Page 104 of Raphael

“No.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re mine,” he stated, like it was the most natural thing in the world. “Because you’ve been mine for a very long time.”

Something about the way he watched me unsettled me, as if he waited - for what, I didn’t know.

Wait. What? He said I was his for a very long time.

Another nudge in my memory, but it dissipated before I could latch on to it.

“We just met,” I responded, my voice weak and my blood pulsing in my ears.

He let out a sardonic breath. “You’ve been mine for years, Reina. From that first dance in La Reina. From the first word you said that night, I’ve been under your spell.”

And just like that, the memory dropped into place.

ChapterForty-Three

RAPHAEL

She finally remembered.

I could see it in her beautiful eyes and in her parted lips, shock evident in her expression.

“You,” she breathed out. “I’ve seen you before.”

Her eyes lowered to my hands and stayed locked on them.

“Diablo,” she whispered. “The tattoo.” Her eyes flicked back to my face. “I remember it.”

She stared at me and I wondered what was going through that beautiful mind. The woman had no idea how obsessed I’ve been with her for years. She had never left my mind. It was hard to believe that after eight years, I was able to touch her. Call her mine. If she thought I’d let her go, she was out of her goddamn mind.

I waited too goddamn long to find her. I’d give heranything,but her freedom.

“I’ve waited a long time for you,” I admitted softly.

She sighed and reached out, her palm coming to my bare chest. As if she attempted to claim what beat underneath it. It was hers already. It had always been hers.

“I forgot we went to that club that night,” she muttered. “Truthfully, everything about that night was a blur except the end of it.”

“The end?”

Her sapphires glimmered and sheer raw pain passed her expression. “Your father raped Anya,” she whispered so low that if it wasn’t just the two of us awake, I wouldn’t have heard it. “Father threatened her and told her she had to go see him. W-we went and then your father raped her. In front of us.”

I recalled the words from Byron when I ran into him and his sister in New Orleans. The girls got caught skinny dipping in my father’s pool. Alexei pretty much confirmed the same thing. It was Byron’s father that came to get them afterwards. Why wouldn’t Aurora’s old man have said anything? Was my father holding something over the Ashfords?

“Tell me everything.” I tried to control the venom in my voice. I didn’t want to scare her.

She swallowed, trying to keep her breaths steady. “We were on our spring break. Anya was invited to your father’s place. We all went along. Aurora and Willow got wild and jumped into the pool. We got caught. He and his guards shuffled us into one of the rooms that had bars. All of us but Anya.” I noticed the small tremor in her hand. “Then he raped her. Over and over again. We were forced to watch it. To hear Anya’s whimpers. And I couldn’t make him stop. I couldn’t even save her.”

Fuck. I hated my father, but at this moment, I wished I could bring him back to life so I could torture him. Make him bleed. Make him scream. For Sailor.

I took a small step towards her and took her face between my hands. She didn’t flinch. She didn’t step away. I took it as a good sign.

“He was a sadistic bastard,” I told her. “He destroyed everything he touched, including my mother.” My forehead came to rest on hers. “I wish I could take your pain away and change history. I so fucking wish that I’d have taken you with me after I beat up that cabrón who touched you and kept you with me. Both you and your sister.”

Because for a fraction of a moment, I’d seen her. It was the girl I caught my father choking in my office that night and I sent her off, thinking nothing of it.