Bijou

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Redd had to be joking, he couldn't be serious.

My savior, the man who had freed me from that hell, he really didn't understand what he was dealing with. I could see it in his eyes. The curiosity, the eagerness for answers of his own, it was written all over his face.

I could give him the answers he was looking for, but I wasn't going to tell him my story. It was too cruel to put into words, to vile to share with another soul.

What I experienced, what I went through. . . I had known for a long time already, it was something I would deal with alone.

“The man whose house you found me in, his name is Diablo. And to make a long story short, he's a fucking asshole.”

“I don't want the short version, Bijou, I need the truth.” Bending over, he rested his elbows on his knees. “I have to protect my sister too.”

Dipping my head, I stared at the sandwich in my hands, running my thumb up and down the crust. Tiny crumbs broke away, falling like bits of sand into my lap. Brushing them off, I took in a deep breath.

I didn't want to explain the entire story, I couldn't go through every detail that scarred me deeper than the surface.

If you could see my bones, you'd probably be able to see all the gashes Diablo delivered in thick lines, like bold unforgiving script. They would show a story, a history of abuse in permanent scars. His words, his hands, his demands; they all stayed with me in some way, layering my body like an onion.

You couldn't peel them away, you couldn't cleanse my wounds or repair the breaks. Nothing, not a shred of a human being still existed anymore.

Bijou was gone, she had been gone for a long time. All that was left was the box that carried her.

“You can't ask that of me, Redd, it's not fair. You have no idea what it was like living in that house. You can't force me to talk about it, I won't do it.”

Balling up the paper towel, he squeezed it like a stress ball. His eyes fluttered around my face, reading me, trying to pick me apart from the cover and see the pages inside.

“Okay, then tell me about him. Who is Diablo?”

“He's not someone you cross, I can tell you that.” Glancing at my hand, the thick scars from the burn smiled up at me. “He's going to kill you too, you know that right?”

Redd's expression changed from curious to flat. The corners of his eyes crinkled, his nose twitching and flaring as he picked apart the idea of an unknown threat.

When he pinned me to the wall, when his eyes turned ink black and his fingers held me hostage—there was no fear. I didn't fear him.

What I felt was more of a slap across the face. Diablo refused to kill me, he'd bring me right to the brink, let me dip my toes onto the other side, only to yank it away. I was hoping that Redd would at least finish what he started.

He didn't. The threat was there, but the strength he needed to complete it didn't exist.

And in that brief moment, if he had actually choked me to death, I would have embraced it. Fuck, I begged him to do it. It would have been far sweeter to have died at the hands of my savior than the man that refused to let me go.

But he couldn't do it, he gave me back the air and apologized. I didn't need him to tell me he was sorry, he wasn't the one who caused my pain.

I was pissed that he had taken the phone, I had thought of him as another man trying to hold me in. . . He wasn't. He was trying to protect his sister. I understood that completely.

“No one is going to kill me. I won't ever let that happen.” His tone was deep, crisp, filled with instant determination at the suggestion someone would even attempt to harm him. “And I won't let him kill you.”

A flutter hit my chest, brief and delicate. But I felt it.

Softening my eyes, I wasn't trying to make him angry or upset. I wasn't trying to taunt him or screw with his emotions. But he needed to know how much danger he had just invited to his doorstep.

“You don't understand, it's not just you or me he'll kill. He's going to kill your sister too.”

Redd lunged forward, wrapping his hands around my arms. “Don't say shit like that. No one will ever lay a hand on my sister.”

My heart raced inside my chest, thrashing around violently against my ribs. His hands were still gentle and kind, despite what he was trying to provoke them to be.

Firm thumbs stroked the inside of my arms, forcing a knot in my stomach. Heavy fingers held me in place, sending a shock to my system.

I was excited, I was suddenly lightheaded and unable to focus on anything but his face. His lips were thick, his chest was puffed up, pressing his hard muscles into the fabric. The way his hair fell over his eyes and his skin glowed with hot sweat, it was too real, too warm, too raw.

My nerves went wild, they were warm and tingling, but for all the wrong reasons. I was everything I shouldn't be and I couldn't understand it.

All I could do was feel it.

What the hell is going on with me?

Drawing in a quick breath, I looked into his eyes. “I'm not trying to upset you. But you wanted to know who you're dealing with, and that's him. He's a vile man with no limitations. He doesn't give a shit about who he kills, not if they get in his way. You got in his way, Redd.”

Dropping his arms, he stood up, turning to face the wall. Every muscle in his body pulsed, throbbing and beating as he allowed himself to hear my words.

“Why were you there?”

Rubbing my arms where he had just held me, the skin was still blazing under his shadowed touch.

“Why do you think? He took me, I didn't ask to be there.”

“And what about your family? You said you have a dad, he didn't come looking for you?”

Shrugging a shoulder, my brows arched up high. “I don't know. Not that it matters, there was no way for me to know if he did or didn't. Diablo would never tell me that.” I didn't want to tell him that my father might be the reason I was there to begin with.

I was afraid to say it out loud, fearing it would sound so much more terrible. Like I was auctioned off as property, given away like a bartering chip.

Inside my head I could tame down the words, I could work them in a way that helped me to accept whatever choices he had to make.

I refused to put any anger into his role until I talked to him myself.

If I ever get the chance to talk to him again.

Pacing in a small circle, Redd's jaw locked in place as he grumbled. “Fuck, what the fuck.”

“You still haven't told me what you were doing there.”

“I went looking for something, and I found you instead. I told you that already.”

Tilting my head a hair, I scrunched my brows. “Looking for what exactly?”

Thinning his lips, he whipped his head over his shoulder. “I don't know.”

Pushing myself up off the floor, I sat on the couch. “Let me get this straight; you don't know who Diablo is, but you knew he had something in his house, and you just decided to go take it? That doesn't make any sense, why would you do that?”

I watched his shoulders roll forward, like giant boulders had just dropped down from the sky and pinned him place.

“Forget it, it doesn't change anything. The details don't matter, what matters is how I fix it.” Spinning on his heels, his hands fell to his sides, hanging with precision. “I am going to fix this.”

“There's no fixing this. There's only two things that are going to happen. Diablo is going to come for me, and he's going to kill you and anyone you love. That's it, that's how this is going to go. That's how he works.”

Slowly, his head lifted up, eyes piercing mine and holding me still. “You don't know me, Bijou. . . And neither does he.”

“If you knew what was good for you and your sister, you'd pick up everything right now and leave.”

“I'm not going anywhere. I worked too hard for this, I won't be driven away by some prick with a stick up his ass. And if I leave, then you have no one. I won't do that to you.”

He said it with such confidence that I almost believed him. A small flicker of heat ignited in my gut, warming my veins and sending chills over my body.

It always felt like no one had fought for me. And now, here was this man, ready and willing to take on the world.

You know he can't help you. No one has ever helped you.

Desperation. . . That's all that was.

The feeling faded, it morphed into a gnawing cramp that hardened my stomach and turned it to stone. I had to accept that my reality and his dreams were far different.

He could want to fix this with every bone in his body, but that didn't mean he would succeed. There was a big difference between seeking justice and gaining it.

I wanted to believe him. I wanted to think that he could mend this break, that he could fix me and give me my life back.

But I knew he couldn't.

Redd couldn't fix what he couldn't touch.