Willow approached to take the rag from him. She frowned when she spotted the faint white scars crisscrossing his upper chest and pecs. His chiseled abs bore no marks. Those scars hadn’t come from this battle; all those wounds had already healed. But what would leave scars like this on a purebred vampire?
Feeling more vulnerable than he ever had in his life, Declan slowly turned his back to her. His shoulders went back as he braced himself for her reaction. Never before had he willingly revealed his worst shame to another, but if his back was anything like his chest, at least it wouldn’t be as bad as it was before she became his mate.
Willow barely managed to suppress a gasp when he revealed his back to her. She stood, staring at him until she realized too much time was passing. She was starting to make this awkward, and he might take her hesitation as a rejection.
With trembling fingers, she bent and dipped the rag into the water before rising to wash the caked blood away. As she worked, she wanted to hug him as badly as she wanted to find whoever did this to him and brutally beat them before plunging the sword into their belly.
Instead, she remained silent as she reined in her emotions. When she finished, she tossed the rag into the bucket and stepped closer to rest her fingers against one of the hundreds of scars crisscrossing his flesh. Most were so faint they were barely recognizable in the dim glow, but others were more evident against the muscles twitching beneath her touch.
His flesh was a roadmap of brutality, violence, and torture the likes of which she’d never seen before. Did he do this to himself, or did he have someone else do it to him to satisfy his craving for pain?
This kind of torture might have fulfilled his need for pain, but the idea of him allowing someone to do this to him made her stomach turn. The question was on the tip of her tongue, but she couldn’t ask it, so she asked another.
“What caused this?” she asked.
“On my back, many things, but mostly a whip. On my chest, a knife.”
He hated that she had to see this, but it was only going to be a matter of time before she saw him completely naked; he’d always known that. However, this was one more thing from his past that he wished didn’t exist.
As she examined some of the scars, she began to pick out differences in them. Some of them were faded burns that must have gone all the way to the bone. Willow bit her lip as she ran her fingers over a much thicker scar running straight down his spine. It looked as if someone had carved him open, and she suspected that’s exactly what happened.
“Who did this to you?” she whispered.
Chapter Forty-Nine
Declan bracedhimself for her reaction to his answer. “My father.”
Willow’s breath hissed in, and her hand flew to her mouth. The fact hisfatherdid this to him was worse to her than the idea of him enduring beating after beating until his needs were satisfied.
Hisfather, the man who was supposed to love him unconditionally, had tortured him instead. A sob lodged in her throat. She had no idea what she could say or do to make any of this better.
Their lives were so completely different. She’d grown up in a household so loving there were times when it was almost suffocating, and she’d neveroncethought her parents would hit her. He’d grown up mostly alone and with the knowledge he would one day become a fighter. And then the only parent he had left turned on him.
With no idea how to take away the suffering he’d endured, she gave in to her instincts and stepped closer to him. Wrapping her arms around him, she flattened her palms against his chest as she rested her cheek on his scars and hugged him.
No child should ever endure what he did. It was centuries ago, but she knew the scars on his flesh were nothing compared to the ones lingering on his soul. Thesescars were the reason this beautiful, strong, and caring man believed he would make a horrible father.
After seeing this, Willow knew how incredibly wrong he was. Anyone who survived this and was still a good man would make anoutstandingfather.
At first, Declan didn’t know how to react to Willow’s embrace. Then he rested his hands over hers and squeezed them in his.
“He wasn’t a bad man,” Declan said.
Willow kept her beliefs aboutthatto herself. “How old were you when this happened?”
Please don’t let him have been a child.It was bad enough he’d suffered through this kind of abuse, but the thought of him being a defenseless little boy when it happened was more than she could bear.
“I was forty. It happened after he became a Savage. I mistakenly believed I could reason with him and convince him to return with me to see Ronan. He’d caused so much destruction by then and terrorized so many humans, but I refused to believe I couldn’t save him.”
He’d been in denial, and it ended the second he was close enough to speak with his father. The emotions that battered him as he stood before the man who, until then, was a good man told him how far gone his father was. Where he once exuded strength, determination, and a caring for Declan and others, rage and a sick, twisted pleasure emanated from him, as did the stench of rot.
Still, Declan hadn’t been able to walk away without trying to talk to him. He’d paid for that mistake.
“He was a good man until he turned Savage. I believed I could bring him back and somehow rehabilitate him with Ronan’s help. Even though nothing like that had ever happened before, I refused to give up hope. My father wasn’t a warm man; we fought Savages well together, and I admired him, but I can’t recall a time he hugged me or told me he loved me. However, he was my father; I know he cared about me, and I cared about him.”
He didn’t have to say the words; Willow understood he’d hoped his father cared enough about him to save himself. “Just because he couldn’t be saved doesn’t mean he didn’t care for you. Once he became a Savage, he stopped being the man you knew.”
“I know.”
