Redemptive (Combative, #2)(20)

“You what? You don’t think with your head?”

He shook his head slowly, his eyes on mine. “Not when it comes to you, apparently.”

“So…” I hesitated to ask, “What do you think with?”

He sucked in a breath before quickly coming to a stand, and my heart dropped when he walked away. I assumed the moment was over, so I started picking up the napkins and pizza boxes off the floor, but then he returned, sat back down, and held out a small silver box. “It’s not a computer,” he joked.

I picked it up, finding it impossible to breathe. I’d seen boxes like these in the many jewelry stores I’d walked past, but I’d never held one in my hands. A part of me was hesitant to accept it, but a bigger part of me was just too damn excited. And that excitement couldn’t be contained when I ripped the ribbon off and snapped the box open.

If I could bottle time, this would be one of them. Every sight, every smell, every feeling of this moment… I’d bottle it so I could experience it over and over.

Nate took the box from my hand and removed the gold bracelet, the tiny charms all coming into view. A star. A sun. A rainbow. A car. And about half a dozen others I hadn’t quite made out yet. “I figure you miss the outside world. It’s not much, I know, but maybe having these close to you will make the days go by a little easier.” He laughed once, but it was sad. “It’s dumb now that I think about it. It’ll just make you miss it more.” He grasped my hand and pulled it to him, then proceeded to clasp the bracelet around my wrist. “Do you like it?” he asked, his gaze lifting to mine, his eyebrows arched a little as he waited for my response.

And then it happened.

A single tear.

A single shaky exhale.

A single sob.

All of it escaped me at once.

I hadn’t meant to let it go.

“Why?” I choked out. “Why would you do this for me?”

His head dropped forward, his shoulders heaving with his breath. When he looked back up, his expression had changed. His jaw was tense; his lips thinned to a line. But his eyes… his eyes held a fear that had me struggling for air.

He got up quickly and held his hand out for me.

I took it.

Then he led me to the kitchen and pulled out a bottle—whiskey, I read—and poured two glasses. He offered one to me, and I accepted.

He drank his, and just as I started to lift mine, his hand covered mine around the glass. “Just wait. I need to get this out,” he rushed out.

I nodded.

And I waited.

He took another drink.

I sat up on the counter.

He watched me watch him.

Neither looking away.

He rubbed his eyes, which had become bloodshot and distant.

Another drink.

Finally, he said, “That room at the end of the hallway was my parents’.”

“Where are they?”

“Dead, Bailey. They’re dead.” He poured another glass, but he didn’t drink it this time. He just stared at it. “My mom died when I was ten. She used to sing that song to me—the same one you sang when I was holding a gun to your head. Every night we’d sing it together, and she’d tell me she loved me.” His teeth clamped shut and anger flamed in his eyes. “She even made me sing it out loud while I was locked in my closet and she was being raped in the room next to me.”

I felt the sob reach my throat again. I didn’t deserve to cry. “Nate…”

“I didn’t know what was happening… not until years later. But at the time… I couldn’t save her, Bailey…”

I reached up and moved his hair away from his beautiful eyes, and I realized what caused the fear I’d seen in them earlier. I cupped the side of his face, and he looked up, his gaze penetrating mine. “How old were you?” I asked.

“Seven.”

“You were just a kid…”

He leaned into my touch, coming closer and resting his head on my shoulder. I combed my fingers through his hair, stroking gently, hoping to comfort him somehow.

Soft and warm, his hands found my legs, and he stood between them. The warmth of his breath on my chest had my fingers curling in his hair. “But I’m not a kid anymore, Bailey,” he whispered. “And now… now you have to let me save you.”

We held each other, my hands in his hair stroking gently, him between my legs and his arms around my waist, gripping my shirt in his clenched fists. There was nothing sexual about it. It was comforting in a way I hadn’t felt in years, and after a while, he pulled back, giving me a half-smile that turned my insides to dust. I’d tried hard to ignore my attraction to him, to push those thoughts out of my head. But in that moment, the way he was looking at me, the way his hands rested gently on my thighs… I couldn’t deny it. “We almost forgot your cake,” he said, shaking his head and backing away toward the fridge. “That would’ve been a shame.”

We ate cake.

He told me about how it took him and Tiny two hours to pick one. Not because they were fussy, but because Tiny wanted to taste every single one. Three times each.

It made me laugh, something I hadn’t known I’d been missing, and his eyes lit up at the sound of it. And just like that, my life didn’t seem so dark anymore.