Page 105 of Reckless Devotion

I force myself not to take another step back, refusing to let him see how terrified I am. I am not a defenseless teenage girl anymore, and if he tries to lay one finger on me, I’ll rip out his fucking throat. I think of Rosie, Kathy, and Maura—all of the women I work with who just want to take back a small slice of the autonomy that got taken from them by a man somewhere along the way. They don’t deserve this. None of them do.

“Even that weird little kid you shacked up with, he could be considered an accessory too.”

He prowls closer and I bare my teeth. “Sunny has nothing to do with this.”

“Who is to say?” He waves a hand dismissively, and I see an image of the same pinkie wing he wears inches from my face.

My breathing comes in a little harder, but I force myself to remain in the present. “Why are you here?”

He pauses just a foot away from me, sliding his hands into his pockets. “I know about the evidence you and your little friends were trying to gather on my family, and I’m pleased to say it will never see the light of day.”

“That’s what you think.” I hurl the words at him with as much force as I can, my fingernails biting into my own palm.

He moves so quickly I barely see it, the back of his hand making sharp contact with my jaw, but I’m prepared for it. My head snaps to the side, flames licking my chest as pain streaks across my face. I rally quickly and throw my weight into a backhand of my own, landing on his cheek with a dullthwack.

“You fucking bitch!” he curses, lifting a hand to test the split that reopened across his cheekbone, finding his fingers covered in blood.

My body trembles, but I force myself to stand my ground. Yes, this man is bigger than me, but I’ll match him blow for blow if that’s what it takes.

He grabs the fabric at the front of my dress and slams me so hard into the wall that all of my breath wheezes out of me and I see stars.

“You’re going to give me every dirty thing you know about your little buddy, Chase Walker. And if he’s not dirty, you’re going to get your cronies to plant evidence.”

When the room stops spinning, I see the fury etched into every plane of his face, inches from mine, his breath hot and repulsive on my face. I grapple with his hands and turn my head away, my stomach revolting.

“No.”

“Yes!” He slams me again, so hard I feel something crack and cry out, my back seizing with pain. “Otherwise I’ll make sure all you see for the rest of your life are the same four little walls.”

I dig my nails into his wrists and turn to face him, mustering up every piece of courage I have. I know in my bones that I could never do that to Chase, even if it were to offer me a free ticket out of this fucked-up situation.

A new emotion floods my system as I see Chase in my mind’s eye, his face relaxed and laughing as he looks at me with warm whiskey eyes and something that always makes my heart beat a little faster. It fortifies me, giving me a calm strength I don’t expect as a foreign type of reckless determination courses through my veins.

I spit in Rénir’s face, watching him flinch back as the sound of the door handle turning reaches us.

“Go fuck yourself, asshole.”

***

Goosebumps sweep my skin and I wrap my arms tighter around myself to try and ward them off, staring at the scuffed and chipped baseboard inches from my face.

The door sounds and I lock myself into the ball I’m scrunched into on the floor, tears silently slipping down to the carpet.

“I brought you some food and water, if you want it.”

The tenor of Detective York’s voice unscrunches my shoulders a fraction, but I don’t move. Something salty and sweet scents the air, and I hear him put something onto the table.

“I’m sorry about all that earlier, I didn’t know ’bout it and it wouldn’t have happened on my watch.”

Again, I don’t move. I don’t buy the sudden softness from the stern, brush-mustached detective who is hellbent on seeing me behind bars.

Tears keep slipping, my eyes raw from hours of lying this way in the corner, the overwhelming reality that I might be going to prison for a long, long time crashing over me like a mammoth wave. That Sunny will be carted off by social services—alone, scared, and let down. And that I might never see Chase again, either. That beautiful, funny, brilliant man who somehow saw me. Every part of me. Even the ones I hid from the world.

Failure burns at the back of my throat.

“This would all be a lot easier if you would just talk to me, you know. We’re going to tell the story either way, don’t you want to get your side of it included?”

I close my eyes, another shudder running through me. I’m still in just my dress—the beautiful cobalt silk one that Chase hand-picked for me, which felt so perfect for the occasion and now feels feebly protective against the icebox interview room.