Salvation (The Protectors 2)

I couldn’t even finish the word because it was so disgusting and ugly.

“Ronan,” Seth said and I felt him come up behind me. His hand closed over my arm and I immediately stepped out of his reach. He got the message and stepped around me but kept his distance. “Ronan, I wanted what happened between us. You must know that’s all I’ve ever wanted,” he admitted quietly.

I shook my head and turned away from him with the intention of making my way back down the beach but he blocked my path.

“I panicked because I couldn’t get my hands free...”

Yeah, because I’d treated him like every cheap fuck I’d had in the years since Trace’s death and I’d tainted him with the stain of my dark, twisted need.

“Seth, you don’t have to explain. What I did to you was unforgiveable.”

Seth seemed agitated as he studied me. Finally, he said, “Trace never told you, did he?”

“Told me what?”

“About what really happened that day.”

I knew exactly what day he was referring to because there were only two days in Seth’s life that he would refer to that way and Trace had only been alive for one of them. I’d been with Trace when he’d gotten the call that his family had been attacked during a brutal home invasion. At fourteen, Seth had been the only one who’d survived the nightmare and even then, it had been close because he’d been stabbed repeatedly. Trace and I had both been deployed in Afghanistan at the time and I hadn’t been able to get leave to return with him to the States, since we’d needed to keep our relationship under wraps.

“What do you mean?” I asked as fear of what I would hear churned in my gut. Trace had been tight-lipped about the whole incident, but I’d always attributed his reluctance to discuss it as being due to the brutal way in which his parents had been killed.

“The men…they were convinced that my dad had a safe in the house. They didn’t believe him when he said he didn’t, so they used me and my mom to force him to talk.”

I shook my head in disbelief as I began to understand what he was telling me.

“My mom…one of the guys, he took her upstairs. We could hear her screaming…” Seth managed to get out before he began sobbing. Even though I’d told myself I wouldn’t touch him again, I dragged him into my arms and wrapped my arms around him as his tears soaked through my shirt. I dropped my lips to the top his head.

“My dad was begging them to stop. Then one of the guys grabbed me. My hands…my hands were tied behind my back…”

I closed my eyes as a fresh wave of guilt washed through me. “Jesus, Seth, I’m so fucking sorry.”

“I tried to be brave. I thought if I screamed, it would be so much harder for my dad.” Seth shook his head against my chest. “It hurt too much. They kept cutting me over and over. My stomach, my chest. My father was screaming and crying. Then they stabbed me before going after him. My mom…she’d finally stopped screaming at some point.”

I held Seth as he continued to softly cry against me. Finally, he pulled back and I dropped my arms. “I just got scared, Ronan. But not of you…not of what you were doing.”

I managed a nod even though his words did nothing to ease my guilt. No matter what the outcome, I never should have touched him. I remembered his inexperienced kisses and another layer of shame fell on my already heavy shoulders. “Seth, was that the first time someone touched you like that?” I asked.

His eyes dropped to the sand and I saw his pale cheeks flush with color.

Fuck.

“It won’t happen again,” I finally said. “It can’t.”

“But-”

“It can’t,” I repeated firmly, my eyes pinning him. The strands of his hair were starting to grow heavy with moisture and I noticed the way his skin glistened beneath the light drizzle. But when a shiver went through his body, I said, “Let’s go back to the house.”

He nodded but didn’t move. I finally moved past him and hoped that he would follow.

He did.

* * *

After we’d reached the house, I’d urged Seth to take a shower and I’d used the time to retrieve my car which was parked about a half a mile from the house, on a small dirt road that provided access to the woods behind the Nichols estate. I had no trouble getting through the security gate at the end of the driveway since the code was exactly the same as it had been years ago when Trace had brought me here to meet his family. Back then, the house had been alive with warmth and happiness and I’d reveled in being so easily accepted into the fold. The concept of family was as foreign to me as my sexuality being accepted without question or contempt.