Revelation (The Protectors 7)

“It’s for the best, Lucy. We can end all this and things will go back to normal.”

“Normal,” she whispered. “My mom’s dead and my stepdad killed her. I don’t have a normal anymore.” She dropped her eyes and leaned heavily against the chain holding the swing up. “I don’t have anything anymore.”

“You have Ethan,” I offered.

She sniffed and said, “He only took me in because he had no choice. He has a whole life he gets to go back to,” Lucy murmured. “He’s not going to want a reminder of everything Eric did to him around.”

“You’re not a reminder,” I pointed out. “Ethan loves you very much and I’m sure he’ll do everything he can to make sure you two can stay together.”

It was a point I really had no right to make, but I’d seen the way Ethan looked at the girl. Circumstances might have forced them together, but he’d given up everything for her and I knew he hadn’t done that out of sense of obligation.

There was no response from Lucy. It was a reminder of how badly I sucked at this communication shit. “I thought I was alone when I was your age too,” I said softly. “My life changed in the space of a few minutes and everything I ever knew was gone just like that,” I said as I snapped my fingers.

“What happened?” Lucy asked.

I glanced at her and said, “A miracle.” As her brow furrowed in disbelief, I felt a smile tugging at my mouth. “My grandmother,” I clarified. “I didn’t even know I had a grandmother. There I was with nothing…scared and alone…broken,” I murmured. “And she swept in and said she was my family now and that everything would be okay.”

“And was it?”

Since I couldn’t lie to her, I said, “It was as good as it could be.”

The answer seemed to satisfy her.

“Lucy, I’m sorry if I scared you last night. I can’t tell you why I reacted like I did because it’s just not something I talk about…with anyone. But I hope you’ll believe me when I say I never would have hurt you or Ethan.”

She cast me a sidelong glance. “We weren’t going to hurt you,” she said softly.

I sighed and said, “Before all this shit happened with Eric, you probably never looked at other people and saw only monsters, right?” At Lucy’s nod, I said, “All I see are monsters…until they prove to me they’re not. I’m not saying it makes any sense-”

“It does-” she interjected. “I see Eric everywhere,” she admitted. “In every face I see. It wasn’t like that before…”

“Before he killed your mom.”

She nodded.

“It’ll get better,” I offered.

Her eyes settled on me. “Will it?” she whispered, her voice heavy with doubt.

Since I couldn’t make her that promise, I didn’t.

“You’ll keep him safe, right?”

“I will,” I said. “I swear it.”

She nodded again, but didn’t say anything else. I got up to leave, but stopped when she said my name. I turned to look at her as a shy smile spread across her lips. “I’m sorry I shot your truck.”

I chuckled. “I’m not,” I said. “Reminds me how glad I am that you have shitty aim.”

Her light laughter followed me back to the house.

Chapter Ten

Ethan

“Jesus, I don’t think I can do this,” I murmured as I leaned forward in the luxurious seat and wrapped an arm around myself in the hopes I could stave off the nausea that was threatening to crawl up my throat.

Cain didn’t say anything for which I was glad for. Platitudes about how things would be fine wouldn’t make me feel any better.

“How long has it been since you’ve seen them?” Cain asked when I finally straightened.

We were sitting on Ronan’s private jet which had just started its descent and was scheduled to land at a private airport just outside of San Francisco.

Home.

“Almost four years,” I said softly. I held my tongue as Cain got up from his seat and came to sit down next to me. I assumed he’d done it so he could hear me better over the din of the engines. But I couldn’t help but fixate on the way his powerful thighs bunched beneath his snug jeans as he got himself buckled in. Or how close his arm was to mine despite the wide seats.

Things hadn’t exactly worked out according to plan after I’d called Arthur from what Ronan had assured me was a secure, untraceable phone about a week after I’d told Ronan and his men my tale. Arthur had been horrified to have to tell me that my package with Lucy’s phone had inadvertently been mailed to my family two days earlier when Arthur’s daughter had come across it on his desk. Arthur had been in the hospital for a routine procedure so he hadn’t been around to explain that despite the package being addressed and the postage already affixed, it wasn’t supposed to have been sent. I’d assured Arthur that it was okay and that I’d retrieve the package from my family, but as soon as I’d hung up the phone, I’d nearly lost it. Not only had I not seen my family in years, they were about to get a letter explaining why I’d been absent out of their lives for so long including information about what Eric had been doing to me. Worst of all, the way I’d written the letter along with the instructions about what they should do with the phone had made it sound like I was gone.