Page 34 of For Cowgirls and Kings (The Trauma Bonded #2)

TWENTY-EIGHT

ADALENE

Bruises. They litter my skin, almost more frequently than the freckles I’ve always detested. I trace one near my collar bone, watching as my finger rises and falls over the swollen bit of bone and tissue there. If I pushed harder than a feather, I’d have to scream out in pain.

My eyes move to another, this one oblong near my hip bone. It’s nearly black, but the edges are starting to yellow, and I wonder what day I got that one. The first day? The last day?

There’s so many—most of them bleeding into the next. Stetson said they’re proof that I’m alive, and just like my fear and humiliation, they’ll fade and eventually go away.

But I’m not so sure.

Even if they’re not on the surface of my skin, or the forefront of my brain, I’ll never be rid of them completely. I know it, like I know the sun will rise and set again tomorrow.

I’ll never forget this moment, this stain on my relatively good and plain life. I’m tarnished and ruined. Forever.

“Are you in a lot of pain?”

My eyes snap up to Mateo’s staring back at me in the mirror.

For days he’s tiptoed around me, giving me so much space, if it was a rope I could surely hang myself with it.

He’s always there, but not, and my anger’s festered into an open wound that even the lightest breeze infects to a torturous poison.

I should feel shame or embarrassment, or fear even, seeing as I’m standing nearly naked, only a small white towel covering my most private bits, in front of a man after what I’ve just faced.

But I don’t. Not when his eyes don’t even waver from my face.

There’s safety there, or indifference. Part of my brain knows this man—he’s as gentle and kind as they come—but this newer, darker part of me whispers about disgust and distrust. It warns me that no one will ever want me, and the only way to protect myself is with teeth and claws.

Some part of me does want to cower, to demand he take me home so that I can drown in my own sorrows the way I’m used to, and away from his guilt filled, yet murderous gaze.

And the other part…it wants to drop the towel and see even if I could still be desirable, even if I’m completely broken, completely destroyed and degraded— that someone could still want rotten goods.

But if he turned away? If he acted as disgusted as I feel?

I’d put a bullet in my brain tomorrow.

“They don’t hurt too bad.” It’s a lie, and we both know it.

Mateo’s eyes sharpen. Twin flames of anger and fear race through me, and I whirl around, my still wet mane slapping the backs of my thighs.

“Am I really that repulsive? You’ve locked me in your house like some kind of Rapunzel, but I’m no damsel in distress.

If you’re sick of seeing me, why don’t you let me leave? ”

I hate saying the words, knowing in my heart of hearts most of them are a lie. But fuck, does it feel good to lash out, to fight back when I feel like I’ve lost all the power I’ve ever had.

His jaw ticks, clearly trying to work out what to say next. It’s fucking annoying.

“Why does everything always have to be so perfect for you—measured, calculated?” It’s the reason I’m afraid of what he might see. If everything in his world has to be perfect, including each word he says, how could he see me as anything but ruined?

“What do you mean?” he whispers, taking a hesitant step forward.

I turn away from him, unable to say the rest. “I want to go home, Mateo. I know Stetson would come stay with me, or better yet, I know they’d let me stay with them.”

When he suggested I stay here days ago, I didn’t argue with him.

At that point, I was still lost to the haze of shock and gratefulness to be alive.

But that haze is gone, and my rage is the only thing shining bright like a beacon in the turbulent sea of my emotions.

Maybe I’m being irrational, but fuck it.

If I only have one life, and this is it, then I want more.

I want to be better, now, not wasting another minute feeling sad or sorry or coddled.

I want people to treat me normal, to feel normal.

What even is normal anymore?

“You’re not going anywhere.” There’s a tremor in his voice, and I feel fit to explode at the paradox that’s him. He looks sickened by me, but then acts like he cares.

“Why?” My hands tremble around the top of my towel.

From the bed, I hear a shrill chirp, Queen Tut stretching out atop the plush white bedding.

My eyes mist at the sight of him, my feet aching to move toward his comfort.

Seeing him for the first time after getting out of the hospital had damn near broke me.

Not because seeing him was some kind of magical fix, but because he looked up at me, demanding treats and scratches, just like he always has.

Normal —he wanted what he’s always known, and in his perfect little eyes, I’m no different than the woman he’s always loved.

Mateo clears his throat. “I can keep you safe here.”

“Don’t act like you care,” I snarl, taking a single step toward the fluffy orange bundle of comfort. I know if I can just curl my fingers in his hair, I’ll feel better.

But I halt at the quiver in Mateo’s voice, “Dale, I care. I care so damn much. You’re my friend, and I?—”

Friends. A tear slips down my cheek, unable to repress them any longer, my face warming—from embarrassment and anger—and it’s like I’m right back there.

I’m being pushed to my knees to suck a cock that I’d rather choke on and die, than taste in my mouth for even a second longer.

We’ve always been friends—Mateo’s always been clear about that.

But when I was tied up, cold and alone, it was thoughts of him, and a chance to be someone else, that kept me going.

I wanted him. He’s always been the one to make me feel safe and whole, and I know now I’ve always wanted him more than just a friend. Realizing again, I’m just daydreaming about something that could never be true, feels like a very real knife through the heart.

I’m in complete and total darkness and there’s no way out.

My eyes snap open when a giant grip gently rests on my shoulder, more hovering than actually resting, and I fight the urge to run. Not for his benefit, but for my own—to prove to myself I’m not a fucking coward.

“Tell me Dale, what can I do? What did they do to you? If you just tell me, then I?—”

It’s like he has no idea how I feel.

A choked sob rips from my throat, “You’ll what? I’ve been a doll my entire life. Now I’m a broken doll. And no one wants a broken doll.”

His hand shakes; I can feel the vibrations as it continues to hover over my shoulder.

“You won’t even touch me. For fear of getting dirty, or breaking me I don’t know. But I’m already broken, don’t you get it? No matter how many showers I take, I’m still dirty. A dirty, broken doll.”

“Stop.” He hisses the word, but I can’t stop. The words pour out of me—a burst damn—and now that I’ve opened the floodgates, there’s no pushing them down.

“At first it wasn’t so bad. I was strong, although a little meek.

I thought that would make them want to hurt me less, if I wasn’t standing up to them.

But that’s what caused the first beating.

And the second. And Mar—the oldest brother, he would tell them to rape me; they held me down and whipped out their dicks to do so, but then he made them stop.

They jerked off and came on me, just to prove they could.

To embarrass me. To show me that it would happen; to fear when it would happen. ”

The memory of that first night flashes through my mind, so vivid that if there wasn’t sun shining warming my skin through the window, I could swear I was still there.

At that point Rafael already seemed more hesitant than his brothers, even though he didn’t stick up for me.

He did as Marco demanded, standing over my body, covering my hair in cum.

But when it was all over, it was his hand, quivering with anger, that cleaned the evidence of abuse from my face.

I don’t know if it was guilt, or repressed good character, that made him disobey his brother in secret. But bitterness leaked from his pores like poisonous gas, and even as he helped me, I didn’t speak to him. I was completely and totally alone.

It was the first true blow to my soul, and it wasn’t the last.

Mateo’s entire body vibrates, but I forge on. I don’t open my eyes, I don’t look at him in the mirror. I can’t face his disgust.

“And then for a while I only beatings. Beat because I ate too much of the food they gave me. And then beat because I didn’t eat enough.

Then I got beat because I had to use the bathroom so badly, and was hysterical that they wouldn’t let me use the toilet.

They beat me so badly that time, and I had to go so bad because I had held it for days that I did.

I shit myself. And then they laughed. And then they beat me because I was disgusting. ”

Tears flow down my face, mixing with the snot running from my nose, and I hate how strongly the words still taste in my mouth—foul and bitter and so fucking real.

“I lost track after that, I was barely conscious most of the time. But the night before I escaped, Mar—” I pause.

I still can’t say his name; it feels too much like giving him more power.

“He snapped, over what, I don’t know, but he came to me by himself, and”—I lick my dry, cracked lips—“then he made his brother’s hold me down and?—. ”

The words are too hard, too close to reliving the entire thing, even if the memory of it replays like the most vivid movie over and over in my mind.

Mateo waits, barely breathing and I strain to listen to the sounds around me to calm my racing heart.

In the distance there’s a lawn mower, and a cow bawling.

Closer, there’s the sound of a cabinet door closing downstairs, and Tut’s quiet rumbling.

And I hear Mateo’s heart, racing almost as fast as mine.

“Did he rape you?”

“No, not exactly.” That’s all I can say. I wasn’t raped, so I can’t claim that as my trauma to bare. But they did destroy me in every other way a human can be. And I feel as filthy as if he had.

“You’re safe.” Something about the way he says it, it’s as much for his reassurance as it is mine. And that does weird, confusing things to my heart. Because I don’t know what I’ll see when I open my eyes and look at his face— pain, sadness, disgust?

“I’m ruined.” I whisper, feeling the sentiment in my bones.

His hand finally falls, the full weight of it on my shoulder, and I sob harder.

He might be my friend, and the perfect punching bag, but his presence does something to my battered soul. Even when I want to hate him—because that would be easier than what I know in my bones I feel for him— I can’t.

“You’re perfect,” he states, his resolve solid as stone.

And for the first time in days, I don’t want to fight him. I just want to fall apart.

“Can…will you hold me?” I’m more vulnerable in this moment than I was on my knees, covered in my own waste. I feel like I’m falling through darkness with no idea where the top or bottom lies.

He grips my shoulders, tenderly with his enormous hand, and turns me toward him. I still don’t open my eyes. I still can’t face him. And then he crushes me to his chest, his hand pulling my head into the warm, firm heat of him.

I shatter, the weight on my shoulders finally crushing me.

But Mateo’s here, and maybe, just maybe, he’s strong enough to help me hold onto the pieces.