Page 6 of Mended Souls
“I found her. It’s not my story to tell. Take care of her, okay?” Hunter said. “She needs comfort right now, and I need to kick Blaize’s ass.”
“I will.” As Hunter walked out, Drew crouched down next to me and Annika. “You need to shower and clean those wrists. Annika will be there with you, I’m just taking you there. Are you okay with that?”
I nodded, and he picked me up into his arms. I sank into his chest as he walked me into my bathroom, sitting me on the counter as Annika turned on the faucet and started filling her bathtub. Annika’s guys didn’t scare me. None of the men here scared me…not until tonight with Hawke.
Annika closed the door and lifted my shirt up, pulling it over my body. I didn’t know whose clothes I was wearing since my lingerie had blood on it.
“Hey, it’s okay,” Annika soothed, her voice keeping me from falling back into the dark abyss I had fought so hard to stay out of. I stood on wobbly legs as she tugged the shorts down my legs. “Do you want to talk about it?”
I looked at her and opened my mouth, waiting for the words to come out, but it was only replaced with a sob. She pulled my naked body into her and squeezed me tight. “I’m sorry.” She shushed me before saying, “You have nothing to be sorry for.”
I sank into the hot water, letting it engulf me and soothe my aching muscles, being careful of my wounded wrists. “I was raped,” I whispered, causing a frown to paint Annika’s face, “before I came here. I was also stabbed, that’s the scar I have. It’s the reason I had a blood infection when Hawke found me. I didn’t tell anyone ‘cause I didn’t want to cause a problem. I was fine for the most part. I’m sorry.”
“You didn’t do anything wrong, Kadence,” Annika comforted.
“I didn’t tell anyone who I was. This could’ve been prevented.”
“This isn’t your fault,” Annika said, firmness laced in her voice. “Your story is yours to tell. Blaize shouldn’t have done this. I don’t care if you killed her kitten, she should’ve thought beforehand.”
I forced out a smile. “I love her.”
Annika looked at me, surprised. “Oh.”
I sank further into the water, wincing when it hit the lacerations on my wrist. “I shouldn’t. Not now. She hurt me. She wanted to kill me. The look in her eyes was feral.”
The woman I saw in that basement was not the woman who brought me immense pleasure weeks ago. The new Blaize was terrifying, and I’d faced a number of terrifying people in my lifetime, but nothing compared to Blaize in that moment. She only faltered when I panicked. Blaize wanted to kill me, and she might’ve accomplished her mission if I hadn’t had a full-on panic attack.
“Don’t listen to your heart right now. You know me, normally I’d tell you to—but after this…trust your brain. If you choose tolet her love you or try to, make her pay. I don’t care if she’s my boss or if she’s scary, if she hurts you again, I’ll kill her myself.”
“I love you. I don’t know how I got so lucky to meet you or your guys.”
“We’ll always be here for you.”
I gave her a smile. “I guess I should get out and get my wrists cleaned. I’m exhausted.”
Annika helped me clean and bandage my wrists, then gave me one of Drew’s shirts to sleep in. I told them all goodnight before slipping under my covers and hoping sleep would find me quickly.
CHAPTER 5
BLAIZE
My emotions had clouded my judgment ever since she arrived, then Layla and Fallon’s attack threw me overboard. I just wanted answers and thought Kadence was the source I needed. I never expected to be this fucking wrong. To cause this much damage. This turmoil had my head in a tangle. I couldn’t deny that I had let my emotions overtake everything in me and create a fucked-up mess with Kadence. She was angry, hurt, and it was all my fault. I couldn’t lie and say it was her being dramatic. I did this.
I triggered her, sending her back to the worst night of her life. I sat, nursing a bottle of whiskey after I threw the glass I had been drinking from against my wall. It bounced off and was currently sitting pretty in the corner of my office. The whiskey didn’t make my heart feel any better, nor did it numb the throbbing in my head. I was a fucking idiot.
Hunter stormed into my office. “I said it once, and I’ll say it again…you are a goddamn idiot.”
“Did you just come in here to tell me what I already know? I fucked up. I don’t know how to fix this.”
“I don’t know if you can. If it’s as bad as Hawke said, she’s going to need time. She held her pain in instead of coping correctly, and now she’s drowning in it.”
I tipped my head back, lifted the bottle to my lips, and took another gulp of the amber liquid before looking at Hunter with a raised brow. “You were not the archetype for coping with trauma.”
“This isn’t about me or my own fucked-up life. I have issues. Lots and lots of trauma, but at least I’m not hurting the girl I love.”
I glared at her. Her sassy attitude was not what I needed, but it was what I deserved. My emotions had clouded my judgment, and I had hurt Kadence as a result. Not just physically, but emotionally and mentally, too. She relived her nightmare. Hunter had always been straightforward and blunt with me, telling me what was on her mind unless it pertained to her own trauma. When I said we were alike, I meant it. She hid her emotions behind a pretty face and kink.
When I found her mutilating that priest, it took her weeks before she finally opened up to me. The answer was screaming at me in the crimson red that coated her skin, but it was her story to tell. She doesn’t tell anyone what happened to her, and sometimes she still needed a breather to scream and cry in my room away from listening ears. Only Hawke, Fallon, Drew, and I knew what happened to her at Holy Trinity.
