Raw Redemption (Crossing the Line #4)(20)

Still poised on his stomach, Henrik watched her through narrowed eyes. “Ailish, put the gun down. Now.”

Was there a please in there? She knew better than to ask that out loud—and it made her throat ache at the reminder of their running joke. How many people could you have a running joke with in less than twenty-four hours? Probably not many, but speculation did her no good, since she’d already pointed a gun at him. For the second time. Very slowly, Ailish placed one foot on the floor, then the other, careful to keep the gun lifted and level. “I have to go now, Henrik. Just let me—” He pushed off the bed and stood at his full height, which muddled her thoughts for a beat. “I’m not going back to Chicago. Just let me leave.”

They were facing off across the bed, but Henrik took a few steps toward the end, as if he would round the furniture in her direction.

“Stop,” she ordered, wishing away the panic in her voice. “You didn’t learn anything from the first time I shot you?”

“The first time was an accident.” His tone was forged in steel, but did she detect a note of…hurt? “You don’t want to run from me. I’m here to keep you safe. Just let me do that. Please.”

His please made her hand droop, just a little, before she jerked the weapon back up. “That’s exactly what I would say to someone I wanted to keep in line. I have a lot of experience being spoken to like that, you know? Twenty-one years.” She retreated a step when he took one forward, sand granules shifting in her belly. “You know, I got caught on purpose. By the police. I wanted to go to prison.”

Henrik became a statue, his mouth the only part of him that moved. “What did you say?”

Good question. She’d never told anyone. Had barely acknowledged it to herself. But there was something intimate and permissive about holding a gun on the man who’d just had his mouth all over you. And nothing would stay behind the dam anymore, truth needing to flow. Be gone. “I gave the police what they needed to put me away. I couldn’t be a witness anymore to my father’s actions. Every day, I felt sick. Even prison was better than my father’s house. But they just let me go. I still don’t understand it. I needed that chance to atone.” It felt incredible, letting go of her misery. She’d kept it inside so long. “I was trading one cell for another, but I never thought I’d be free. I am, though. I’m going to make up for my wrongs by being a good person. Someone who’s nothing like my father. And if there’s even a chance you’ll take me back to a cell, I have to get away from you. It’s…it’s nothing personal.”

He finally shook himself out of his eerily still state. “It’s been personal since I walked in here last night. Like it or not.” His gaze raked down her body, snagging on her bare thighs. “You just had your ankle hooked around my neck. Was that an act?”

“No,” Ailish answered without hesitation. “I like you, Growler. I wish you hadn’t lied to me, because now I have to question everything you’ve said.”

His expression reminded her of an athlete who’d just lost a game at the buzzer. “I didn’t want you to know I’d been kicked off the force.”

“Why not?”

He moved a few steps closer, his big barrel chest heaving in and out. “Because I like you, too, baby.”

Ailish wanted to shout at her heart for having the nerve to lift, at her gun hand for starting to tremble. How could she feel anything but nerves? She was running out of space, and she was on the wrong side of the bed. They needed to reverse sides if she wanted to make it to the door. Only she could barely see the door around Henrik’s wide shoulders, his tight jaw.

Loathing the whimper that passed her lips, Ailish cocked the gun. “Stop coming toward me or I’ll shoot you.”

“No, you won’t,” Henrik murmured. “You know you can trust me, even though I f*cked up. You can feel it.”

Irritation blindsided her. “Kind of like I should be able to trust my own father, right?” She swallowed hard and climbed onto the bed, sidestepping her way across the pillows. “I don’t know what trust is—I only know what I was taught to think. Maybe someday I’ll understand what trust means, but I won’t be able to learn anything if someone puts me in a cell. Or returns me to my father for good.”

Rage slashed over his features and for a second, Ailish thought he might dive onto the bed to retrieve her. “I’d never let either of those things happen.”

“Why? Why do you care so much? You barely know me.” The gun was getting too heavy. She had to get away soon or her arm would drop. But it was suddenly imperative that she learn the answer to her question. It had been nagging at her since last night, and she’d only just acknowledged it. “This is just your job. I’m a job to you.” She nodded once. “Right?”

His stare penetrated, reached inside and rearranged vital parts. “Ailish—”

The cabin door burst open.

A gun was leveled at Ailish.

“NO,” Henrik roared. “NO!”

...

When Henrik was nine, his older sister Danielle took him to a carnival. As a preteen, she’d wanted nothing more than to gossip with her friends, and looking after Henrik had seriously cramped her style. Sick of listening to the girls talk about girl things—and tired of feeling like a burden—Henrik went off by himself, buying his way into the haunted house with his last ride ticket. He’d found nothing about it scary, even recognizing a few of the zombies from around the neighborhood. But there’d been this one bloodcurdling scream that had stuck with him. The recorded sound had swooped down on him as he exited the haunted house—and after hearing it only once, he could recall it perfectly.