Shattered (LOST #3)(55)

Just as she’d tried to do with Jax.

Only she was back in his bed, when she’d never returned to the others.

“Sarah . . .” When he said her name that way, it sounded like a caress. “I always get what I want. You should know that.”

And she thought about the bar he owned, all of the businesses. The fortune he’d amassed. He’d pulled himself from nothing . . .

I want everything.

But why did he want it with her?

“You’ve never even asked me . . . about him.” Others had. They’d asked with a sick curiosity. With disgust. With pity. With fear in their eyes. Different emotions, but they’d always asked.

She felt him shrug against her. “If you want me to know, you’ll tell me.”

Her breath came out on a ragged gasp. So simple. So . . . “I wish I didn’t know.”

The back of his knuckles slid over her arm. “Why? Do you think it makes any difference to me? You aren’t your father.”

“But that’s why he’s after me.” The man who’d taken Molly. The devil in the darkness. “To punish me for my father’s sins.”

“No, Sarah.” His knuckles slid over her skin once more in an oddly soothing caress. “He just wants to punish your father.”

“I want to punish him, too.” Those words tumbled out. “I wish, so many times, that I’d been strong enough to stop him.”

“Sarah?”

“Eight months,” she said, shuddering. “I knew what he was for eight months, and I didn’t stop him.”

“You were a child—”

“I’m a liar.”

He stiffened.

“I first heard the screams when I was six. I let him tell me to just go back to sleep. I listened to him. There were other signs . . . other nights when I’d wake up. Things he’d say and do, but I ignored them . . . he was my father, and he loved me.”

No, he didn’t. He just acted as if he did. He’s a psychopath. Psychopaths don’t love. They mimic. She’d learned all she could about her father’s condition when she’d been in school. Her father had driven her to become a profiler because by that point . . .

I already thought like a killer. So why not try to learn more and catch the other killers out there?

“I lied to myself for years. I believed my own lies as easily as I believed his.” And her father had been such a genius when it came to lying. On the surface, he’d been charming. Everyone had loved him. That was why—when the truth came out—all the neighbors had been so shocked.

He was such a good man. Always willing to help out with my yard work.

He never bothered anyone. He was a widower. He took such good care of his little girl.

He never caused trouble with anyone. Quiet, courteous . . .

Lies.

“There was this boy at school . . . he’d been teasing me, calling me names.” She had to swallow to clear the lump in her throat. “I hadn’t even told my dad about him, but I learned—later—that one of my teachers had called Dad. She was worried about me being bullied and she was trying to follow up at home.” She bit her lip. She bit it to stop the tremble.

“Stop, Sarah.”

He tapped her lip.

She realized that she’d nearly drawn blood.

Sarah’s tongue swiped over the lip, soothing the pain.

“I was having a sweet sixteen slumber party. My friends were coming over when I found the—the bag downstairs.”

He’d gone still. As still as stone.

“Ryan was in that bag. My dad had . . . sliced his throat. From ear to ear. Ryan’s blood had soaked through the bag, and my dad was there . . . telling me happy birthday.”

Jax swore and pulled her into his arms. He held her there, right against his heart, with a hold that was so tight and warm.

“My dad said he did it for me. To protect me.” She shook her head. Jax’s hold tightened on her. “I never wanted that. I never wanted him to kill anyone. Not for me.”

“I know.”

Did he? She’d seen suspicion on so many faces.

“He’d trained me to kill, for years, and I didn’t realize it. I was thirteen and he was showing me people in malls . . . people who weren’t paying attention to what was happening around them. People who would make easy marks. I didn’t know he meant people who could be his victims!”

“What did you do?”

Sarah pulled back to stare up at him.

“When did you cut your wrist, Sarah?”

She blinked. “That night. On my birthday. I—I canceled my party. Told my friends that I was sick. And when I was alone . . . when he left to get rid of the body . . . I sliced my wrist.”

“Christ.” His hold was almost painful then.

“I was bleeding out on the floor. I thought I was dead, and then he came back.” She’d never told anyone this part. Not the shrink she’d seen, not the cops. “He was crying when he found me. My dad told me that he couldn’t live without me . . . that he needed me to keep going.” He’d wrapped up her hand. He’d rushed her to the hospital. Then he’d fed the nurses a lie about her being despondent because her boyfriend had broken up with her.

The boyfriend? Ryan Klein. A guy who’d seemingly deserted everyone and left town.