He froze instantly.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, tears streaming now. “I’m sorry.”
He cupped my face with both hands, thumbs wiping the wet tracks from my cheeks. “I will personally deliver justice to every single one of them,” he said, voice low and lethal. “Every man who touched you. Every man who hurt you. They’ll beg for death before I’m finished.”
More tears fell.
I glanced down—his erection had softened slightly, the raw moment stealing the urgency from his body.
Panic flared.
“No—no, I want this,” I said quickly. “I want you.”
He searched my eyes for a long beat, then nodded once.
He tugged my jeans down slowly, carefully, peeling them off my legs.
My red cotton panties followed.
I was bare beneath him—completely exposed, scars and all.
The memories hit like a fist: rough hands pinning my wrists, cold stone against my back, the sour reek of sweat and liquor, my own screams echoing off the walls.
I flinched hard when his palm settled on my inner thigh.
He paused again. Gently parted my legs wider. Lowered his head.
I braced—expecting his mouth on me, craving it, needing something to overwrite the past.
But he stopped inches away. His breath ghosted over sensitive skin.
Then he lifted his head, eyes wide with something close to horror.
A single tear slipped from the corner of his eye.
It startled me more than if he’d pulled away completely.
“What?” My voice cracked, brittle with nerves and want. “Why did you stop?”
He swallowed hard.
His hand trembled as it hovered over me, then lowered—careful, reverent, as though my body might splinter under the wrong touch.
“You have scars,” he said hoarsely.
His fingertip traced a thin white line low on my abdomen. Not pressing. Just following the shape of it, as if memorizing.
“And here.” Another along my thigh, longer, jagged at the end.
“And this—”
His thumb stilled.
Hovered.
Just shy of a still-healing laceration near my entrance—raw, red, angry. Untreated because I’d learned the hard way that pain drawn attention. Because I’d learned survival sometimes meant neglect.
His breath hitched.