I took time to unpack, forcing down the warm fuzzies the renovated room was giving me. I couldn’t believe Wrath had spent all this time making this room exactly how he knew I’d like it.
Wrath was not that sweet. I’d seen him wrap his hand around a man’s throat and squeeze because he’d ogled me a little too long at some club party. He’d nearly crushed his windpipe and it was over nothing in my opinion.
I didn’t belong to Wrath. I was a free woman. Even if he and I were married, another man still had the right to look my way without the threat of being harmed.
“Bath’s ready,” Wrath called, interrupting my musing.
“Okay.”
“Why are you white knucklin’ that rock, Moonbeam?”
I sighed. “I just can’t figure you out.”
“What can I help clarify?”
“You take all this time to make my room perfect.” I met his eyes. “Thank you for that, by the way.”
“You’re welcome.”
“You’re running a bath for me right now, you’re gonna feed me, and make sure I have wine. You found wine, right?”
He smiled slowly. “I did.”
“Okay, good, thank you,” I breathed out. “But all of that sweetness can change in a split second, and you can kill a man with your bare hands.” I raised my hand and made a clamping motion. “Just squeeze the life out of him.”
He crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow. “You talkin’ about the shithead a couple years ago?”
“He didn’t seem like a shithead.”
“Well, how about I enlighten you, Moonbeam?”
Here comes the feral cat voice again.
I wrinkled my nose.
“Shithead had come in with a couple of his buddies thinkin’ he was gonna prospect with the club.”
“Yeah, he told me.”
“You weren’t supposed to be there,” he growled.
“I know,” I snapped back. “It was either be at the club or have to listen to Raquel and Orion go at it at home.”
“You should have chosen the townhouse.”
“Can we move off the subject of you telling me where I’m supposed to be, please? You’re not my keeper.”
He took a deep breath and studied me. “Shitheadhad been caught with his pants down, literally, when he tried to assault one of the waitresses at Nocturn.”
I gasped, my stomach suddenly roiling. “What?”
“Come to find out, he’d done it more than once and he wasn’t here to join the recruits, he was here for a lesson.”
“What kind of lesson?”
He shook his head. “Not important. Let’s just say, he won’t be able to do it to anyone else in the future. But that night, when he looked at you like you were up next on his list of victims, I educated him otherwise,” he said, closing the distance between us. “I know your head’s been fucked with your whole life, and people in your past have betrayed you, but I’ve got your back.” He cupped my face. “I’ve always had your back, even when it didn’t look like I did.”
“But why?”