“When you’re in danger, when someone’s coming for you, you feel it,” Conor explained. “It’s dark and paralyzing and cold. If you aren’t expecting these two, you’ll feel that. You’ll also feel them. Jess is wild energy, but it’s subtle. I still don’t notice she’s there until she’s right next to me.”
Jess mock-bowed.
“There’s a pressure that comes with Kieran. Makes it hard to breathe. Makes your body heavy and shaky in a way that’s closer to the after-effects of a panic attack than fear.”
I forced a smile. “That’s pleasant.”
The corners of Kieran’s mouth twitched into a smile.
“You don’t notice it if you know he’s there,” Jess said with a secretive smile. “But what our boy here is saying, is that he’s been around us long enough to know when we’re coming even though we forget to knock most of the time.”
“All the time,” Conor corrected.
She rolled her eyes, but her expression was all playful teasing. “Anyway, continuing on. If you’re ever in a situation that you hopefully won’t be in.” Jess’s eyes darted to my daughter for a quick second. It was enough to tell me that she wouldn’t go into detail in front of Lex. “Remember what you just felt . . . and pray for it.”
I nodded. “Understood.”
Conor stepped forward and dropped to a crouch so he was eye to eye with Lexi. “Jess is here to talk to your mom. I know you don’t know him, but can Kieran hang out with us?”
She watched Kieran for a while before stepping from my hold to whisper loudly in Conor’s ear. “Does he color too?”
“Of course,” Conor said at the same time Kieran said, “Absolutely not.”
Conor’s mouth twisted into a broad smirk when he stood and turned to face his friend. “Looks like you’re about to color.”
“Please take photographic evidence and send it to Einstein so we’ll have it forever,” Jess said with a little clap as Kieran turned and stalked off toward my room. She tossed Conor her phone before he left. “Just in case he steals yours.”
I watched them go, trying to evaluate how I felt about Lexi being alone with those men. Both I hardly knew, one I barely trusted. When Conor turned and offered me a reassuring smile before leaving the door cracked behind him, my apprehension settled.
It was as if he’d known I would be worried because Kieran was such an unknown.
“Couch?” Jess asked, even though she was already walking that way.
I followed, knowing why she was here and wanting nothing to do with the conversation.
My brows rose when I rounded the corner into the living room and saw the coffee table littered with bags, cups of coffee, and food containers.
I hadn’t even heard them set anything down on their way in.
Jess swiped a cup as she passed and practically danced her way to the couch.
How she did that without looking ridiculous, I would never know.
She gestured to one of the other remaining cups. “Grab one and sit.”
I picked up a cup and toyed with the lid. “I know why you’re here,” I said as I sat opposite her.
“I can see that. I can also see you don’t want me here.”
“It isn’t—no, that is not—Christ.”
A soft, melodic laugh sounded before she took a long sip of her coffee. “I meant for the conversation,” she murmured against the cup.
“Oh.” I swallowed thickly and forced my hand into my lap so I would stop fidgeting with the lid. “It isn’t you.”
“It’s that I’m not someone you trust, which is fine.” She lifted her free hand toward the bedroom that held the boys and my world before placing it against her chest. “I understand. But in understanding that, I have to tell you that I already have an idea of what you aren’t telling me. I don’t know specifics, but I have an idea.”
My head was shaking before she finished speaking. “You don’t.”
“Okay.” Her tone was soft, but there was the subtlest hint of skepticism.
“You don’t. I told you that he didn’t abuse me—in any sense. I wanted—” I choked on the lie before it could escape.
Because I hadn’t wanted him.
I’d never wanted him, even long before the games began.
Jess was silent for a minute before saying, “Okay, maybe he didn’t. But you also told me that you felt violated, so I was hoping you would explain that to me.”
An hour later, I’d somehow told her the entire thing.
From the very first game until I found the pills, leaving out anything that had to do with Zachary and Jason’s plan to get Vero back, contacting ARCK, or how I’d really ended up here.
Jess had stayed silent throughout the entire thing, listening intently. The only reason I knew she was paying attention at all was the deep sadness that started seeping from her when I talked about the years that should have been kept behind the walls of my home.
Throughout it all, I told myself to stop, but it was like ridding myself of a disease.
Once I began the process, I couldn’t stop.
“Sutton, I hear you, I do. But that—everything you told me—was abuse. Mental, physical, sexual . . .”
“No. No, it wasn’t.”
“It was. The games . . . if you had enjoyed what he was doing, you wouldn’t have run from him. You wouldn’t have nightmares about it. You wouldn’t be shaking while telling me about it.”
“You don’t—you don’t understand. It’s just something he wanted to do. I was fine with it.”
A startled huff escaped her. “Did he tell you that you were fine with it?”
My mouth formed a thin line . . . because he had.
So many times.
“There’s kinky, and then there’s what he was doing. You told him to stop. You told him he was hurting you. He told you to shut up and play your part, Sutton. That’s disgusting.” She sat forward and reached for my hand. “If Kieran did any of those things, he would find himself in a grave.”
Anyone else, I would take the words as nothing more than a hypothetical statement.
With Jess, I kind of wondered if she would put Kieran there herself.
“But it wasn’t always like that. There were times that it wasn’t.”
“Yeah, but did you want those times to happen? Did you enjoy it?” she asked, her tone gentle, hesitant. When I only stared at her in silence, stunned that she would ask something so bold, she gave a little shrug. “You mentioned that you held off, made sure you didn’t have sex at times. That isn’t normal for someone who wants to be physical with their partner.”
“I didn’t want another baby,” I whispered, partially in embarrassment, partially in caution in the chance Lexi could hear me.
“That isn’t what I asked.”
I gaped at her for a few seconds. “What does it matter if I wanted it or enjoyed it? There are obligations I had as his wife; I was filling them.”
Her eyes widened, but instead of responding, she said, “I’m not attacking you. I just want us to talk so I can help you understand what was happening. I know once you finally see it all for what it was, it’s going to hurt, but you need to.”
“No, you need to understand that what you’re trying to say happened didn’t. You’re trying to take seven years of my life and change it into something that is just—God,” I cried out.
At some point, I’d stood.
At some point, I’d begun yelling.
But Jess just sat there, calmly watching me, pain and worry filling her dark, dark eyes.
My body shook as that soul-deep chill worked through me, and I turned to start pacing so I could warm myself up.
One of the times I was facing her, I stopped and gripped my arms to try to calm the trembling. “There are things that happen between a husband and a wife that are for them to figure out, things that are not meant to leave the walls of their house. It is the wife’s job to make sure that her husband is satisfied at any cost. That’s what I was doing.”
/>
“Who told you that?”
“My mother,” I yelled. “Jesus, why am I even talking about this with you? I don’t even know you.”
Jess looked horrified. “You should want to make the man you love happy. You should want to make your partner happy. But not at any cost. Not at the cost of your happiness. Not when it comes with the price of him physically hurting you and raping you and telling you to allow it because it is your job. Telling you that you enjoy it until you believe him.” She paused when a sob wrenched from me, her eyes studying me for a few moments. “He had to drug you to even make you want to have sex with him.”
“I know,” I snapped and dropped my head into my hands as every fear and every resentment and every hatred came rushing up to overwhelm me.
Jess was silent as I cried, only reaching out to place a hand on my knee when I collapsed onto the couch again.
“I went to my mother after the first game.” I finally lowered my hands to look at Jess. “I was scared and distraught and ready to leave Zachary. I told her what had happened, or, at least, I tried to. She stopped me before I could finish and told me snap out of it. Asked if he was my husband and then told me to stop being ungrateful and to go home. To remember everything he gave me. She said, as wives, we had to sacrifice ourselves to our husband’s needs. As I was leaving, she told me to remember that couples without problems are what people want to see. That the ins and outs of a marriage are to remain within the walls of a home. And that marital problems should be forgotten before they begin.”
“She sounds as bad as Zachary.”
A soggy laugh climbed my throat. “She isn’t pleasant, but she made it seem normal. Like it was to be expected in a marriage. So, I tried to tell myself it was. I told myself it hadn’t been as bad as it seemed or that I could handle it because, most of the time, Zachary was so charming. But then it happened again and again, and every time, all I wanted was to get away—to disappear. It was why I ran and hid . . . it’s instinctive to hide from that kind of evil. But I was told that I wanted it and enjoyed it, and it was easier to survive it if I closed my eyes and made myself believe that it was normal. If, when it was over, I made myself believe that I was doing what I was supposed to as his wife.”
“None of that was normal.”
“I know.” My eyelids slipped closed. “I’ve known.” I swallowed through the shame threatening to choke me. “But I didn’t know how else to survive him and what was happening.”
Jess gripped my hand in hers and squeezed tight. “You did, and that’s what matters.”
“I don’t know if I love him,” I admitted softly.
“That’s understandable.”
“No,” I said quickly and opened my eyes to focus on her. “I don’t know if I ever did. My father made me date two men and told me whoever proposed first was the one I had to marry. I knew both of them, but I didn’t know them well. I hadn’t had any interest in dating them before, and the circumstances surrounding my father’s command made me want to date them less.”
“What kind of screwed-up place did you grow up in?”
My chest moved with a silent laugh. “Somewhere I thought was normal until a week ago. Funny how much can change in such little time.” I shook my head, as if that could clear it from the onslaught of this week. “When Zachary proposed, my mother asked if I loved him, and I said of course not. She asked again, and I laughed. Then she asked again, and I realized the only answer to her question was yes. She asked me every day until the wedding. My answer always had to be yes.”
I reached for my naked ring finger and exhaled shakily.
“But, like I said, he’s incredibly charming, and like everything else, I told myself the lie enough times that I started to believe it.”
“I’ve heard that about him.”
My eyes flashed to hers, and for a second, I couldn’t understand the anger there. “Einstein,” I finally whispered.
Her mouth twitched into an oddly beautiful mixture of a smile and a frown.
“I’m sorry for what happened.”
She waved my words away. “You didn’t know what he was going to do.”
Except I had, in a way.
Say it. Say it . . . just say it.
She’ll understand, she has to.
But if she doesn’t . . .
“Uh, but Zachary, there were things he did and said almost immediately after our marriage that were . . . off, I guess, and then the games started a couple of years in. So, if I ever had truly loved him, or had started to, it died that first night. Not that it would’ve made a difference. Then, for the last year, I’d been so confused because whenever he touched me, or whenever there was the possibility of it, I wanted his touch in a way that made me almost sick in my soul. All I kept thinking was, how could I be afraid of someone and hate them and want them in that way?”
“It wasn’t real,” Jess said gently.
“I know that now. I knew when I found the pills, but it doesn’t change the disgust I felt and still feel with myself.”
After a moment, Jess said, “I want to tell you that you shouldn’t feel disgusted—and you shouldn’t. It was nothing you did. I know that feeling, though, and I know it takes time to work through.” Her mouth stretched into a meaningful smile. “Time and maybe the one man in the world who can chase your demons away.”
My cheeks blazed with heat when I realized her meaning.
It had only happened last night, and I doubted Conor had said anything to them about it, but he had been up before me and I’d taken so long getting ready . . .
“I so knew it,” she whispered. “I knew it, I knew it. There’s so much tangible tension between the two of you, I knew you liked him too.”
“He told you he liked me?”
“He asked to be removed from the case because of it.” Jess must have seen the way her news sent a punch to my chest because she hurried to add, “Obviously, that didn’t happen since he’s still here.”
I wanted to know when he’d asked to leave and what else he had said to them, but I knew gaining answers would only muddle things that were already so complicated.
“There are things you need to know, though. Conor is the bright spot in our world. He’s happy and kind and there for anyone when they need him. Yet, for how caring he is, he protects his heart. He never reveals his interests. Ever. Which means he doesn’t need someone to fuck and move on from.” She leaned forward, her face slipping into something wicked and slightly unhinged. “So, let me be the one to tell you that, if you hurt that man, I will kill you before anyone else can.”
Once again, I had the strangest feeling she wasn’t being hypothetical.
I swallowed thickly and nodded before shaking my head. “It doesn’t matter, I can’t . . . we can’t. I want to—God knows I do. There’s something about him that calls to me in a way I’ve never experienced. But as much as I want to answer that call, we can’t. I’m still married to Zachary.”
A breath of a laugh crept from Jess. “Not.”
“What do you mean not?”
“You aren’t married. You never were.” Her expression fell for a moment before her eyebrows lifted in surprise. “Did you not know that?”
No.
No, no, no . . .
She’s lying.
But no matter how many times my mind screamed denials, I couldn’t forget the way the words had easily fallen from her lips, as if she’d been unconsciously correcting my mistake.
A mistake she clearly thought I should’ve recognized.
My chest heaved with harsh, ragged breaths as I tried to hear her words and understand their meaning.
My mind just kept rejecting them.
Because that would mean . . . what the hell did that mean?
“What do you mean?” I said through clenched teeth, not realizing that I’d yelled or that I was standing again until she was there with me, trying to calm me.
“Take a breath.”
I was.
I
was taking too many too fast.
“Slow breath,” she said gently but firmly.
My head was shaking, and I was backing away from her and stumbling over the coffee table.
I didn’t even feel the impact when I fell to the floor.
It felt like those last months with Zachary all over again—as if I were going insane.
I was married. I knew I was.
I had a ring—had. I’d had a ring.
There had been a wedding, and a church and a priest and a damn reception. My mother had been awful and had continuously told me I was the only imperfect thing there.
But in just a few sentences, I was wondering if it had all been another lie.
In one conversation, I felt like I couldn’t trust anything I’d known.
In one week, my entire life had changed.
“Sutton, it’s okay. Just breathe,” Jess said as she crouched next to me.
“Don’t touch me,” I screamed and jerked my arm from her hold. “I spent seven years with that goddamn monster because he was my husband, so tell me what the fuck you mean.”
Kieran was suddenly in the room with us seconds before Conor came charging in after him.
“I thought she knew they weren’t married,” Jess whispered to the guys. “I didn’t realize.”
My gaze swung to Conor, a plea for him to tell me they weren’t really tilting my world on its side again, but he was staring at me cautiously.
“You knew,” I choked out. “You knew, and you didn’t tell me? You knew I was disgusted with myself for being tied to him. You knew I hated that I was still bound to that man in any way . . . and you didn’t tell me?”
Nothing.
Conor simply continued to watch me as I yelled at him. Only moving when I struggled to stand from the floor.
I swatted at his hand. “Don’t you dare touch me. You knew.”
From the way his jaw ticked, he heard the double meaning in my words.
Not only did he know that I was sick over my lingering, legally binding connection to Zachary, he’d known I was torn up with guilt over what we had done because I was still married. Even if to a man I hated.
I pushed past him and whirled on the three of them when Jess called my name. “I’m done. I’m done having you all rip the floor out from under me. I’m done having my world twisted into something I don’t even recognize with each new bomb you drop.” A frantic, breathless laugh bubbled up my throat, and I reached for my head. “I feel like I’m going crazy because I don’t know what actually happened, what’s real, what to believe.”
Limit (Rebel Book 3) Page 18
