Damaged and the Knight (Damaged #2)

“I came in front of Farah,” I said, pulling away and wiping at my tears. “With Travis, after he’d hurt her. I had to look in her eyes as she cried in a corner and I got off. I’m a whore.”


Judd yanked me to him and I thought he might hit me. “My mom would think she asked to be hit by my dad. Like she brought it on herself. He was a predator though and she was weak. Those fuckers are predators and you were a child. You were too young to know what was happening and you’ve filled your head with fucking lies. Dammit, Tawny,” he said, shaking me by the shoulders. “You were what, twelve, thirteen? They screwed you up and you never healed right. You just tell yourself those damn lies again and again. You think them every time you pass a fucking mirror. I see the way you dodge anything with your reflection. That’s fucked up and you deserve to be free of it, but you can’t because your brain is wired to self-hatred.” Judd paused and pulled me into his arms. “You need help rewiring it.”

“What can some pill do though?”

“If it’s like my mom, it’ll just even out your moods. Make it easier for you to work through shit when you start feeling bad. It doesn’t make you happy. It just makes it easier for you to make yourself happy.”

I tried to imagine feeling calmer and being able to get stronger. Sometimes, I thought if I didn’t have Farah and now Judd, I would rather die than feel as bad as I did. If a pill kept me from feeling so bad, I wanted to try. When I was calmer, I knew I deserved to be happy. Now, finding Judd, I had a chance to be happier than I’d ever dreamed, but I was scared.

“Will you go with me to the doctor?” I asked, sounding like a kid.

Judd caressed my hair. “Fuck yeah, babe. I’ll do whatever you need because when you smile, it’s like the world is perfect. But when you say that ugly shit about yourself, I can barely keep from tearing this world apart for hurting you the way it has. We’ll do this together.”

Wrapping him tighter in my arm, I sighed. “I do want to smile and know what I really look like in the mirror. I want those things, but I’m scared to do anything different. I’m worried if I try and fail that I’ll know it’ll never be better.”

“If one thing doesn’t work, we’ll try something else,” he said, running his fingers through my messy hair. “We’ll try because that girl back with those bikers deserved to have a good life. We need to give her that.”

Suddenly, I felt like I was that girl again. Really felt the pain and shame. Remembered how my father wouldn’t look at me after Travis said I loved every moment. Mostly, I remembered how broken Farah was and how I worried she wouldn’t love me anymore. I wondered if every time Farah looked at me that she saw the whore coming with the man who tortured her?

Sobbing against Judd, I remembered how simple my dreams once were. Before those bikers showed up, all I wanted was to take my sister out for a birthday dinner at Dairy Queen. Why couldn’t that little girl have another chance to feel truly happy again?

By the time I calmed down and rested next to Judd on the cold ground, I already felt happier. I’d never said those ugly things out loud. Instead of keeping the pain inside, I showed Judd all of the painful scars and he still looked at me like I was beautiful. The smile he gave me as we returned to the Harley was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. My knight never stopped saving me.





Chapter Twenty Three


I was raised to believe therapy was something rich weak people did because they were too weak to know better. Even knowing most of the shit my family believed was stupid, I felt weird sitting in the shrink’s office. Judd sat next to me, messing around on his phone. I wasn’t sure what was so fascinating, but I sensed it was related to the mole. Once he was done texting his secret codes and sent them to Cooper, he smiled down at me.

“Having fun yet?” he asked.

Nodding, I ran my fingers over his angel tattoo. Even though Judd thought I was beautiful like the angel, I felt dirty sitting there with him.

“What if she’s mean? What if she calls me names like Aunt Pam said the therapist did to my cousin who killed herself?”

“If she’s a bitch, I’ll hold her down while you punch her in the face.”

Smiling weakly, I felt the panic growing. “What if she says I’m too fucked up to help?”

“She’s getting paid, babe. No way she tells you that you’re beyond help.”

Staring into his eyes, I fiddled with the crucifix necklace. “I’m scared.”

“I know, but I’ll be with you. If things go south, I’ll take you back to my place and make you feel better.”

“Therapy is for losers,” I whispered.

“My mom went to therapy and she’s not a loser.”

“Your mom has an exotic name. Is she exotic?”