“Nina, I’m going to get you in the shower. Is that okay?”
“Why? The blood?” She panics.
“No, no blood. You’re just really hot.”
“Okay.”
She looks up at me, my chest aching with the hurt in her eyes.
God, this is all my fault.
Why did I bring that shit up with her mum?
I lift her in my arms, carrying her to the en suite. I don’t put her down, walking in the shower with her locked tight in my arms. I reach in and turn on the spray, sitting with my back to the wall as the warm water runs over her.
She lies broken in my arms.
My beautiful broken Pixie.
“He hit me,” she whispers after a few minutes of silence.
“Who?” I demand, fighting to keep my voice steady.
“I don’t know. I never knew their names, but he hit me. At least, I think he did.”
Rage flits through my every orifice, every organ, every single nerve, burning with white-hot rage. I take a deep breath, knowing I can’t be mad right now, pushing it to the back of my mind until I can use it to unleash. And I will.
“Nina, it was just a nightmare. It wasn’t real. I’m here now.” I lift her chin, bringing her face to mine.
Her eyes lack the light that shone in them just hours ago.
“You hurt me.”
I close my eyes.Shit.“I’m so sorry, Nina,” I force out, fuming at myself. I’m such a prick. “I didn’t mean what I said.”
“Please leave me alone,” she states, eyes lost.
“You think I’d fucking leave you alone right now?”
“You leave, or I will.”
“Let me help you.” I try to hug her tighter, but she climbs from my lap, crawling to the other end of the shower.
“Please,” she begs. “I need to be on my own right now.”
Fuck.It takes everything inside me to stand and move my feet to the door, praying it’s the right thing to do.
I go back to my room, shedding my wet clothes from my body and launching them at the TV as my anger surfaces. Sitting down on the edge of my bed, I run my hands through my hair with absolutely no idea how to fix the fractured soul I can’t seem to figure out.
* * *
Nina
Climbing from the shower floor,I drag myself up and under the spray, washing my body clean, wishing I could erase the images in my head. Maybe I should have let Mason hold me, but for all the reasons I wanted him to, there were twice as many as to why I didn’t. He believes that to care is to know everything, all the things I would have told him if he had just asked. He is wrong. You can care for someone and not know their secrets, exactly how I did for him.
He took what he wanted without asking, which I could have got over—I was prepared to swallow my dignity and take his controlling nature in my stride. But that was before he trampled on my pride.
His words were the beginning of the end. He doesn’t get to hurt me, especially when he doesn’t even know me.
