I turned those ropes over to Des, you thought I was planning to share you with him, because your father”—the rat bastard cocksucker—“told you the person you belong to gets to make that call. Yes or no?”
A little jerk of her head. He pressed onward. “And that upset you so badly, thinking I was about to do that, that you nearly passed out.”
“I’m sorry. I should—”
“It’s not a good idea to apologize to me for that,” he said mildly. “If I put out a collection jar at the store to pay someone to kill your uncle, we’d not only have enough money by closing time to hire a top of the line hitman, we’d have enough left over to fund the annual town Fourth of July picnic.”
Her eyes snapped up to him. He stroked her face some more. She didn’t want to talk about this, he knew it, so he wouldn’t push it much further. But he wanted to try one more thing. Even if it went badly, maybe he’d dug up the ground enough a seed would finally take root, despite how many others kept getting washed away by the storms that this subject caused within her.
“When someone has branded it to your core that you don’t have the right to want things, it’s hard to shake that. I get it. But I want you to say one thing to me. Even if you’re just mimicking my words, even if you don’t feel it yet.”
“Rory.”
He took a tighter hold on her. “Say, ‘I don’t want you to share me with another man.’”
Her gaze darted around, came back to him, jumped away again. “I…”
“You can do it,” he said. “I know you can. You can do anything.”
“I…please.” She shuddered. “I don’t want…please don’t…”
She convulsed, and then she bolted, scrambling away, stumbling to her feet, her hands still tied.
His heart leaped into his throat. He was chasing after her in an instant, but with the grass he couldn’t move as fast as she could run. Which she was doing, in a panicked, mindless kind of way.
The tributary, with its fast current and deep waters, was just beyond the light of those tiki torches. If she stumbled over the bulkhead, fell into the water and darkness and hit her head…
He aged ten years in ten heartbeats, which was when she collapsed to her knees and hunched forward, bracing herself on the ground with one hand as she began to heave.
That was why she’d been scrambling away. To deposit the contents of her stomach in the grass, instead of on him.
He tuned into his surroundings enough to notice he wasn’t alone. Des was between her and the water, poised alertly a few feet ahead of the track she’d been taking. Julie and the Dungeon Master were also just now catching up, keeping a distance, but still forming a loose four-point circle around her.
Rory had no idea how Des had moved that fast, but he felt nothing but gratitude. He could only manage a nod though, since all of his current energy was devoted to settling his heart rate so he didn’t go into cardiac arrest.
He didn’t let that stop him from closing the distance between him and Daralyn, though. He rested a hand on her back, gave her a soothing touch. Since she was shaking, hopefully she’d miss the tremor in his own hand.
She needed his strength, so he pulled it together. He couldn’t worry about what his audience was thinking, or if he was about to be thrown out of this place. His only focus was the woman he’d protect with every resource he had. He’d have to rely on Des and Julie to keep handling whatever was going on around them.
She seemed to be finished throwing up, so he kept stroking her, murmuring, doing the quiet things to tell her he was here and it was okay. His heart cracked over the struggle he felt going on within her. Jesus, he couldn’t imagine how exhausting it must be for her. Would she ever be able to break free of the hold the past had on her, to say what she wanted for her own self, her own life?
Fuck, Dr. Taylor had warned him, told him that expressing what she wanted wasn’t as simple as saying it out loud. But he’d felt so close to it.
So he’d pushed. Okay. He’d fucked up. But she was here, she was okay, it was okay. And he’d keep doing what he was already doing. Read