Dominated (The Enforcers 2)

“I kn-know,” she choked out. “I d-don’t want to c-cry but I can’t s-stop. Oh, Silas, what am I going to do?” she asked miserably. “What am I going to do?”

He pulled her into his arms and she buried her face in his neck as sobs erupted, shaking her entire body. For seemingly an eternity, she sat there, huddled in his arms, sobbing her heart out. When finally some of the horrible sound coming from her abated, she lay limply against Silas, so much misery in her heart and soul that she wanted to die from it.

“You won’t die from it, honey,” Silas said, his voice rich with sympathy, making her realize she’d said her last thought aloud. “It may feel like it right now, but in time, this too shall pass.”

“I used to love that quote,” she said softly.

“And not now?”

She shook her head. “This won’t ever pass, Silas. You don’t just recover from something like this. Nothing will ever be the same again.”

“Drake will pull his head out of his ass and realize what a terrible mistake he made,” Silas said, though he sounded pissed that Drake had ever believed such a horrible thing about her anyway.

“As you said, even if that happens, it will be too late,” she said softly. “He didn’t believe me when it mattered. He didn’t have faith in me at all. If he doesn’t believe in me, how can I be with him? I don’t want others to convince him that I’m innocent. He should know that, Silas. He should know. I’ve never given him any reason to distrust me. I’ve been nothing but honest and open with him and yet he never believed in me the way I believed in him.”

She shook her head sadly and closed her eyes, wondering how she could have been so wrong about the man she had loved. Still loved no matter how much she wished differently. But love wasn’t something that could be turned off as simply as a light switch. She should hate him. Despise and loathe him with every part of her. And yet she ached. She bled. She grieved.

“I understand, doll. It’s a hell of a mess and I hate to see you hurting so badly. You of all people don’t deserve this.”

Silence fell and he held her for another long moment until finally the medication took full effect and her eyelids grew heavy. When he registered how limp she was, he carefully pulled away and eased her head down onto the cushion of the sofa.

“Rest for a little while,” he whispered. “I’ll take you to the apartment when you wake.”

• • •

Drake stood at the window overlooking the busy street that the entrance to Impulse faced and stared broodingly over the dull, gray winter morning. The weather fit his mood to a T. It had been tailor-made just for him. The bleakness spreading like a stain on his soul after Evangeline’s deception and betrayal was insidious and hopeless. Like he’d never feel the sun on his skin again, forever doomed to a life of cold drabness.

“Why did you do it, Angel?” he whispered. His eyes closed against the wash of pain. “I gave you everything. But it wasn’t enough. Why?”

It always circled back to what he already knew and, as he’d confided in Evangeline, stupidly thinking she was different. If his own parents couldn’t love him, how could he expect anyone else to ever love him?

The answer was, he couldn’t.

And he’d never make the mistake of trying to make someone love him again.

A sound at his door had him spinning around, a black expression on his face, a warning to whoever was trespassing that they were not welcome. But as his men filed in, expressions of worry, concern, anger . . . fury . . . all were reflected. But the single thing every expression had in common was judgment.

It fired his temper and sent his mood even blacker, and he hadn’t thought that was possible.

“What the fuck do you want?” Drake snapped in an icy, rigid tone.

None of them tried to disguise the disgust in their expression as they stared Drake down.

“Do you honest-to-God think that Evangeline ratted us out to the goddamn cops?” Jax demanded. “Can you look me in the eye and tell me you believe that shit?”

“You were there. You saw what I saw. What you don’t know is that she was approached by the cops when she was out to lunch with Zander, Thane and Hatcher. And yes, I do have proof of that conversation, since she’s the one who told me. After Hatcher had already called me, of course.”

“But she didn’t know Hatcher had called you,” Thane bit out, seemingly pissed that his lunch with Evangeline was helping build the evidence against her.

“Says you,” Drake said mockingly.