He knocked ever so gently before he opened the bathroom door. I was naked, perched on the side with just my feet and calves submerged.
“I drew it too hot.” Rafa leaned over me and turned the tap to cold.
“Baby, I just want to take care of you right now. I need to. It will help me to feel better.”
He shucked his shirt and even though I’d seen his chest before, seeing it reminded me of our tryst on the cam-girl site.
“Fino said he watched us, told me he uploaded the video.”
Rafa’s face fell, then his hands balled into fists.
“I think he was bluffing though. I searched his machine and the websites and I didn’t find anything.”
“Which one is Fino? The hack the Gabriellis hired?”
“He’s the one you, uh—” I faltered. “He was the guy you beat with your gun.”
“Good,” Rafa said and crossed his arms. He stared at the wall and I could tell he’d been thrown off and his mood had gone downhill.
I slid into the bath and submerged myself up to my neck.
“Those men are evil, Rafa. They had it coming and deserved what they got.” Rafa nodded but his eyes seemed glazed over in thought.
“I don’t know that I can be good for you, Fio. I tried to paint a picture that we’re a big happy family, fully functional. But the truth is, you should run while you still can. We’re not a big happy family, especially not me. And there’s a reason I’ve avoided relationships up until now.”
I reached up and took his hand. He let me hold it, but I didn’t think he was going to let me talk my way out of him telling me whatever it was he felt he needed to tell me.
“You scare me, Tatum.”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
Seeing Rafa attack that man like a complete animal made me realize there was a lot more to him than I could see on the surface. He maintained a placid exterior, but it was obvious things were not so calm underneath. They say still waters run deep and it was easy to see that was the case with this man.
I probably should have been terrified of someone like him, who could turn violent on a dime, but I wasn’t because I knew what brought him back was the sound of my voice. When I’d asked him to stop beating Fino in the woods, he didn’t hesitate. It told me that Rafa did have impulse control, especially when it came to my well-being.
“No, I’m sorry. I was so stupid. I have a really hard time getting out of my head. I’ve had a rough life, the type of life that someone can’t really come back from. I’ve never felt a connection to anyone before, that’s why I hide behind the screen and don’t participate in real life so much.”
I felt my heart pounding as I listened to Rafa. Part of me was afraid I was about to be dumped, and another part of me was terrified to hear the story that made the Connor brothers so unique. I could tell they weren’t your average everyday set of siblings, something extraordinary had happened to them and it made them the extraordinary people they were today.
But I knew without a doubt in the deepest recesses of my heart that he was mine and I was his, and that had already been decided in the stars.
“Your mother was abusive?”
Rafa turned from me, got up and walked over to the mirror behind me. I could hear him taking deep breaths. I wasn’t sure if I did something to upset him, asked the wrong thing, maybe at the wrong time but I knew if we were going to have something together, he would have to open up to me. I needed to know what happened so that we could move forward. I wanted this to be real—not just a passing encounter I would always remember, compare everything else to.
“My mother was really fucked up. I’m not sure if it was the drugs or if she was mentally ill, but her behavior was wrong, it was sick. My mother was sadistic, Tatum. She used me and my brothers in ways you can’t imagine.”
Rafa walked back over to me and turned around, exposing his back to me. His back was beautiful, muscular and sculpted, but it was also covered in scars and my heart broke seeing the remnants of wounds on him. The entirety of his back was covered in tiny holes that looked like burns around those marks were slash-like scars, some shallow, some deep. It was a palimpsest of torture, a memoire of pain.
“Rafa,” I whispered. I got up out of the tub and walked over to him leaving a puddle of water in my wake. I didn’t know what to say, so instead, I wrapped my arms around him and gently kissed the scars one by one.