“I wish that were the truth.”
I wished he were dead or rotting behind bars, right where the sadist belonged. But no. He was free.
Because of me.
Because I’d thought I was brave and it’d turned out I was nothing but a coward.
Lyrik lifted my wrist and pressed the underside to his mouth, over the scars that remained there from where I’d struggled and fought to break the ties, where ink disguised the evidence of my bonds.
“The scars are my enemy,” I whispered hard. “I covered my wrists next, and again, it felt good. It became this sick pattern. Every time I got scared or felt small, I would get another tattoo. Even after the exterior wounds were covered. Until I’d built up this guise that warned everyone off. I never wanted anyone to see.”
He tucked his chin and at the same time he lifted mine toward him. Intense, knowing eyes darted all over my face. Searching. Seeking. Defining. “But you let me.”
A roll of soggy laughter rolled from somewhere within. “Maybe that’s because you’re the first person who refused to let me hide.”
Maybe it was because he was all the things I had always wanted, but shouldn’t have. Couldn’t have. The darkest light. A disturbed safety. Stony and impenetrable and devastatingly soft.
I smiled a wistful smile. “And I think I’d been running from you for so long, when I finally stopped, you crashed right into me and ripped everything open wide.”
And it just kept spilling out.
“You revealed things I didn’t even know were still there.” Tears gathered in my eyes. I swatted at the one that fell. “I hate being this person. Weak. Fragile. Powerless.”
He held me tighter, the words a breath at the top of my head. “No…sweet, brave, beautiful Blue. Pretty sure you might be the strongest person I know. You’re here. Alive. Living. Strong enough to open that gorgeous mouth and voice what the sick bastard did to you.”
The words dropped low. “And now you’re here, lying with me. You were strong enough to leave.”
I looked up at him and revealed the one thing I wasn’t sure I wanted him to know. “I didn’t leave…I escaped.”
And I’d been running ever since.
Darkness clouded around his features, a storm gathering strength. “I want to know who he is. Just a fucking name. That’s all I need.”
The words trembled. “And I just want to forget. I want you to erase him. Like you promised you would.”
Not drag him out into the light.
Because I wasn’t ready. And I wasn’t sure I was ever going to be.
Pure menace rumbled at the top of my head. “Erase is exactly what I want to do.”
This man. Menacing and terrifying and intimidating.
And I’d never felt safer.
I drew in a breath and let my fingertips play over the bars of the song that wound up his arm. I wondered if I could decipher his song. Flowers and leaves climbed in between, and in the muted light, I squinted, focusing in on the name hidden within.
Brendon.
My gut twisted in a slow, sinking dread as I carefully traced the lettering.
As if I’d touched an apparition, fingers disappearing into the misty vapors.
I knew the moment it struck him. A pain so brutal I felt it splitting through him and crashing into me. And again Lyrik was flinching. Deflecting. Shielding and shuttering. Shutting me out.
Two seconds after I’d let him in.
Slowly, I withdrew my shaking hand and tried to reassemble some of my well-practiced, hardened exterior. Because my insides felt raw and achy and sore. As if I was bleeding out. Bleeding for this boy when he was only going to cut me deeper.
God, this got messy and fast. And I knew better. I knew it all along.
“I should go,” I muttered as I rolled from him.
He snatched my wrist. “Stay.”
I gasped, and he loosened his hold. Those dark, penetrating eyes swam with turmoil. “Please,” he said.
“I have no idea what you want from me. What you’re asking of me.”
“Two months, Blue. I’m asking you for two months.”
Could I cope with that? With getting this small piece of him and maybe finding some of the missing pieces of me?
Tenderly, he ran his fingers through my hair. “Please.”
“Okay,” I whispered, because with him no didn’t seem to exist.
IN THE NEAR DARKNESS, I sat at the tiny desk in my bedroom. I stared at the blackened laptop screen. Willing it to stop screaming at me to search for what it had concealed inside.
I couldn’t sleep. Couldn’t focus.
Since Lyrik had torn me open wide two days ago, it was as if my past was nipping at my heels. Razor-sharp teeth bared, waiting for the perfect moment to sink right into my Achilles heel. It was going to be a hard fall when I finally hit the ground.
But I could feel it. Advancing and encroaching and invading. Like a dark cloud that ate up the earth and was getting ready to swallow me.