She sniffles and nods. “He thought, Fight fire with fire, you know? He thought bad men like them would help kill a bad man like you.”
“And you were his bargaining chip?”
“Worse. I was his sacrificial lamb. He threw me in Logan’s lap and… and…”
I run a thumb across her tear-stained cheek. “You don’t have to say this,” I whisper fiercely. “You don’t have to re-live it.”
Renata shakes her head. “No. I need to. It feels… it feels important, for some reason. I don’t know why, but it does.”
I draw in a slow, shuddering breath. Her face is hot beneath my palm. We’re locked together, so close our breath is mingling between us. The dim lights glint off the metal and leather on all sides. When it catches her eyes, they sparkle like stars.
“I was young. Naïve. I thought Drago had my best interests at heart. But my wedding night was a rude awakening. He was… rough. He wanted to hurt me. And it did, Kian. It hurt me so fucking bad. He…”
She stops short. The words are too painful to speak. “He broke me,” she says at last.
“No.”
“No?”
“No, he didn’t.” She looks up at me in confusion and I press on. “You’re not broken. You’ve fought me at every turn. Even when the odds were against you. If anything, what happened only made you stronger.”
She gives me a sad, tentative smile, though I can tell she doesn’t mean it. “I can’t believe I just told you that.”
“Why did you?”
“I don’t know. Maybe I’m sick of trying to hide from my own thoughts,” she admits. “Maybe… I want you to understand me the way I’m trying to understand you.”
She looks down between her feet as though she’s revealed something excessively, embarrassingly personal. The air is fragile with tension. Like it might shatter at any moment.
“I can’t save you, Renata,” I whisper. “And you sure as hell can’t save me.”
“Save you from what?”
“You’re not the only one with demons.”
She reaches out and rests her fingertips on my forearm. So light and graceful that I can barely sense it.
“What happened?” she asks.
“This place happened.”
“The Room?”
“Yes.”
“You brought someone here,” she guesses.
I nod. “Yes.” I can feel the enormity of the story pressing up in my throat. Begging to be told. To be shown the light so I can purge it from me.
But it’s too big. Too painful. Too many sharp edges to cut myself on.
“Do you know what happened after I was married?” Renata asks.
I meet her gaze.
“Drago realized quickly that Logan had no interest in a real alliance. He played us both. And Drago, God help him… he came to save me. He pulled all his allies together, called in every favor he could, and he stormed the clubhouse. Killed them all. Burned it to the ground.”
I recoil, surprised that he would do that for her.