Total pages in book: 172
Estimated words: 157460 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 787(@200wpm)___ 630(@250wpm)___ 525(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 157460 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 787(@200wpm)___ 630(@250wpm)___ 525(@300wpm)
It was different at night. She came in every night and took away the things that tried to spill out of his head. So many terrible memories haunting him, and with each one, he moved farther away from her. She detested that. She had become aware that part of the reason he distanced himself from her was that he detested her ability to see what had been done to him as a child. No man wanted a woman knowing he’d been repeatedly raped and abused, subjected to the worst kinds of torture. He might want her to think they were nightmares, but they both knew she was looking into his real childhood memories.
She told herself a million times that she didn’t want him to think that the terrible things done to him made him unworthy of a relationship, but she knew it was so much more than what he considered the humiliation of her knowing about his childhood. There was much more to his past than that. More that she had caught glimpses of and he had tried to hide from her.
The stark truth was, he had killed people. A lot of people. If the images in his head were anything to go by, he had done some pretty terrible things to them first. When the men had been waiting in her garage to kidnap her, he had gotten to her fast in spite of being wounded twice. And he’d hurt at least two of them pretty severely. One was very bad, and he’d done it with his bare hands.
She’d been fighting off the two trying to drag her out of the garage. She had skills, and they weren’t trying to really hurt her—or kill her. That gave her an advantage Player didn’t have. She’d tried to warn him, but she hadn’t known there were so many in the garage lying in wait to try to kidnap her. For what? She had no idea what they were after. She had discussed it with her grandmother. The jewelry they’d had in the house was gone. The thieves had already taken it. What were they after?
Zyah forced her mind back to the pertinent facts, the ones she hadn’t confided to her grandmother—or to anyone else. Player had already been shot, suffered a terrible brain injury, but even with that, even unable to see, he’d shot two men, just going off the sound of their voices. She saw them fall. They’d been dragged off by their friends, but they both were hurt, she could tell by the trail of blood left behind. Strangely, the garage, yard, sidewalk and asphalt didn’t show one speck of blood an hour later, when she went outside. How had that happened?
Torpedo Ink had shown up. Player’s family. His brothers and sisters. They’d come to ensure he was safe. Steele had performed a miracle on him, and then stitched that deep groove that went nearly halfway around Player’s head before she had insisted he had to stay right there, that he couldn’t leave. Because she had that strange premonition she sometimes got that told her she needed to be somewhere or something had to be done. She had good instincts, and in this case, she knew had she not acted on them, Player wouldn’t have survived.
She sank down onto the bed, gripping the wooden post, facing the window that overlooked the sea. It looked out over the grassy field and the bluffs, with the view of the ocean crashing over the rocks, throwing white foam into the air. Her life felt like it was spiraling out of control, when she’d always been completely in control. She’d thought that was her problem. Never once had she let loose. She hadn’t known how—until that first night with Player.
Zyah had seen Anat working hard to get them out of debt and to provide a home for them. She had wanted to help her grandmother. From a very young age, she had begun to do whatever she could to contribute. That had given her a serious view on life. She had become disciplined and very focused on becoming financially sound for her grandmother and for her own future. She planned everything. Her job had allowed her to put her money in stocks and bonds. To put most of it toward retirement. She was even careful with her investments, not risking too much.
There had been so many nights she’d dreamt of letting loose. Of having friends and a partner. She could be that person she knew was inside her, waiting to break loose. “Player.” She whispered his name aloud.
This agony had to end soon for both of them. He wasn’t hurting because his heart ached for hers. Or his soul cried out for hers. He couldn’t take her knowing what had been done to him as a child. She didn’t blame him for that. But it still hurt when he stayed so distant from her. Since that night he’d initiated sex with her—and she wasn’t putting that responsibility on him, because she’d been all in—he’d grown even more distant. That really hurt.