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“Nothing worked out the way Craig planned. He certainly hadn’t expected Roy’s…reaction to me.”

Red splotched his cheeks and the torment in his eyes blistered in her chest. She tucked her chin and let her hair cover her face again.

He gathered it with one hand at her neck and used it to tilt her head back. “Stop hiding from me. I want to hear all of it.”

The concern in his soft expression and his mere proximity bolstered her.

“The moment I arrived, Roy watched me…in the oily way he does. Eyes sliding up and down. Smile oozing across the table. I wasn’t used to that kind of attention. I was inexperienced, completely unaware of what it meant. I couldn’t have guessed at the things he was thinking about doing to me. Over the course of the night, his glances grew more intense, more possessive. I should’ve figured it out and run.”

His eyes, glassy under the fluorescent lights, cleaved straight through her heart. “You were a child, had zero power to change the outcome. You did as your father told you, trusted him the way every child trusts her parent for protection.”

She nodded. “Then three women sashayed in. They were beautiful, with boobs out to here, and dressed in undergarments. They flocked around Roy, so confident in their bodies, and very acquainted with his.” She blew out a breath. “Christ, I was so young. The way they touched him and kissed him, I was both mesmerized and sickened. Yet, he never took his eyes off me. He eventually waved them away and called me over to sit on his lap.”

The sound of wood cracking rent the air. “Motherfucker.” The cabinet handle broke off in his hand and he tossed it into the sink. After a few calming breaths, he asked, slowly, “What did he do?”

Shaking her head, she stared at a rip in the wallpaper over his shoulder. “As soon as he pulled me into his lap, I knew. Even as stupid as I was, I knew Roy had decided to keep me, to do whatever he wanted to me.” He’d demonstrated it, right then and there, under the table, touching her in ways no one had before. And she had been too damn frozen in fear to fight him. She’d frozen like that for two fucking years.

Jay’s body shook. “And your piece of shit father?”

“He didn’t notice. He was too busy losing his card game. Within a couple hours, he’d lost our house and the car we drove there in. And still, I thought he’d win everything back. When Roy asked everyone to leave and it was just Craig and I left, he told Craig to wager me. If Craig won, he’d walk away with everything and his debt would be cleared. If he lost…”

Jay’s chest heaved, his arm holding her to him.

“I understand why Roy did it. He’s the big scary boss man no one wants to fuck with. He was flaunting his power over Craig. And what he wants…”

“He gets.” His voice was quiet, inconsolable.

Her throat swelled. “Craig didn’t even think about it. Didn’t even negotiate the terms. Maybe he assumed it was one night. Maybe he thought he was going to win, and it didn’t matter.”

“And the stupid fucker lost everything, including his daughter and his life.”

“When they walked him out, he didn’t say good-bye. Didn’t look at me. Probably too afraid to draw Roy’s attention.”

He cupped her face and kissed her lips. “It’s unfathomable. You are so precious, how could anyone walk away from you?”

She rubbed a finger over the deep lines fanning out from the corners of his eyes. Roy shared Jay’s sentiment, but Roy’s was a sick selfish kind of obsession. “So that’s it. Took me two years to escape. Met you four years after that.”

“Charlee.” He shook his head. “We need to talk about those two years, and whatever happened in your second kidnapping.”

Full disclosure. She’d vowed not to hide from it. “Ask me then.”

“You were a virgin?” The low dangerous level of his tone said he already knew the answer.

She nodded. “That night, I learned that sex didn’t require my permission. He took it, regardless of how hard I fought. Anal, vaginal, oral. In that order. Most of the scars you saw were inflicted in the first few hours.”

His body vibrated beneath her, rotating the air with the violence of his breath.

“It’s in the past, Jay.” She smoothed her hand over his jaw. “The only things he got from me were what he took from me. Even the orgasms.” The last word was a whisper.

Heat reddened his face behind hard eyes. “Tell me about that.” He seemed to be hanging onto his anger by a fragile tether.

“Jay, I don’t think—”

“Tell me, goddammit.”

A swallow scorched down her raw throat. “When I wouldn’t come or feel anything when he fucked me, he hit me harder, fucked me harder.” The words clawed at her throat as she forced them out. “It made him so mad when I hid inside myself. He wanted to possess me in every way and had found a way to draw me out. He used my body against me, made me feel, and forced me to orgasm when I tried to hide from his touch.” Her mouth went dry. “He’d had plenty of practice over the first two years and learned how to control my body better than I could.”

For a long moment, the only sound in the room was the grinding of his teeth. “And you can’t come now?”