Page 23 of Recovering Ivy (Red Team #4)

Zane

Mine.

Ivy was mine. Mine to protect. Mine to avenge. Mine to keep.

All day I’d been wrestling with my emotions, not something I was used to.

I liked my life neat and orderly. The only emotion I was comfortable with was anger, and the only things I allowed myself to feel daily was guilt and determination.

I knew I should let Ivy go. I should walk away now and save her, but I wouldn’t.

I would set a course and not deviate from it until I owned her. I would accept nothing less.

A war had been raging inside my head and in that moment the battle had been won.

I knew what I needed to do. I knew it was going to be a long, hard road paved with landmines and more emotional baggage than I was equipped to handle, but I’d figure it out.

The promise of what Ivy had to offer would be my guide.

I wouldn’t fail her. The broken and battered woman standing in front of me was meant to be mine.

I felt it to my core. She was stronger than I could ever have imagined.

I’d spent five minutes in the presence of the venomous snake that was Ivy’s mother and I wanted to commit murder.

Knowing Ivy had spent a lifetime hearing what I just heard was a hard pill to swallow.

No one deserved that. No child should have to grow up seeing what Ivy had seen.

The shock of her mother’s visit had not worn off when I helped Ivy into the passenger seat.

She didn’t speak on the drive home. She remained pulled into herself when I guided her into the house and sat her on the couch.

Her knees came up to her chest, her tiny feet rested on the edge of the couch, and she hugged her legs tightly.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m so embarrassed you witnessed that.”

“You have nothing to be embarrassed about,” I told her.

“That was her going easy on me.”

“Jesus. Fuck. Baby, I’m so sorry.”

“My whole life she’s been telling me I’m trash.

My whole life I spent trying to prove her wrong, show her I’m not what she thinks I am.

I’ve been trying to prove to myself I can be something different, something better.

But what if she’s right? What if the filth and stink can’t wash off?

I’m her daughter after all. What if what she has in her is in me, too? I’m so tired of fighting it.”

Hell fucking no was that bitch going to beat Ivy down any more than she already had.

“You’re not fighting anything. There is nothing to fight because you are nothing like her.

Nothing, Ivy. No part of you is even remotely close to her.

You are beautiful and strong. The woman I met today is weak.

She didn’t have it in her to beat back whatever demons plagued her life.

She is vindictive and envious. Baby, stop fighting and start living. You are just you.”

“I can’t unlearn what she’s taught me, Zane. ”

“Yes, you will, and I won’t stop until you forget every last nasty word she’s ever said to you, every fucked-up lesson she shoved at you. Sarah Long will be a forgotten memory.”

“How do you forget?” she asked.

At her question, I felt my breath leave my lungs and struggled for oxygen.

I understood her question, but I didn’t understand why she was asking.

No one had ever flat out asked me that. My brother was the only person with balls enough to dance around the topic.

Everyone else gave me the respect I’d earned and left my personal life off the table.

But if I was going to claim Ivy, I had to try.

Opening myself up was not easy, it wasn’t something I ever wanted to do, it wasn’t something I’d ever thought I would do. Not even with Linc.

“I don’t,” I answered.

Most of the men I’d been in combat with had learned how to compartmentalize.

They learned to place different tragedies, different memories, different emotions into boxes and lock them away, never to revisit them.

I couldn’t. I didn’t get to indulge in forgetting.

I had people’s lives in my hands. I couldn’t ever forget the mistakes I had made, or the lives that had been lost because of me.

“Because you feel responsible?”

“Because I am responsible. Every part of a mission comes back to me.”

“Isn’t that a little egotistical? You can’t control everything.”

“There is no ego in combat. And I have to be in control, of everything, at all times. If I’m not, people get hurt, my men die.

I don’t get to pretend it was fate, or bad timing, or bad intel.

Every black mark on my soul is because I failed.

I failed my men, I failed the mission, I failed my country.

Every scar and mark I wear serves as a reminder that I’m inadequate.

” I paused, needing a moment after my admission.

“You’ve seen my scars, Ivy. Plain as day you can see my failures etched across my skin.

I’ve never tried to hide them from you. My hands are dirty; I’ve taken lives and will not stop.

It’s a part of my job; it’s a part of who I am.

I’ll try my hardest not to bring it home to you, but I can’t promise you I’ll succeed.

I may be a dick most of the time, but I’m not a liar and I don’t make promises I can’t keep. ”

“I’m not sure I understand what you mean by bring it home .”

I was fucking this up. I didn’t know what the hell I was doing. I sounded like a love-sick teenager whose balls hadn’t dropped yet. I didn’t do hearts and flowers and puppy dogs. I didn’t know how to explain to her what I wanted. I wasn’t this man, the type that stumbled over his words.

Fuck.

Spit it out, Lewis.

“I’ve never done this,” I admitted.

“Done what?”

“This. You and me. Us. What we’ve been doing.

I don’t allow people into my world. I’ve never had breakfast with a woman.

I’ve never spent multiple nights with a woman.

I’ve never talked to a woman about anything remotely personal.

We fuck, she leaves, or I leave, but one of us always goes.

I don’t even offer coffee in the morning.

It gives the wrong impression. It invites conversation, conversation I don’t want to have. ”

“Ouch.”

“That’s me, Ivy. I’m a prick. I live by strict rules. Those rules are in place to protect myself and others.”

“So you want me to leave?” Her expression had changed from confused to hurt. I was still fucking this up.

“No. I want you to stay.” I needed a drink.

No, not a drink, I needed a new set of balls apparently, since I’d lost mine somewhere.

“I’m fucking this up. I tried to keep my distance, but I can’t.

I cannot for the life of me get you out of my head.

It started the morning I woke up and you’d snuck out.

I was pissed at you, pissed I didn’t know your last name to track you down, pissed at the universe for giving me something so damn sweet then yanking it away.

I couldn’t stop thinking about you; I still can’t.

You can be in the next room and I hate it.

I want you next to me. What I’m saying is, whether you like it or not, I’m not letting you go. ”

“Do I have a say?” She smiled.

“No. You’re mine. I’ve never been so sure of something in my life.”

“Well… if I don’t have a choice…”

“You have a choice. But not a say.”

“That makes no sense, Zane.”

“Sure it does. I get the say, and you get the choice of how difficult you’re going to be before you come around to my way of thinking.”

“I’m not sure I like how bossy you are,” she huffed.

“You’ll learn to love it,” I assured her.

“Don’t think I will. You may want to reconsider everything you said. I don’t take kindly to being pushed around.”

I sat on the couch next to her, unwrapped her arms from around her legs, and pulled her over me until she was straddling my lap. She muttered her annoyance but made no attempt to pull away. When she was settled where I wanted her, I brought both my hands to her face and held her gaze.

“I will never push you around. I may be bossy, but I am not an abusive prick. You will learn to love me being in control because it means you’ll be free to be anything you want to be, secure in the knowledge I will keep you safe.

I will never ask something of you to be a dick or for some fucked up power trip.

I want nothing more than you to be happy and safe.

I can’t control everything, but what I can, I do.

I can’t explain to you why I need it, but I do.

As Jasmin says, I get cranky when I’m not in absolute control. ”

“Do I get to decide what we have for dinner or will you control that, too?” she sassed.

“Now you’re being a brat and brats get spankings.

” Ivy’s eyes flared, and I was pleased she was turned on by the idea.

My need for control certainly extended to the bedroom.

Lucky for her, she thoroughly enjoyed me in charge.

“You like the idea of me bending you over my knee and pinkening your beautiful ass?”

“I shouldn’t, but I do.”

“Why shouldn’t you?” I asked, allowing my hands to wander up and down her torso. I was finding I didn’t mind talking so much when she was on my lap. I’d have to remember to have all future conversations this way.

“Because I’m not a child that needs to be punished.”

“No, you’re not. You’re a head-strong, independent woman, who enjoys her man reddening her ass. Not because I have the right to punish you, but because it turns me the fuck on. In return, you get mind-bending orgasms and the freedom to let go and just feel.”

“Well, when you put it that way…” she smirked before she asked, “will I have to kneel for you and have rules I have to follow?”