“Then wait for me on the couch.”
He accepts the compromise gladly, trudging over to the couch and plopping down on it face first. Shaking my head, I tie off the trash bag and leave it by the garage door. By the time I’m done straightening up, there are three bags in total waiting to be carried to the bins. I’m contemplating whether I want to take them out to the big bins now or leave them until the morning when the sound of timid knocking reaches my ears.
Beck, who was snoring softly just a second ago, wakes immediately when I pass the couch on the way to the front door. “Who is it?” he asks, moving to his feet. I understand why he’s on high alert. The last time we had an unannounced visitor late at night, it was Aubrey.
“No idea.”
I look through the peephole, wishing I had my gun on me when I see a dark figure standing on the other side of the door with their head down. My lips part to issue a warning to Beck but think better of it, turning on the porch light instead. They look up, shielding their eyes from the bright light and revealing familiar features to me.
Immediately, I undo the locks and yank the door, wrapping my arms around the person and hauling her across the threshold.
“Selene.”
My nostrils are flooded with her scent. There are berries and flowers and the nectar of the sweetest summer fruit andher. Soft and supple and sweet and, somehow, mine. I can’t stop touching her.
Even as I back us into the living room, crashing into Beck as I go.
Even as she pulls back and arches over me to meet his pleading lips.
Even when I drop down on the couch and she’s straddling me.
My hands have a mind of their own, and I’m powerless to stop their thorough, yet modest exploration. Passing over her shoulders and back, ghosting over her arms and finally cupping her cheeks, lifting her head so my eyes can run anxious lines over the column of her neck.
“Are you hurt?” Beck asks, sinking onto the couch beside us with his mind in the same place as mine. “I thought I got him off of you before he got a good grip.”
We’ve replayed the moment a million times in the last week. At first, Beck was confident he had stopped Aubrey from doing any real damage, but as time has gone by, he’s been less and less sure. I know the dip in his degree of certainty is directly related to not being able to see Selene with his own eyes. I release her, allowing her to turn to Beck and show him the same flawless skin I was relieved to see.
“I’m fine,” she says, grabbing one of his hands and bringing it to her lips. He pulls in a sharp breath when she kisses his knuckles. “Thanks to the two of you.” Her voice breaks and suddenly she’s blinking back tears. “I’m so sorry.”
“Sorry?You don’t have anything to be sorry for, gorgeous.”
“I got you fired,” she says, insistent and sorrowful. “I almost got you killed.”
I don’t know if this is what she came here for, knowing the risk it carries, I doubt it. Something much more important led her to our door, some question or concern or need, but this is the thing on her heart. The heavy weight of guilt, of actions she didn’t take or condone, sit on her shoulders, completely at home among the delicate lines. I’ll give her whatever else she came here for, but first, I have to take this burden from her.
My fingers grip her chin, gently turning her focus back to me. “You didn’t get us fired. We went up those stairs knowing exactly what the risks were, and we didn’t care. Leaving you alone to fend for yourself when we knew Aubrey was on a warpath wasn’t an option.” A tear breaks free from her right eye, and I brush it away. “I would gladly die a million deaths for you, Selene. Meeting my end doesn’t scare me, but knowing a world without you in it is a reality I would do anything,giveanything, to avoid.”
“So don’t ever worry about what loving you or protecting you will cost us,” Beck whispers. “Because whatever the price is, we’re prepared to pay it.”
Selene shakes her head, refusing the comfort we’re attempting to offer. “Love isn’t supposed to have a cost, especially not a mortal one.”
“And if you were anyone else, if we had met under different circumstances or led different lives before we found each other, that might not be the case, but that isn’t our reality, pet,this is.And we have to live it. We have to fight our way through it. We have to do the work to change it, and none of that happens if we’re too busy questioning what we’re worth.”
Insulting her wasn’t my intention, but it still happens. She rears back. “I’m not questioning anything.”
“Aren’t you, though?” Beck’s voice is soft as he puts his hand on her back to hold her in place when she tries to leave my lap. “No one is saying you don’t see our value, gorgeous. I think right now, you’re struggling to see your own, because it sounds like to me you’re trying to tell us you’re not worth all this trouble.”
“Because I’m not!” Selene hisses, lips quivering as wild eyes bounce between Beck’s face and mine. “You didn’t see yourselves on that floor. You didn’t see the joy those men took in holding you down, in causing you pain, in hearing you struggle for your next breath, but I did. I saw it all, I heard it all, and I will forever be haunted by the knowledge that I caused it.”
“Causedit?” Disbelief coats my words.
“Yes, I provoked Aubrey. I kept badgering him about Sutton even though I could see how agitated he was. I should have stopped, but I didn’t, and that put us all in danger.”
“Gorgeous. You have to know that Aubrey was always going to escalate the situation. He was livid when we left Camp David, and by the time he got to you, he was completely out of control. You could have given him the silent treatment, and he still would have reacted the same way because in his mind, you had already done the worst thing you could do: step out of line.”
Relief floods me when Beck’s words penetrate the bubble of self-loathing surrounding Selene. Her shoulders drop, and the wrinkle of doubt between her brows smooths. I use the moment of calm as an opportunity to broach the topic of the Kentucky trip.
“Why didn’t you tell us you thought Aubrey was involved with Sutton’s death?”
