Cade hissed out unintelligible words.
Lucky brought his fist down on the table so hard the wood cracked.
Steg hadn’t moved a muscle, his eyes hard and shimmering.
“I’m just gonna preface the next part of the story by saying he did not rape me,” I said, deciding not to tell them everything. I could tell my girlfriends; they could heal. These men couldn’t, despite how strong they were, knowing that would leave a mark, so I protected them from that.
Luke squeezed my hand tighter that time, then brought it up so he could press his lips to it.
“He handcuffed me to the bed. With less-than-noble intentions. Before he could consummate those intentions, Luke arrived.” That time I squeezed. “And he killed him.”
The room paused. Everything. For a second, no one seemed to breathe, and a collection of eyes went to Luke. For the first time not in hatred or anger.
“Let’s be clear here and say that he didn’t technically need to kill him,” I continued. “I’d managed to get him off me and chewing on his tongue. Luke could’ve done the ‘cop’ thing. Shot him in the leg. Restrained him. Cuffed him. Read him his rights. But he didn’t. Because of me. He sacrificed everything he stood for because of me.”
I looked around the room. At the men I grew up with. Who I considered family. My eyes lingered on Steg before landing on Cade.
“I’m not asking you to sacrifice everything you believe in,” I whispered. “I’m not even asking you to kill for me. The opposite, in fact. I’m just asking you to do something for me. Let me be happy. Let me live with the man I love without the fear that the family I love will kill him. Because to be clear, ending this, ending him, that’s me gone. One bullet will end two lives.”
There was silence at the table for a long time.
The longest.
“Where’d you bury him?” Gage asked conversationally.
“Quarry that got shut down a few years ago, twenty minutes south,” Luke answered.
Gage nodded. “Nice.”
I stifled my grin.
“He hit you and you didn’t come to us?” Cade asked quietly. Only I could hear the hurt in his tone.
I softened my gaze. “I didn’t need to,” I said. “I know this club, know you. You’ve been determined to shield me from the worst of the worst, from all my Fuck-Ups. And I’ll love you for that. Among other reasons, like your great taste in wives and cute kids. But I didn’t need that shield that night. Luke was there. Luke’s always been there.”
My eyes moved to Luke, who was staring at me intently. “I’ll always be here, babe,” he promised.
There was a long pause at the table as everyone digested my words.
“Fuckin’ hell, can we stop with the sappy shit?” Gage boomed. “We’ve established that Rosie is a badass bitch, so is it really a surprise that she’s in love with a badass motherfucker too?” he asked the table.
I grinned.
“Can we please get back to figuring out how I’m going to get my killing in this year?” he continued.
The air around the table softened.
So did Cade’s gaze, for a moment at least. Then it hardened again.
“Yeah, let’s get to the killing.”
Chapter Twenty-One
One Week Later
We were staying at Luke’s house because Gage was at mine.
He’d offered to take back his old room at the clubhouse, but I knew no amount of disinfectant would clean out whatever had gone on there.
That and I was afraid.
Afraid of my own house.
The memories, the demons lurking there from that night. What happened. I was terrified that if I went back in there, it would all come back. He would come back: his touch, the invasion of my body. And I’d be reminded of just how easy it was.
I couldn’t. And it made me realize that this was something I was going to live with for the rest of my life. It didn’t make me weak; it would make me stronger. One day. And I knew Luke was right, I did have to talk about what happened. Staying silent, blaming myself when none of what happened to me was my fault, that was weak.
So I’d talk.
Eventually.
But right then, we were about to go out to dinner for Luke’s parents’ anniversary. We’d already done the official dinner with the parents a few days after we’d temporarily moved back to Amber.
I’d been nervous. Very nervous. It was funny, I never thought I’d care so much about something like that. But I cared about Luke more than anything. And he’d given everything to fit in with my family. I was terrified that I couldn’t do the same, that his family wouldn’t want me with him.
That couldn’t have been further from the truth. His father had answered the door with a huge grin, taking me into his smoke-scented embrace.
“Ah, I’m so glad my boy’s finally come to his senses,” he chuckled as soon as he’d let me go.