Wretched Love

SWISS

I watched Kate sleep for a long time after I took her clothes off, cataloging every inch of her skin, making note of what was healing quickest, what was takin’ longer. Every time my eyes touched a mark on her skin, I saw red.

She didn’t so much as move as I took off her clothes, put her under the covers. Not even when I moved the chair at the end of the bed so I could sit beside her.

No, she was out. Understandably. Purging all that shit, secrets she’d kept her entire adult life. That must’ve been like running a fucking marathon.

She shared it with me, even though it hurt her. Fuck, it took every ounce of energy and life from her. I watched it happen. She did that for me. For us.

It was something I couldn’t wrap my head around. A weight on my chest that kept me up the entire night, watching her, making sure her own chest rose and fell. I’d imagined the ways I would’ve killed the fuck who did that to her if he hadn’t been lucky enough to die from a heart attack. The fuck who had raped her.

Stole her innocence.

Her first experience of sex was forced. By a man she trusted, one who took something from her. Something I could never get back. Something I could never fix. And I didn’t even get the satisfaction of torturing and killing him.

The mother... If she was still alive, I’d deal with her.

Kate had gone from that house straight to a life with someone who made her feel worthless. Who belittled and terrified her. Another motherfucker who had abused her.

My blood was pumping hot through my body as I stared at Kate. It blew my mind. I had no idea how she’d survived all of that and still became the person she was. Soft. Loving. Magnificent.

It would torture me for the rest of my life, what she’d been through. What I couldn’t change. It’s what kept me up all fucking night, staring at her, stewing in my rage.

It was just before dawn when I rose from that chair. I’d been battling with the decision I’d finally made. Had tried to convince myself to peel off my clothes and get into bed with her like my instincts were screaming at me to do. But I had other instincts. Ones that were louder, hungry, and more powerful.

Those instincts had me brushing the hair from her head, laying a kiss there and leaving the house.

I’d come to know a lot about Kate’s body, attuned myself to it, out of survival more than anything. I’d watched her while she was unconscious for days. Fucking days. With a tube down her throat. Watching as her bruises bloomed. Hearing how her voice changed after someone tried to strangle the life from her.

I knew Kate. Every inch of her. So I was mostly certain that I had a handful more hours before she woke up. Which was the only reason why I left in the first place. If I had an inkling that her sleep was thin, that she was apt to wake up from one of those horrific fucking nightmares, I wouldn’t have gone.

But she was out.

So I’d climbed on my bike and rode here, creeping through the silent halls of the club before heading down to the bowels. Where we took people who made it personal. Who needed to die a specific way.

The room smelled of piss and shit.

This fuck soiled himself the first fucking day down here. ’Cause he was that much of a coward. The ones who laid hands on women always were.

He’d cried, begged, of course. They all did. I’d gotten tired of that and gagged him, kept it that way. Hades had fed him enough food and water to keep him alive ’cause I couldn’t stomach giving this piece of shit anything that would prolong his life.

There were muffled cries against the gag as I walked into the room.

I ignored them and yanked over a metal stool to face him in the chair he was tied to.

“I’ve heard a little story about you.” I struggled to keep my voice even. “About your past.” I clenched my fists on top of my thighs. “With my woman.”

I gritted the last word out, unable to lock my shit down, thinking of Kate telling that story.

The story that fucking tore my insides apart. I’d had to stand still, stock fucking still, the entire time, even though I’d been desperate to go to her. To touch her. Comfort her. But I couldn’t. ’Cause if I had moved during the time she had been telling me about the stepfather who fucking raped her, about the husband who beat her, there would’ve been no comfort. I would’ve torn the room apart. Then I would’ve come here and put a bullet in his brain. No matter what promises I’d made. I would’ve done it. Would’ve ruined Kate and I if I’d moved.

So I’d stayed as still as a statue while my woman bared herself to me. Second to holding my daughter, to finding Kate on the side of the road, it was the hardest moment of my fucking life.

“Years of her life you stole,” I said quietly. “Fuckin’ years. That she had to live under your rule.” My eyes met his. His were wide with fear. At least one of them was. The other was swollen shut. He had a fractured eye socket. That’s what I’d been going for. Recreating every single one of Kate’s injuries, but with a little more flair, of course.

He’d be lucky if he regained full sight in that eye.

Lucky.