“That he wouldn’t kill me?” Ranger eased his boot from the accelerator. “Didn’t give it much thought. Was too busy trying to remember if my nanna still had my passport.”
“Did she?”
“Here, ain’t I?”
He was, but I had to touch him to believe it. A slow trail of my finger along his jaw, skating close enough to his mouth that he bared his teeth.
“How likely is it that some cunt will try and off you in daylight?”
I blinked, withdrawing my hand. “Honestly, I do not know. It has been many months since I last left our property before dark.”
“How many months?”
“A few—I think. I was not . . .”
“Well?”
“Priest was injecting me every day. And I was weak from everything else. Once Jake had me, it took a while for me to see beyond surviving that.”
Ranger shifted his grip on the steering wheel. “Locke said you were hurt worse than him.”
“Not by much.”
“Don’t lie to me, Vik. Nash told me all about it.”
“I am not lying. I was with Locke every moment Priest had him. I know what he endured.”
“They didn’t drug him.”
“They did not. So he felt every blow. Have you ever thought about that?”
I had. Often. I didn’t have nightmares, but if I did, I would dream of the pain Locke Halliwell had borne far more than my own.
We reached the town and I directed Ranger to a public car park, the air between us thick with grief and heartache.
His.
Mine.
It all hurt, but I could not bear the tight set of his shoulders. This man... he did not deserve it.
I caught Ranger’s wrist before he could exit the SUV. “I am sorry I speak without thought. I used to be better.”
Ranger stared at where I held him. Then slowly raised his gaze to mine. “That’s not what you’ve lost.”
He got out of the car, wrenching free of my grip. Panic squeezed my chest that he might leave, but he opened my door a moment later, relaxed again, as if we had spent the last five minutes talking about the weather.
The sun had already stained his skin a healthy light brown. It looked good on him. Jake’s clothes looked good on him. I slid from the car, wanting to say so, but the reality of being out in the open took over.
Sometimes, I believed myself dead inside. Others, I knew the lifetime of war I had survived wouldn’t perish until I was ashes in the ground.
My boots hit the tarmac and my senses came alive. Ranger still held my fragile heart hostage, but the need to protect him overcame the desire to bury my face in his neck and never come up for air.
You should not have brought him here.
A cold fact that chilled my blood. But Jake was my life. My brother. For my heart to keep beating, I had to know he was alive.
“Lead the way,” Ranger murmured. “I’ve got your six.”
