Page 59 of Redemption

“You can’t hurt my mother either.”

I growl, then catch myself. “Fine. I won’t hurt anyone in your family. No matter how much they deserve to suffer.”

“Swear it.”

I narrow my eyes at her. I don’t want to agree to this blanket pardon of her loathsome relatives.

But she would be troubled by their suffering. She’s so soft-hearted and good to her core. She would shed tears even for her abusers, just like she said she cried over her rapist’s death.

I won’t allow the monsters who raised her to cause her one more shred of grief. And she would grieve them if I killed them for her. She would probably feel responsible.

I won’t do that to her.

“I swear I won’t hurt anyone in your family.”

She nods, accepting my promise.

“My mother’s punishments were erratic,” she admits. “Sometimes, I wouldn’t be allowed to leave the house for a week. Other times, a simple slap to the face was enough to satisfy her. There was no rational pattern to the severity of the consequences.”

“The chaos was designed to keep you on edge.” Her mother is a narcissistic piece of shit. I’d known as much after spending five minutes in her presence at Meadows’ wedding.

But learning the extent of her cruelty to my Abigail is enough to make me see red.

“Dane.” My name is laced with warning, and I realize my hand has fisted beneath hers.

I force my muscles to relax.

“I’m not in that house anymore,” she reminds me. “She can’t hurt me.”

“And you’ll never step foot inside it again.” I try to keep the ring of command from my tone, but I don’t quite succeed.

“I don’t intend to.”

“I’ll protect you from them,” I vow. “I’ll make sure they never bother you again.”

“You can’t guarantee that,” she counters, but she doesn’t seem troubled by my fierce countenance. “I can handle them.”

I remember the way she wilted like a cut flower in her mother’s presence at the wedding.

“You don’t have to handle them alone. Not anymore.”

She stares at me for a while, and I realize she’s not going to respond to my intense declaration.

“We should get some sleep,” she says instead. “I’ll be here if you have another nightmare and want to talk.”

I marvel at how she’s softened toward me.

Maybe she won’t hate me forever.

Maybe she’ll love me again one day.

17

ABIGAIL

I’m safe now, Dane.

I can hardly believe I said those words to him last night. They’d been automatic, an irrepressible urge to comfort him in the wake of his nightmare about losing his sister.