When I raise my gaze to his, there’s no hiding the tears.
“Easy, baby.” He moves to sit beside me, pulling me into his side. The warmth of his body is the best balm against all the fear cracking the shield of numbness wrapped around me.
“You’re safe here,” he says, his voice a low rumble. “Just focus on being here with me and you’ll be okay. No one gets in through that door. Not unless they’re family. Okay?”
As he speaks, I feel the caress of his breath brushing over my ear and the sensation gives me another kind of shiver.
I force my muscles to relax one at a time.
“Family? You mean the other men who fought alongside you today?” There were so many of them that it felt like a small army.
He nods. “My brothers. The Savage Reign crew. They are out there looking for Veles and taking care of what is left of the Vultures. You have nothing to fear anymore.”
He means it. I can feel it in every word, every movement.
But my brain remembers the punishment my body took at the hands of those assholes. What it felt like to spend five months under their control.
My hands start to shake, and I tuck them under the leather to hide the trembling. But this man doesn’t miss a thing. He looks up, eyes darker than the storm I see rolling in just over the horizon, and when he sees my trembling fingers, he takes them in his. His skin is callused, warm, and grounding.
He reaches out and strokes the underside of my jawline in a slow glide and tilts my head up to where our lips are nothing more than a whisper apart. My whole world melts away with that one gesture. One movement from either of us and this moment will take on a whole other tone.
That wouldn’t be so bad.
Everything about this man screams power and protection. From the way he holds me, to the way he angles his body. I never knew how feeling safe to breathe and exist could make a grown person cry, but I’m on the brink of tears.
Piercing eyes capture mine. “Let me take care of you. You can relax. There’s no one here who will hurt you.”
My pulse quickens.
“I don’t know how to do that.” I admit. It’s been too long since anyone cared about my well-being and I’m not talking about only the ordeal with the Vultures.
“What?”
“Let someone help me. I’ve been on my own for so long it’s hard to ask for help. Even now.”
“You’ll never be alone again. Let’s get settled. Okay? You like pink roses?”
What a random thing to ask. “I do. They are my favorite. How did you know?”
He points to a vase on the side table next to the couch. I was so tied up in my emotions that I didn't see it before right now.
“Oh, they are beautiful.”
He takes one out and passes it to me, watching as I inhale the sweet scent of the full bloom.
“Your colleagues shared everything they knew about you. Including how you always refreshed your class flowers with new pink roses every Monday morning.”
“I love anything pink, really. Especially pink roses.”
His smile makes my heart happy. “Noted.”
“But I have to say, you were very sure you would be rescuing me if you had these flowers here for me.”
“I’ve kept that vase with fresh flowers every week for the past five months.”
“Oh.” The truth in his eyes says more than anything else he can say.
I reach out and slide the rose back into place among its friends. It’s a mundane thing, but simply feeling the softness of the petals seems to calm me.
