Diego heard the defiance in her voice. The expectation that he would condemn her. A child? He should have seen that when he was examining her. All he saw was the mess the bullet had made of her body.
“There’s no doubt in my mind that if you killed him, he deserved killing.” He kept his voice mild. Soothing. “And don’t cry.” He swept his finger under her left eye to remove the glittering liquid. “You’ll break my heart, and you’ve already put the damn thing in jeopardy.”
She blinked rapidly, her soft lips parting slightly. His body reacted in an inappropriate way for a doctor. Her doctor. He needed to keep reminding himself of that.
“He wasn’t the only one I killed that day. He had two friends with him. They were fellow soldiers, men I trained with. I kept to myself for the most part because many of the soldiers were amped up and seemed off to me.”
His gut tightened. He couldn’t abide men who beat or raped women. It was a huge trigger for him after the experiences of his childhood. He had a bad, bad feeling his little warrior woman had been exposed to men like the ones who had tried to rape her when she was at her most vulnerable.
“With that experience, it’s a wonder you went to your uncle with Bridget.” It was an effort to keep his voice mild and soothing, but he managed.
“Believe me, I was ready to kill him if needed. Bridget was in a bad way, and I needed to go back for my daughter. Before I could, I had to ensure Bridget would be safe. Luther was my only choice. I counted on the fact that my feelings of loyalty and need to protect family were just as strong in him.”
A daughter. That was the reason Leila had told Luther she had to leave but would come back. She had killed the child’s father along with two of his friends.
“They tried to rape you.” Diego made the statement for her.
“Leon succeeded. That was how I conceived.”
So the bastard who raped her had been named Leon. That name would forever haunt him because he was determined to take that memory onto his shoulders and find a way to lessen the impact on her.
“And you kept the baby.” Again, he was very careful of his tone. He didn’t want her to think he wouldn’t accept another man’s child, no matter the circumstances of conception. Her daughter was Leila’s. He would welcome—and love and protect—any child of Leila’s.
The tears in Leila’s eyes did more than gut him. His heart felt as though it clenched in his chest so hard he feared a heart attack. That didn’t bode well for their future. He was going to be a pushover for the woman. Maybe that was what she needed. He hoped so, because he was already feeling possessive toward her. Protective. It felt as though she was always meant to be his. Maybe he’d been created and shaped into the monster he knew himself to be just to be able to protect her. To be whatever she and her daughter would need.
“I’d been alone so long. It wasn’t her fault that those men were jacked up from the enhancements. I needed her.”
She spoke low, a confession when he wasn’t the priestly type. She didn’t need to feel guilt just because she wanted a family.
“I understand, Leila,” he assured, because it was the truth. He’d lost most of his family, but he’d always had Rubin with him. Later, he’d been accepted by Ezekiel Fortunes and Zeke’s two brothers, Malichai and Mordichai. They’d formed another family unit. Then he’d had Nonny, the grandmother of one of the GhostWalkers inhis unit. He’d always had people surrounding him, caring for him, and yet he was a walking mess. What had it been like for her? She’d been alone.
“You don’t though, Diego.”
Those long lashes swept down and back up again. Wet. Spiky. Heartbreaking. If she kept it up, he was going to have to put her on his lap and just hold her. If the men hunting them found the trail, which he doubted would happen, he’d cross that bridge when he came to it. Right at that moment, the only thing that mattered to him was to stop her tears.
“Then tell me, sweetheart.” He massaged the nape of her neck, trying to ease the tension out of her. Trying to convey to her that she wasn’t alone and she’d never have to be again if she could just see the man right in front of her.
“I flirted with him. With Leon. I was so tired of being alone, and he seemed decent. I really thought if I got to know him, maybe I’d be attracted to him. I was the only one who lived in the dormitory, and he came there with his friends. I didn’t see the others when he knocked on my door, and I opened it. He punched me so hard it nearly knocked me out. They dragged me inside and I was too groggy to fight him off. The others held me down…” She trailed off again, turning her head away from him. “If I hadn’t drawn his attention, it never would have happened, and all of them would still be alive.”
“How many other women would they have raped?” he asked gently. “You’re not thinking about this clearly, Leila. If they were so willing to rape you, it was in them. They would have done the same to other women. More than likely they already had. The fact that he incapacitated you immediately leads me to believe it wasn’t the first time and Leon had perfected his technique.”
Leila fell silent, but she leaned into him. The tension slowly faded from her body. Diego remained silent, letting her work it outfor herself. He knew he was right. He was good at reading human nature. He might not have met Leon and his friends face-to-face, but he’d met many men like them. Enhancements often brought out the worst traits in the soldiers. Introducing aggressive predators into the DNA was asking for disaster. He should know. For every good characteristic, there were two bad.
“I didn’t think of it that way. Now that you’ve pointed it out, I believe you’re right.”
“Did those running the laboratory allow you to keep the baby?”
“They were excited when they found out.” Her gaze met his. This time the green was as cool as ice. “They knew if they tried to take her from me, I’d declare war on them.”
Diego waited for her to continue. He was beginning to feel a sense of urgency, and he reached for the owl, an automatic reaction he’d had since his childhood and all the years he’d practiced communicating with the birds in the forest. Now, despite long months away, he connected easily with the great horned owl. Once he had her attention, he sent out a command using the notes of a male owl calling to her.
They had developed their private language over time. The female owl was extremely intelligent, and she had caught on to his various call patterns and the meanings behind them very quickly until, over the years, they’d developed communication skills he hadn’t believed possible. He needed her to find the intruders and let him know their exact position. He preferred to hunt them a good distance from Leila. No matter that he told her she could defend the den they were in, he didn’t want her to have to.
The notes of the male owl were as close to the real thing as possible. Her eyebrow shot up. “You’re telling an owl to do something.”
He nodded. “I need her to let me know the location of those men hunting you.”
“She can do that?”
