“And your dad?”
“Well, let’s see, if I could get him away from work to even ask him to come with me all I’d achieve would be to make him feel even guiltier than he does now.”
“He’s avoiding you?”
“For some reason, he thinks it’s his fault I was hurt. I guess because they wanted money from him. No matter how much I try to tell him he isn’t to blame, it doesn’t seem to sink in.”
And once again she was taking care of everyone else around her.
“I hate feeling weak, Curt.”
He ran his hand over her hair. It reached past her shoulder blades now and was filled with strands of light blonde to dark brown. The scent of strawberries hit him, making him nearly groan with need.
“You’re not weak.”
“Yes, I am. I can’t sleep without having a light on. I wake up every night with my heart racing, feeling ill, and with no memory of what I was even dreaming about. Although maybe that won’t be a problem now. I know what my nightmares are now, don’t I? Do you think that will make it easier or harder? I have someone to drive me around. A chauffeur whose gaze never stops moving, who stares at everyone with suspicion and never lets his guard down. I’m living back home with my parents. Other than my therapy sessions I don’t go anywhere, I don’t see anyone. I’m scared. All. The. Time. Do you know what that feels like? Of course, you don’t. Because you’re you. If that village had been attacked when you were there, you’d probably have had those assholes disabled in under five minutes, have rescued everyone, and then just gone on with your day. All without breaking a sweat.”
“I think you overestimate my abilities,” he said dryly.
“I want to be more like you. Will you teach me how?”
She wanted to be an emotionally challenged asshole with no soul? At least that’s what his wife had called him. Right before she’d walked out the door and died in a car crash.
“You don’t want to be more like me.”
“You want to know the only time I feel safe anymore? When I’m with you.”
Jesus, she was killing him. This right here is why he shouldn’t have played with fire and brought her home with him.
“Jenna—”
“Will you teach me how to defend myself? How to make sure no one else ever hurts me again?”
Oh, fuck.
“Jenna, I can find you—”
“No, it has to be you, don’t you understand? I can’t let anyone else close to me. Do you think I could sit on just anyone’s lap? When everything came back to me today, when I felt physically ill with all the horror and fear, do you know what the one thought was that got me through? It was knowing that you’ll always come for me. I’ve never felt about anyone the way I feel about you. It’s always been you, Curt. Always you.”
She leaned up and kissed him. And when he felt her lips against his, so gentle and unsure, he almost gave in to the urges riding him. It would have been so easy to roll her beneath him, to take from her. And take and take.
He slid his hand up her side until he encountered the underside of her breast.
“Curt, yes,” she murmured, and he froze.
This was Jenna. He didn’t do this with Jenna.
He pushed her back, his movement so hard and fast she almost fell from his lap. Fuck! This is why he stuck to subs at the club. Because they knew the score. That it was just about release. It was play. Nothing more. They knew to obey him without question. To give him their submission. There were rules they both had to follow and there were safe guards in place so that if anything went wrong, those subs were protected. From him.
Here, there was no one to watch over Jenna—just him, and he couldn’t trust himself with her. He couldn’t trust himself not to let the darkness inside him come out and hurt her.
He grabbed her before she fell and stood her up before stepping hastily away.
“Curt, what is it? Don’t you feel the same way about me?”
“No, I fucking don’t.” He laughed. It wasn’t a pleasant sound. He saw her wince, her face turning white. He had to do something to make her see that he wasn’t her fucking knight in shining armor. He wasn’t good. He wasn’t her savior. He couldn’t keep her safe.
“That was a mistake,” he told her.