, sensing the path my thoughts were taking, she took my free hand in hers. “Nothing happened. But I made a mistake that day.”
“We both made mistakes.”
She brought my hand to her mouth and kissed my knuckles. “Please listen.”
I nodded once.
She searched my face, then she told me the rest of it. “Vance had driven me to the studio. It was raining that day, and he hadn’t enlisted yet.”
I never should’ve asked him to look out for her.
As if seeing the downturn of my thoughts, she shook her head. “Nothing more ever happened between us. I swear on my mother’s and grandmother’s graves.”
I didn’t give a fuck about her swearing or the truth of her statement, I gave a fuck about the fact that I hadn’t been there. That if we’d stayed together, I wouldn’t have been there. Not for that, not for any of the times she’d needed me, and probably not for our children. I’d planned on a career in the Marines, as far as it would take me, but the stark reality of that commitment was hitting me now.
I wouldn’t have been there.
“Vance happened to walk me in that day, and he was there when Kyle showed. I don’t know, maybe Kyle had been waiting to see him. Either way, Kyle stormed in, and he made a show of it. He said he was going to kill Vance, and he was acting crazy, and the producer called security, but before they got there, Kyle kept yelling and Vance just stood there. He had this smug look on his face like he wasn’t bothered in the least. In fact, he told him to keep it up. He said he wouldn’t see a cent of the money if he tried anything, and I realized then Leo had paid or was paying him, but still Vance wasn’t defending himself or you, and I don’t know.” She sucked in a sharp breath. “I just, I got upset. Very upset.” Her gaze dropped, and she let go