Page 69
Terrified. Broken. In shock.
Silas hadn’t taxed him with the job of watching over me until the second time I tried to be free. After I’d been held hostage by Kent Ellison and his men.
Trevan stroked the pad of his thumb under the hollow of my eye. “You have always been my responsibility. Since the moment I saw you sitting on the top step of the house across from mine.”
My spirit swam. A thrilling of emotion. Affection and loss. I swallowed around the lump in my throat. “But somewhere along the way, I became a burden.”
“Never.” The single word sliced through the dense, thick air.
How could he argue it?
A tremble rocked me through. “You were the only person I could call. The only person I trusted to call.”
And I’d placed a burden on him he shouldn’t have to carry.
“I’m the only person you should have called.” It was a raspy slash of severity.
The secret Trevan had kept for me for so long shivered in the atmosphere. A dark energy that pulled between us.
Memories assaulted.
“You bitch. You don’t get to play with me. This is over when I say it’s over.”
Surprise jolted through her. She couldn’t believe Patrick’s venom. The rage.
She jerked her hand away. “Don’t ever touch me again.”
She turned again, but this time he grabbed her by the hair. Pain splintered across her scalp as he yanked so hard she was sure he tore out a fistful of it. “I’ve only started with you.”
“I was an idiot. Both times,” I whispered.
“You were searching for something you weren’t allowed to have,” Trevan argued.
“And you were always there for me. Always running to me the moment I asked you to. Just like right now.”
He wouldn’t be in this bed any other way.
“Feel like I’m gonna die whenever I’m not there and you need me. Whenever it feels like I’m going to be too late. Like I was then.” Harsh emphasis curled out with Trevan’s words.
My spirit squeezed with his confession, and he seemed to war before he shifted gears, referring to my second massive mistake. “When I found out Kent had you…”
His jaw clutched. A spark of metal and flint in the darkest night. “Your brother had me locked in my room at the old clubhouse to keep me from going for you myself. Sure I was going to ruin the entire mission by trying to get to you.”
“I didn’t know that.” Gutted awe filled my whisper.
His chuckle was raw. “We both were desperate to get you out, but Silas at least had his head on his shoulders. The second we got the news, I was on my bike and ready to roll. No plan. No backup. Phoenix and Regan had to pull me off to stop me, and Silas instructed them to drag me inside and lock me in my room since I refused to follow orders.”
An order given by my brother was law.
One he’d been willing to break for me.
A weighted silence hung heavy between us before he murmured, “Thought I’d lose my goddamn mind during those five days. Not knowing if you were okay. Terrified of what they were doing to you. Knowing I’d kill every single one of them for hurting you in any way.”
The terror I’d been holding onto for six months seized my breaths. Terror that I’d tried to lock down and stamp out. Pretend as if it didn’t happen.
The wounds so raw and real, even though that time felt like a dream. A nightmare that had held me pinned to a barren, dingy floor.
Trevan’s massive body roiled. Restraint and hate and care.
