I’m a fucking idiot. A motherfucking idiot. I never should have insisted Hayden tell me this shit. It doesn’t matter. It wouldn’t have mattered if she told me she was married to the asshole. I still would have claimed her as mine. There’s no going back, there never was. Before Hayden, I was ready to die. Fuck, I wanted to die. I’m being a complete selfish prick, but Hayden makes life bearable. I’m keeping her. The only thing her telling me has done is ensure Blade’s fate is a hell of a lot more painful.

“Michael,” she cries, when I reach under the back of her legs and lift her up into my arms. “What are you doing?”

“I want you in our bed, with my arms around you,” I scowl, my voice sounds angry, and I know she thinks it’s directed at her. It’s not, I’m angry at myself—not Hayden. I put her through hell, I should have left it alone. I lie down on the bed, taking her with me and settling her beside me. I hold her close and gently brush her tears away. I hate them, because they’re my fault. She shouldn’t have had to shed more tears, not after losing her friend tonight. She should never shed more tears because of that fucking prick Blade. Killing him will be a damn pleasure. “I’m sorry, Beauty. Quit crying. It’s over now. You’ll never have to deal with him again. I promise you.”

“You can’t promise me that, Michael. He won’t stop. Charlie is dead because of him and he’ll keep trying until he succeeds. He warned me of that once. I should have listened,” she whispers, her eyes downcast, refusing to look at me.

I put my hand under her chin and pull her face up, so that she doesn’t have a choice but to look at me. “I can promise that. I’m going to kill him, Hayden. I’m going to make sure he never breathes the same air as you again. The only question left is how painful I make it.”

“I don’t want you to do that.”

“Do you care what happens to him?” I ask, in disbelief.

“He’s dangerous, Michael.”

“He’s a nuisance, a boy trying to prove he’s a threat. He’s nothing, Hayden. I promise you. Whatever you think he is, I’m capable of much worse.”

“You’re not. You could never be like him, not even at your worst. That’s not who you are,” she denies, vehemently. She shakes her head slightly to add weight to her claim. She doesn’t really know me at all. Not the animal inside.

I should feel guilt, because I’m the man who helped bury her brother six feet under. Now, I only wish I was the one who killed him to begin with.

“I can be worse,” I warn her, because she doesn’t need to see me falsely. I want her to know the truth about me, I don’t want to hide my past. It’s me, even if I plan on never going back to it.

“Don’t say that,” she cries, and her body tenses up against me. I twist so my upper body is over hers, with about four inches of space between us. She reaches her hands up to hit my chest. “You are not like him. The man I’ve been sleeping with, the man who bought furniture for my daughter and has protected me, he is not evil.”

“Hayden—”

Before I can try and calm her down, she reaches down and hooks my shirt she’s wearing and whisks it over her head.

For a minute, I stare down at her confused, not sure what she’s getting at. There’s a vibe coming off of her that I don’t like. It’s a mixture of fear, hurt and anger.

“You wouldn’t force a woman to stay with you. You wouldn’t do that when she tried to leave because you promised her to your buddies!”

“Hayden, wouldn’t do what? Promised you to…What are you talking about, Beauty?”

“The last three months at the Dwellers’ clubhouse, Blade had been visiting my bed at night less and less. I wasn’t being watched as closely. He was getting tired of me. I was planning my escape, I was taking my time, because I knew I’d only get one shot and if I failed, I would die. But, I heard him,” she says, her body is shuddering underneath me, it’s not because she’s cold though. She’s not in a panic attack, but the emotions are similar.

“Hayden, sweetheart, it doesn’t matter anymore. It’s over, I told you, you never have to go back there.”

“He was in his office one night, bragging to his buddies about how he was going to take a new old lady. This one was supposed to be connected with some crime group he was getting involved with, the Donnely’s, or Donahues, something like that. According to him, she was everything I wasn’t, and she would make him powerful. The men started joking, asking him what he was going to do about me.”

“What did he tell them?” I ask, but then I already know. Blade’s death is going to be so fucking painful it follows him into his next life.

“He gave me to them. Like I was a piece of meat. She’s still high from the drug I put in her drink. You boys can go have your fun now. She’ll love anything you do to her. Hell, I might even join you. The more the merrier,” she says, imitating his voice, or at least the ugliness behind it.

“What did you do, Beauty?”

“He thinks I didn’t know, but I did, Michael. I knew I was pregnant and despite who Maggie’s father was, I wanted my child. I’ve always wanted my child. I couldn’t stay any longer. I had to risk it. So, I ran.”

“But you didn’t make it.”

“I got outside. I made it to a small toolshed. My plan was to stay there, until they left to try and find me or to go into town. I had been watching and no one really used the building. There was a small room in the back and…I really thought I’d be safe in the closet. I thought I could hide there,” she whispers. She’s crying again, I pull her trembling body into me, situating her head on my chest. I hold her tightly, my hand clenching in her hair. I’ll let her cry over this bastard one more time, but I swear this will be the last time.

“Finish the story, Hayden and then, it’s gone. It ceases to exist for you, because he will cease to exist.”

“Michael—”

“Finish the story, Beauty,” I tell her quietly, as tenderly as I can, because I’m not a tender man. I don’t have that left inside me.

She takes a deep breath, and lets it out slowly. “I heard the front door open. I couldn’t see them from my hiding spot, but I heard them coming. I tried not to breathe, not to move. I prayed and prayed that they would give up.”

“But they didn’t,” I finish for her, that one lone sentence so full of regret. If only Skull had sent me earlier. If only I had gotten to her before Blade had a chance to hurt her. If only.

“I was so frantic to get to safety, I didn’t notice the mud on my shoes, or the tracks that I made…”

“That led them straight to you,” I finish resignedly.

“There were three of them, so big in that small room, all towering over me. All laughing at me. I was defenseless.”

“That’s why you had the panic attack that day in your kitchen.”

“That’s why I have all my panic attacks, Michael…”

“Keep going. Telling me will help and then you will forget it.”

“I’ll never forget, Michael. It’s always there.”

I pull her head up to me and hold her so that she’s looking straight into my eyes. I extend my thumb to swipe at the one lone tear that’s making its way down her cheek. “You will forget, Beauty. I promise you that. It will be my mission in life to give you so many good memories, that the bad ones have no room to stay. I promise you. Do you hear me? I. Promise. You.”

“Michael—”

“Shh…Tell me the rest. Finish the story so we can start putting it behind you,” I urge her, wanting this done. She needs better memories. Happy ones. Her and Maggie deserve happy memories.

“Blade grabbed my leg and pulled me out of the closet. I tried to fight him, but I lost my balance. I fell back on the floor when he jerked extra hard. It was concrete and it left me dazed. Dog…he held my hands above my head. The other two held my legs and body still. Then Blade stood up. He was like someone else. I mean, logically I knew he wasn’t the man I cared about in the beginning. I knew he was evil, but I had never seen this evil close up, not until that moment. He looked possessed, towering over me, hate pouring out of him, as his boot came down and landed against my side. He did it over and over. My legs, my back, my side, my head, anywhere he could find a good angle, he’d kick. I did my best to curl away from him or use my arms to cover my stomach. I really did, but I started to get dizzy and my vision blurred and everything was this weird gray hue. I knew I was going to die. I accepted it. I hurt for my baby, but there was nothing I could do. If I had told him about her, it would have been like delivering her to the Devil himself. I couldn’t do that.”

“What happened next?” I ask, when she goes quiet.

She reaches over, grabs my hand, and pulls it down to her hip bone. Slowly, she spreads my fingers out against the fine, spider-web like scars there. I had felt them before. Now, I could see them, though not perfectly with the pale light of the lamp, but I see enough of them to know that getting them would have been painful. A few of the ones have raised edges, showing they went deeper than the others. It’s a miracle either her or Maggie survived.

“He took out his knife. At first, he pushed it into my neck, and I thought he was going to kill me. I mentally prepared myself for it when he pushed his knife just deep enough to make the blood flow. He laughed as I cried out in pain, and I hated myself for giving him that. He spat on me, sneering how only he could decide when he was done with his property. I told him I wasn’t his property anymore, that he lost that when he decided to drug me. I told him I’d rather be dead than to spend one more night breathing the same air as him,” she murmurs. “Which probably wasn’t that smart to tell him, but it was honest, and by that time, I really just wanted it all over. I was barely conscious. I knew all hope was gone. I was just so tired…”

“Finish it,” I urge her again, but God help me, I’m just one step away from leaving to hunt down that fucking sack of shit, and tear his skin from his body, one piece at a time.

“He began sliding the knife into me, not very deep at first, but over and over in the same spots and getting a little deeper each time. I began fading in and out. Before I went out completely, I heard him tell Dog to kill me and make a lesson of me for everyone to see. Then, he wanted them to leave me where my body would be found.”

“I’m going to kill him slowly—one piece at a time,” I growl, my insides feeling raw, and my hands shaking with fury.

“No. You can’t.”

“Why?” I all but howl. It doesn’t matter what she says. I’m doing it. There’s nothing she can say that will change my mind.

“I don’t want you to be the one to kill Maggie’s father. I never want her to look at you and see the man who ended the life of the father she never met. Even if he’s a horrible man, Maggie might always wonder. I don’t want her to look at you and resent you…”

There’s a lot to take in there. Most notably that whether she realizes it or not, Hayden sees me in her future. But, on the heels of that discovery—which I like more than I should, there’s another. And this one makes me want to scream. This one burns inside of me and I need to obliterate it.

“He is not Maggie’s father,” I tell her, sliding down on the bed.

“I may not like it, but—”

“He’s not her father, Hayden,” I interrupt her and I’ve had enough of hearing about Blade and enough of hearing about Hayden’s past.

I’ve had enough talking.