Keep Me Safe (Slow Burn #1)(11)

The fact that he’d added to her already overwhelming burden, things she had to live with every day, her sleep tortured by the taint of evil she’d confronted time and time again . . . ​his guilt—and genuine regret—ate at him with every passing day he’d been unable to locate her.

On his darkest days, he’d wondered if she was even still alive. Such desperation and despair as he’d seen in her eyes and then the resignation and fatalism in her features could well drive her to the ultimate act of finding rest at last.

Her death.

If she became reckless—careless—if she simply didn’t care any longer whether she lived or died it would make her bolder. Death may well represent her final escape from the hell of her day-to-day reality.

What the hell could he do to help her heal? If she could even ever be healed. He saw the toll the events of a year ago had taken—and still was taking—on his sister and she’d only suffered once. Once was enough. But Ramie? She’d undergone the same kind of horror not once or twice. But dozens of times. He had no idea how she coped with it all without shattering into a million pieces.

Maybe she already had. Maybe she’d never be able to pick up the pieces. Maybe there was simply nothing he could do but helplessly stand by while she lost another sliver of her soul, until there was simply nothing left of her but a mere shell of the woman she once was.

She was only twenty-five. Not even to the peak of her life. And yet when he saw her dull, lifeless eyes, she’d seemed far older than her age. More weary. The weight of ten lifetimes, more than most people would ever endure in a hundred lifetimes all pressing down on her, suffocating the life right out of her.

But then she’d been helping victims since she was a young girl, when the extent of worry for a child her age usually amounted to making good grades, hanging out with friends and having a boyfriend. Certainly not the oppressive responsibility of having the lives of kidnap victims hanging in the balance, their fate in the hands of someone so young and vulnerable.

It was obvious to him that she’d had no childhood at all and that she’d been forced to grow up and bear adult responsibility far too young.

His heart ached for the girl she once was and for the woman he may have irrevocably damaged in his desperation to save his loved one. Had Ramie ever been anyone’s loved one? It appeared from everything he’d read that she’d never had a stable family, never enjoyed the unconditional love of family and certainly had no comprehension of a life without the suffocating responsibility she’d been forced to take on at such a tender age.

Weariness and guilt assailed him because he knew in his heart that if he had to do it all over again, he wouldn’t have chosen differently. If he hadn’t found Ramie precisely when he did, his sister would have died the very next day. But knowing that didn’t make the bitter pill any easier to swallow. And it didn’t stop him from his determination to ensure she didn’t suffer any longer.

“Do you have the key to her room?” Caleb demanded, his impatience rearing its head. He was in a hurry to see for himself just how much damage had been done to her.

Antonio grimaced and shook his head. “She wouldn’t allow it. She was scared out of her mind and it was obvious she didn’t trust me. I can’t say I blame her. She’s holed up in her room and I’d be surprised if she answers her door at all. I would have carried her to her room because she looked completely dead on her feet, but she was very careful not to let me touch her. She maintained several feet of space between us, and she locked herself in the minute she got inside the room.”

“Fuck,” Caleb muttered. “The room is registered to her but also to me. I’ll get a key from the desk.”

“Won’t do you a damn bit of good if she’s dead-bolted the lock, and in her shoes I’d have done exactly that. When you’re scared shitless someone is going to find you and subject you to God only knows what, you don’t do something stupid like leave entry into a hotel room to chance. The only way you’re getting in there is if she lets you.”

SEVEN

RAMIE roused violently, bolting upright in the bed, fear surging, adrenaline racing through her veins. She heard the firm knock at her door. For a long moment she sat in bed, covers pulled tightly to her chin, staring at the door as if expecting it to burst in at any moment. What if he had found her?

Her mouth went dry and she couldn’t swallow the burgeoning knot in her throat.

It took her another moment to gain her bearings, to remember where she was and that Caleb had said he’d be here as soon as possible. Was it him? Or was it the man she’d narrowly escaped just hours before?

Her hands shook, causing the covers to tremble like rolling ocean waves. She couldn’t think for the roar in her ears. She did not want to answer the door not knowing what awaited her on the outside.

A peephole. She didn’t have to unbolt her door to check the peephole.

She scrambled out of bed just as another knock sounded. And then she heard his voice through the door.

“Ramie? Ramie, it’s me, Caleb Devereaux. You can open the door. You’re safe now.”

Logically she registered who it was, that she recognized his voice, but his assurance that she was safe now didn’t provide any comfort because she knew she wasn’t safe. Maybe she’d never be safe. Even though she’d recognized his voice she still approached the door with caution and rose up on tiptoe to check the peephole.