Chapter 14
Gabe forced himself to hike over to Chloe’s office the next morning, even though he was blurry-eyed and hungover. If anything was outstanding in her office, he’d have to deal with it.
Well, that was what he told himself anyway.
Face it: all you want is to see if you can still feel her presence there, if her scent is still permeating the room.
Yeah, he was a stupid bastard, but something inside him couldn’t just leave the situation alone. As an adult, Chloe had to make her choices, but Gabe was finding it harder and harder to accept what she’d decided.
She didn’t want him.
He shook his head as he put his key in her office door, feeling pathetic. She’d told him straight out that their relationship had been temporary, and she hadn’t exactly ever said otherwise. He was the one who wanted more. He was the one who fucking felt like he couldn’t live without her. He was the one who would never get over her. Hell, she was already with her ex again, and probably wasn’t giving him a second thought.
Gabe was dumbfounded as he entered the office and found it a complete mess. Chloe was anal about paperwork, but it was scattered everywhere, a laptop on the floor looking like it had been carelessly tossed there, judging by the distance it was from the desk.
Her office wasn’t large, but it had additional rooms to do lab work and analyze data. The front office where she worked consisted of a number of file cabinets, a desk, chair, and mountains of paperwork.
It looked like papers had fallen when the laptop had left the desk, the sheets lying haphazardly on the floor. One piece of paper caught his eyes, standing out like a sore thumb because it was handwritten.
Gabe picked it up and scanned the contents, fury surging through his body as he read the words. It wasn’t signed, but he knew it was from James.
Picking up the laptop, he noticed a small flash drive embedded in it. He sat in Chloe’s chair, so pissed off now that he barely gave himself a moment to notice her subtle scent that still stuck to the fabric of the chair.
Sitting the laptop carefully on the desk, he booted it up, hoping it still worked.
His heart raced as it started to bring up the familiar trademarks signaling that it was still operational.
“Come on. Come on.” His voice was gruff and impatient.
He found the download quickly, as soon as the desktop screen came up, and he clicked on it. Gabe held his breath as he waited to see what dirt James thought he had on the Colter family, information that had been powerful enough to force Chloe back into his stranglehold.
His eyes widened and then every hair at the back of his neck rose up as he stared at what appeared to be a video.
It didn’t take him long to identify the subjects.
The film was so painful that he wanted to look away, but he forced himself to watch as James fucked the woman Gabe loved. James was hurting her, her body bound to the bed with her on her stomach while the bastard smiled evilly, his dick slamming into Chloe’s ass over and over again. Her shrieks of pain and pleas for him to stop shredded Gabe’s heart, and his gut rolled as he saw James turn directly toward what had to have been a hidden camera and smile. The asshole enjoyed the pain Chloe was experiencing, reveled in it.
For the first time since his father had passed away, Gabe felt tears of rage, regret, and anguish start to flow down his face. He didn’t wipe them away. He didn’t give a damn if he was crying. The excruciating pain of watching the woman who was his entire world being hurt and undeniably shamed by a heartless bastard was Gabe’s undoing. He couldn’t have cared less if the whole damn world was watching him at that moment. All he could think about was his Chloe.
As much as he wanted to look away and be in denial, he didn’t. Chloe went through it, and he couldn’t change history. But by God, he could be man enough to watch and understand exactly what had happened to her, even if it was tearing him to shreds. What had it been like for her to go through something that painful, that vile, that humiliating, and that destructive?
“I’m so sorry, sweetheart. I’m so damn sorry,” Gabe rasped aloud, hating himself for ever believing his sweet Chloe was stupid enough to go back to James without a reason.
He forced his eyes to stay on the screen, to continue watching.
There was narration dubbed in, and Gabe’s face turned red with rage as he heard James explaining how much Chloe loved to take it up the ass, and liked to pretend it hurt her. He called her “his kinky bitch” and explained how satisfied she’d be when it was over.
Gabe wanted to reach through the screen and strangle the sadistic bastard until he was dead, torture him like he was torturing Chloe.
Breathing hard, his entire body quaking with fury, Gabe forced himself to watch the entire film, twenty minutes of his life that he’d never stop having nightmares about. He’d never forget Chloe’s broken voice begging James to stop, telling him he was hurting her, her terror-filled screams of agony hanging in the air as her ex smiled and kept hammering at her so hard it was fucking insane.
No wonder she said anal sex hurts. The bastard raped her.
Gabe felt sick to his stomach for even touching her there. She’d been so tight, and it was no wonder that she was screaming in terror and pain in the video.
She was genuinely terrified, and she was hurting so badly.
Gabe flinched as Chloe turned her head in the video. Her eyes were wide with terror and desperation, her face wet with tears, her body struggling to get away from the bonds that held her in a position that allowed her to be tortured, violated.
“Oh, Jesus, I can’t do this,” he growled, but clenched his fists on the desk and waited.
Finally, it was over, and Chloe laid still and bleeding on the bed, as James’s dubbed-in voice explained how much his fiancée loved kinky sex, and how he did his best to cater to her twisted desires.
The bastard’s voice faded, and Gabe slammed the laptop closed.
Stumbling to his feet, he found the small bathroom, dropped to his knees and heaved until there was nothing left inside him except pain.
Not allowing himself that much time to feel, he cleaned up and went back into the office, collecting James’s note, the flash drive, and Chloe’s laptop.
Had she wanted him to find it, or had she forgotten it in her rush to leave? He doubted she’d wanted him to know. Obviously she hadn’t wanted anyone to know.
“Goddammit, Chloe. You don’t need to sacrifice yourself for your family. They wouldn’t want it,” he whispered huskily, knowing now that everything she’d said to him on the phone the night before was a lie.
She didn’t want to be with James.
He was threatening revenge porn if she didn’t cooperate, films where James made the viewer believe that Chloe had loved every minute of his rape. It was probably the slimiest thing he could imagine a man could do to a woman—other than raping her to make the trashy films.
His Chloe had been scared, afraid people would believe what they were seeing.
Yeah, it would destroy her life and start a scandal for the Colters, but James was messing with the wrong damn family.
Not one damn person would ever look at this video again. He’d find the original, and destroy what he had just seen. It would never see the light of day again, but Gabe knew the scenes would haunt him for the rest of his life.
He locked the office and strode toward the house with Chloe’s equipment, pulling out his cell phone as he went.
“We’re getting married today,” James informed Chloe casually. “Dress well.”
Chloe had used every minute she was at James’s house to try to find the device that held the original video he’d sent her. Unfortunately, he’d rarely left her alone. She’d rifled through every single place she could rush through while he was taking a shower and dressing in the pristine suit he was now wearing, but she’d found nothing.
She’d spent the entire night in her truck crying, and trying to find a way around giving herself up to James. Blurry-eyed and feeling defeated, she’d shown up at his door early this morning, knowing her only hope was to search for the original video he had taken without her knowledge.
God, she remembered those few nights on those videos. They had been the worst experiences of her life. Having to live through it all over again had made her fearful once again, and physically sick.
“I don’t have a dress,” she said hastily. “And I’m not ready to marry you. We don’t even have a license.”
“We will. No blood tests required, and we get the marriage license immediately. I already made an appointment with a judge to marry us this afternoon.”
Chloe looked over his kitchen table at him and wanted to slap the smug look off his face. “You were pretty sure of me,” she said casually.
He shrugged. “Of course. Your weakness has always been your family. The revered Colter family has no blemishes. That’s why your brother has such a strong lead predicted for his next run in the senate.”
Chloe wanted to tell him that Blake was favored because he was a damn good senator, but she kept silent. She didn’t even want her brother’s name mentioned by someone as slimy as James. The two men had no similarities to each other.
“Wear the dress that makes you look fat, the one from New Year’s,” James told her nonchalantly. “If that’s all you have, I’ll try not to pay attention.”
Arrogant bastard! “Nobody is going to be there. What does it matter? I have jeans, and that’s what you’ll get.”
His brows rose. “Arguing with me again, Chloe?” He stood up and walked calmly over to her. He jerked her to her feet with so much force that she nearly fell. “Don’t do it. Don’t make me hurt you,” he demanded angrily.
“I never made you do it. You did it all by yourself. All I wanted was for you to be happy when we were together. I busted my ass and turned myself inside out to make everything better for you. But it was never enough,” she answered, her tone hostile. She was beyond tired of taking whatever James wanted to give, which was always pain and criticism.
“You brought it on yourself,” he answered, grasping both of her upper arms brutally.
“I’m not playing this game with you anymore,” Chloe said furiously. She brought her knee up to his groin and nailed him, forcing him to release his hold on her. Promptly, she brought her arm back and let the bony portion of her hand crash into his nose as hard as she possibly could, her anger driving her.
He wailed like a boy, landing on his ass on the expensive tile floor beneath her feet. She watched, shaking her fist at the pain she’d inflicted by crunching his nose with her hand.
There was a certain satisfaction in knowing she could fight to protect herself. She might not be an expert, but she didn’t need to be. Lara had taught her every dirty fighting technique she knew to bring a bigger male to his knees.
Guess she was right!
She watched unemotionally as he whined, clutching at his groin and his nose.
“You stupid bitch. You broke my nose,” he moaned.
Good. “Would you like me to take you to a doctor?” She couldn’t help but say the sarcastic words.
“I am a doctor,” he retorted angrily. “You won’t get away with doing this,” he warned ominously.
“I’ll try to beat your ass any time you touch me,” Chloe returned with just as much rancor. “I may be forced to protect my family, but you are nothing to me.”
She folded her arms in front of her as she watched him struggle to get up. Chloe didn’t even lend him a hand. There was no sympathy left in her for him. He was a sociopath all the way to his soul. There were no redeeming qualities in his entire being, and there probably never had been.
Once, she’d been a fool.
Now, she was a fool’s captive until she could figure out where he, the man who claimed to love her—her rapist—had put the original video of her violation.
The longest scene, the one of him torturing her with brutal anal sex, had occurred soon after she’d returned to Rocky Springs. He’d apologized when she’d confronted him about his behavior, telling her sometimes he liked it that way, but that it would never happen again. Foolishly, she’d let it go. James had been contrite, and she’d been a complete idiot. The last scene when he’d held her down amid her protests that she didn’t want to have sex with him was the very last time they’d been intimate, which had proved to be her fertile time and had resulted in her pregnancy. She hadn’t told him he’d succeeded in getting her pregnant, and she never would. Chloe refused to do anything that would give him any satisfaction unless she had to.
“Go get dressed. Wear whatever the hell you want, but we are getting married unless you want to be the most watched Internet whore in history.” He stumbled over to the sink and grabbed some paper towels for his bleeding nose.
She let his insult fly over her head. Nothing he said about her could wound her anymore.
Chloe walked toward her suitcases with a small, sad smile on her face. Kicking his ass had been one of the most satisfying things she’d ever done, but she missed Gabe so much her heart ached.
Mostly, she hated herself for lying to Gabe. It had been the hardest thing she’d ever done. But she’d gotten herself into this mess, and it was her disaster to deal with right now. Chloe didn’t want anyone to get hurt because of her stupid choices. She just hoped she got lucky and could keep her family safe by finding the original video. It had to be on a computer…but where?
She grabbed her oldest pair of comfortable jeans that were worn in the knees, and a butt-ugly green fluorescent t-shirt. Without speaking another word to James, she went to take a shower, locking the bathroom door behind her.