Page 136 of Tormented
I smile, bringing my right hand up to grasp the opposite elbow as I watch the group interact. For once I feel at home, comfortable bearing witness to the things that happen within our walls, as though nobody would question why I’m even here.
“What have you done now?”
Except her.
“Not now, Ramona.”
She smirks, glancing across the room to where Mack stands waiting with his backpack. “You’ll never have what we did.”
I pull in a deep breath, and close my eyes to gather my cool. “Key word there: ‘did.’” No need to lose it in front of her kid.
In front of Sawyer’s kid.
Ramona frowns, her jaw working side to side as she thinks her next words out carefully. “You want to make yourself a part of his life? Then you need to understand two things. One: you hurt him and I swear to God I will make your life hell.”
“Like you don’t already,” I scoff.
“And two: I don’t care how great he thinks you are, or how head over heels he might be. You will never have a thing to do with my son. As long as you’re around, Sawyer will never have Mack stay over with him; he’ll only ever be able to visit us.”
“You finished yet?”
“For now.” She starts toward Mack, and then stalls. “I hope like hell you two never decide to have children, because with parents as screwed up as you both are, that kid would be a right piece of work.”
She storms off, catching King’s wary eye. I wave a quick hand at him to let him know it’s okay, and head upstairs to shower. I’ve got road dust in my hair, a little blood on my clothes, and years of suppressed memories crawling over my flesh where Evan touched me.
A short while later, my clothes are stripped and in a pile by the closed door, and I’m in nothing but my underwear as I gather up my toiletries. Sawyer comes striding into the room without so much as a knock.
“Damn it,” I cry out, diving out of view of anyone who might be in the hall. “Give me some warning next time.”
His head turns as he checks out my clothes to his right, a wicked smile playing on his lips as he slowly closes the door. “Hey, Abbey-girl.”
“Everything okay downstairs?” I ignore his blatant innuendo.
He nods. “Fine. Sonya’s goin’ to keep her company for the night, and King’s got Callum seein’ what he can dig up on her.”
“Good.” My shoulders sag with relief.
“How you doin’?” He closes the space between us, placing his huge hands on my shoulders. “You okay?”
“I think so.” I force a smile, but it doesn’t wash.
His gaze moves between my eyes, searching, reaffirming. “You weren’t put off by a single thing I did these past few days.”
“Nope.”
“Didn’t worry you at all?”
“Not at all.” If you asked me, everything he did was justified.
“So . . . us.”
“Mm-hmm.”
“You think it’ll work yet?”
I duck my chin, overwhelmed at the thought of everything he’s done for me. “Would you have gone after Evan, even if you didn’t know his connection to me?”
“Probably not for a while.” He frowns, narrowing his gaze a little. “Do you think I did that tonight for me? Not you?”