Page 29 of Cursed by Death (Ruby Jane #1)

F ox called Rally on the way back to my house. I couldn’t hear what Rally said but I heard Fox’s entire side of the conversation. He told the Prince everything that happened and didn’t once exaggerate a single thing or input his own opinions, which I appreciated. He simply stated facts. It was another mark in Fox’s favor, and it was a serious one.

I kept my eyes closed the entire ride but I figured he knew I wasn’t sleeping. There was no way I could sleep after that revelation. I would more than likely have extreme nightmares and I wanted to avoid that.

That was partially why I usually ended up drinking so much before I fell asleep every night. The alcohol always knocked me right out. If I dreamed in that state I never remembered it.

When I was sober the nightmares were always horrific and kept me locked in the past. For, that was what the nightmares always were, different versions of past experiences that always left me wanting to die.

Fox parked the car in front of the house and followed me up to the front door, like the good little guard he’d been trained to be.

“You should take my car and go home, Fox. I’m going to lock myself inside the house and probably just get drunk. I’d really like to be left alone to do that. Please. Tell Rally that I promise not to go anywhere for the rest of the night and you can come back tomorrow, okay. But for tonight, I just need to be left alone.”

As I spoke I avoided making eye contact with him. I didn’t want to see what he thought of me, what he thought of what I was, or of the cowardice I was showing at that moment.

I didn’t think I’d be able to look myself in the eye in a mirror so I wouldn’t expect anyone else to be able to look at me either.

“I’ll call my Prince and see what he says. But, first, look at me, Ruby.”

I shook my head and I just wanted him to go away because I didn’t want to end up crying. I’d somehow managed to keep it in so far. “Just go away, Fox. I’m sorry, but I can’t let you in my house right now. And don’t you dare let yourself in because you know the code now. That wouldn’t be fair to me.”

“You’re not like that,” he said in a hushed rush of words. “Nobody thinks you’re capable of anything like that, Princess. You’re a good, kind person. No matter who your father was, no one will ever mistake you for a demon. Please, Princess—”

I let myself inside and closed the door in his face, really hoping he’d listen to me and not just let himself into my house at this moment.

They were pretty words but Fox didn’t really know me so he had no business talking like that. I didn’t need, nor did I want, false kindness or bullshit from anyone.

Though I appreciated Fox’s attempt, I did not need it.

Locking myself away to be alone wasn’t a healthy coping mechanism but it was the only one I had.

I went upstairs to my bathroom, stripped out of my clothes while avoiding myself in the mirror, and I got into the shower. I turned the water on and to as hot as it would go.

I stood there beneath the spray, burning.

Burning and crying. My tears were silent but there was a slight tremble to my fingers that if anyone were around to see it would have given me, and my raw state due to my emotions, away.

I didn’t know why this was hitting me so hard, the death of this one man. A man who meant so little to me because I’d never even met him before. A man who’d murdered my friend.

Why did I care so much that he was dead when I knew that, in the end, he would have ended up dead anyway? I knew the hunters would have taken his life away from him when they’d eventually found him. I didn’t know how they’d kill him, just that they would.

I dropped down to my ass and pulled my knees up to my chest, wrapping my arms around my legs.

My father had been there in that run down dump of an abandoned home and, if I was correct, he’d been the one to murder and sacrifice that demon.

His scent hadn’t been on the homeless man on the porch. I didn’t think he’d been the one who’d killed the man on the porch, the one who’d slit his throat.

That meant he hadn’t gone there by himself, there had to have been at least one other person there with him.

The major question I had was why? Who were those men to him and why had he gone there to kill one of them?

I closed my eyes and memories assaulted me.

I sniffled as I wiped the back of my hand across my nose. I hated crying. It made me feel like a baby and always made my mommy unbearably sad.

And when she was sad my dad usually got mad. Not at me, just in general.

He crouched down in front of me and his eyes blazed blood red. They only did that when he was really upset. Otherwise, they were a pretty brown color.

Most people were afraid of him when his eyes turned red but I wasn’t. Mommy told me I had nothing to fear from him because he’d never hurt me.

She said he loved us but I only believed her sometimes. I knew that he loved her, he was obsessed with her, and he never tried to hide that.

But he never really showed me that he loved me. He acted like he tolerated me and I knew he did that because mommy loved me and he loved her.

“What happened to your face, Ruby Jane?” he asked me in a quiet, controlled voice, but I knew better. He was angry. So very angry. “Who left those marks on your beautiful face, daughter?”

“Leave the girl alone, Johnathon,” my mother commanded. “You’re scaring her.”

He scowled at me and it wasn’t a friendly look. “No one fucks with my daughter and gets away with it. I’m going to go down there and teach those little fuckers a lesson. And then I’ll pay their parents a nice little visit, too.”

I shivered at the darkness in his words. He was going to harm those boys and their families. It wasn’t okay, but I knew better than to ask him not to. He’d see it as a weakness and it would make him like me even less than he already did.

I touched the side of my cheek and winced. I was going to have a bruise where I’d been struck. It would look worse than it was because of my pale coloring, but it would only serve as a reminder of this incident to my dad and make him even angrier.

The tears started falling as memory after memory assaulted me.

My father only ever showed that he’d cared about me when punishing someone else who’d wronged me in some way. And, even then, it was never about but me, but rather about him. If he let people get away with treating his child any way they wanted and just get away with it without consequences then he believed it meant they thought him weak enough to allow such a thing.

I don’t know how long I sat in the shower crying for but I probably would have stayed in there for hours if someone hadn’t come along and turned the water off. The sudden silence was almost more deafening than the sound of the water had been.

Fuck.

I never should have given the code to the front door to that fucking man. Of course, he wasn’t going to respect my need to be left alone at a time like this.

Rally wrapped a towel around my shoulders. He put one arm under my knees and wrapped the other one around my back. He picked me up with ease and I closed my eyes, resting my head on his shoulder.

If it were anyone else but Rally I would have been embarrassed to be found like that. I couldn’t tell why I felt safe enough with the man to be so vulnerable in front of him but I was. I thought a large part of it had to do with him feeling safe enough with me to have shifted into his wolf in front of me and then spending the night with me like that, entirely vulnerable to me. I knew he’d been the predator in the situation but it hadn’t been about that, not at all.

He carried me into the bedroom and placed me down on the foot of the bed.

I liked that he didn’t ask me if I was okay or what was wrong. I liked that he didn’t feel the need to fill the space with useless, needless words. It’d be pointless. Especially with questions he was smart enough to already know the answers to. I liked that he didn’t try to make me talk about it.

I watched him move around my space and I realized I wasn’t uncomfortable having him in here and going through my things.

I’d never really had another person in my bedroom before. Whenever I’d had men over to have sex with I’d use one of the other bedrooms in the house. I wasn’t exactly sure why other than not wanting to have strangers in my most personal space. I guessed that was reason enough though.

I guess with Rally it was okay. I already had him in my basement and gave him the code to my house, so why wouldn’t he feel comfortable enough to riffle through my dresser drawers.

He dug a pair of underwear and some socks out of a dresser drawer. He placed them on the bed beside me and went into my closet. He came back out a minute later with a deep purple cami and sleep shorts set. He put them on the bed with everything else he’d gotten out.

He knelt on the floor in front of me and picked up the white fuzzy socks that were covered in rubber duckies wearing sunglasses. I feared he’d figured out one of my secrets. When I was all alone in my big house I liked to walk around in fuzzy socks that had cute things on them. I watched as he lifted one foot after the other and put the socks on my feet.

I had never gotten dressed by putting my socks on first before. They were usually the last thing I ended up putting on. Head first, feet last. Or, something like that.

He slid the panties up my legs and I lifted my ass up off the bed and he slid them up the rest of the way. He did the same thing with the shorts.

That left me clutching the towel to my chest and unwilling to look away from Rally’s eyes. He hadn’t once taken a peak at my nudity. That wasn’t what this was about for him and I was incredibly relieved by that.

Rally wasn’t in this for me for sex. He wanted a real connection, a real relationship with me. My chest warmed as I realized for the first time that I wanted that kind of connection with him too and I wasn’t afraid of it.

I dropped the towel and his eyes never once strayed from mine. He smiled sweetly at me as I lifted my arms up so he could put the cami on me. It was made of a silky material that felt lovely against my skin.

“That’s my good girl,” he purred and I thought I might be losing my mind because those words made my pussy clench and I felt myself getting wet.

I had never been someone’s good girl before but if that’s what Rally thought I was then who was I to tell him any different.

“You stay right there while I go and get your hairbrush. I’m going to brush your hair for you so it doesn’t dry with knots in it.”

My throat was suddenly so thick it was almost painful to swallow. I was still trying to gain back some form of control over my emotions when he came back into the room carrying my hairbrush.

He sat down on the bed behind me and began running the brush gently through the wet strands of my hair.

I cleared my throat. “My mother is the only person who’s ever brushed my hair before.”

“Hmm,” he made a humming noise under his breath.

“Where’s your mother at now?”

“He got her shot and killed,” I whispered. “And then he literally cleared out our condo and left me there all alone. I was just a little kid and I lost both my parents in the same week. That’s how I ended up in foster care. The only other family I had was my grandmother and she didn’t want me.”

“I’m sorry, baby. That’s fucking awful. I know he’s a bad mamba but I can’t believe he left you like that right after your mother was murdered. A father is supposed to protect his children, not abandon them when they need him the most. That’s despicable behavior and I’m so sorry you had to go through that. No child deserves that.”

I couldn’t agree more. But, still… “He killed the man who murdered Thomas. Why would he do that? To my knowledge, he’s never even met Thomas before. What would he have to gain from killing that man?”

Rally was quiet for a moment and then he wrapped his arms around me tightly, hugging me from behind.

When was the last time I had allowed someone to hug me?

I couldn’t remember.

“I don’t have an answer for you, baby. You may never get the answers you seek. The only person who can give you those answers is a man I don’t want you anywhere near. And that’s not me trying to tell you what to do. That’s just me being concerned for my mate’s safety because he’s the most dangerous person you could ever be around.”

I completely understood why he wouldn’t want me around the man.

I didn’t want to be around the man. But I was going to go looking for him anyway because I was going to get the answers to my questions, whether it was good for me or not.

“Are you good now, baby, because I gotta get back to the shop. There are a bunch of wolves in town that aren’t mine but want to join with us. I walked out of a meeting with some of them to come here and make sure you were alright. Unfortunately, I have to get back to them, though.”

I wanted to cry all over again. Christ. Rally just might be the sweetest man I had ever met in my whole life.

I told him he could let Fox inside the house and he left.

I texted Detective Rowans to tell him I was fine and not to worry about me.

His response was immediate and surprised me.

I knew you’d be fine. You might have needed a minute but I knew you’d be okay you’re strong and resilient.

Well, okay then. It felt nice to know that’s what he thought of me.

It’s the hunter’s that I’m worried about. After you left they argued. Roan wanted to chase after you and Bane had to physically restrain him to stop him.

I don’t trust them, Ruby Jane. And I don’t think they’re just going to go back to where they came from when this is all said and done.

I think they’re both obsessed with you and I don’t trust them. Watch your back and be careful.

I didn’t like the sound of any of that and it was the last thing I needed in my life at the moment.