Page 48 of Damaged

His silence was answer enough, and I knew it wasn’t something I would be able to convince him of anytime soon.

“You asked me about the computer,” Silver murmured. “As Ivan got worse, he began drinking and taking all kinds of pills.”

When Silver’s voice fell off bit by bit as he talked about the very topic that had started this whole thing, I gave his hand a squeeze to reassure him. I heard him exhale slowly.

“He was also still putting the powder up his nose. I, um… I saw what all of that stuff did to him. He’d fall asleep more easily and he wasn’t as interested in…”

“In hurting you,” I supplied. I wasn’t sure if Silver understood what rape was and I didn’t want to steer him in that direction. He’d already exposed so much of himself that the last thing I wanted to do was force him to relive Ivan’s abuse.

“Yes,” Silver responded. “Once he’d start doing all those things, I encouraged him to do more of it. Drink more, take more pills, put that stuff up his nose. Between that and whatever was making him paranoid and confused, he’d often fall asleep for hours. Sometimes for the whole night. I’d seen him working on his computer before, so I knew the basic stuff like pointing to certain things on the screen and opening them. It took a while before I stumbled onto the one for the internet. Once I did, it was like a whole new world had been created just for me. I’d spend hours every night exploring it. I started listening to what Ivan or his men would say and then I’d look up the words. I’d learned to speak Russian and German after I went to live with Ivan, but many of the girls he’d taken spoke English, so I never really lost that. They’d tell me things about where they lived, what their real names were, all the stuff they missed from home. I looked all of it up on the internet. When morning would come, I’d always make sure to be back in bed with Ivan. He never knew about any of it.”

“Until you helped Maggie,” I said.

Silver nodded. “I… I couldn’t let Ivan take the baby. Maggie had given me her brother’s phone number, but I knew if I called from Ivan’s house or his mobile, he would find out. So I used the internet to plan our escape. I, um, have a good memory, so I would always delete the browser history after I used the computer.”

“And when Maggie didn’t make it out, you took Willa to Jace. You risked your life,” I pointed out.

“It wasn’t enough. I should have been able to get Maggie out too?—”

“You saved that baby’s life,” I repeated. “Why did you go back to Ivan after you gave Willa to Jace? Jace would have gotten you out of the country?—”

“Ivan’s men found us. I don’t know how, but I knew what they would do to Jace and Caleb if they found them. They had to get Willa to safety or it all would have been for nothing. I knew Ivan wouldn’t kill me if I was caught.”

My insides churned as I began to understand the magnitude of what Silver had done to save not only Willa’s life, but Jace’s and Caleb’s too. “You led the men away.”

Silver didn’t answer. He didn’t have to. The pieces were starting to fall into place. Jace and Caleb had returned to the States only days before the men Jace worked with had stormed Ivan’s stronghold. They’d found Silver alive but badly beaten.

Which meant everything Silver had done to save Willa had only been within the last month.

“How did you know Ivan wouldn’t kill you?” I asked. Bile crept up the back of my throat as I remembered Silver’s condition at Maggie’s funeral. All those bruises and lacerations had been Ivan’s punishment for his betrayal. Yet he’d let Silver live. It didn’t make sense.

“I was too important to him,” was all Silver said in response. When he didn’t expound on the statement, I knew he was done talking. I could feel him trembling next to me. As painful as it was, I managed to maneuver my arms around him so that I was clutching him against me. He didn’t make a sound, nor did he shed a single tear, but the look in his eyes told me everything I needed to know.

He was gone. Gone to whatever place he’d gone whenever Ivan had touched him, hurt him. That was what had kept Silver alive for so long. He’d understood that his life had become about survival and nothing else. How many young men would have been able to do the same? I, myself, had faced the will to survive every time I’d been deployed on a mission, but I’d done so with training, weapons, and a squadron of men covering my back.

I could feel the pain starting to build along my spine but for once I welcomed it. I needed it more than I needed a drink or a handful of pills. I needed it so I could admit to something I’d never even told Jace, the only man I called friend these days.

It was my only chance to keep Silver from taking that fucking plastic bag and walking out of my life forever.

Chapter 16

SILVER

Every part of my body felt numb.

And cold.

When I’d started to answer Dalton’s question about how I’d figured out how to use a computer, I’d somehow bypassed the question and revealed so much more than I’d intended. I’d only meant to give Dalton a break from the other things he’d seemed to be willing to tell me about his childhood, but lying next to him on the lounger had made me feel safer than I ever had. In truth, I couldn’t even remember what being safe felt like, but something about being around Dalton made me feel like nothing and no one could or would touch me ever again. If that wasn’t what safe felt like, then I’d probably never feel it.

I couldn’t even remember a lot of things I’d told Dalton because my mind had done what it always had from the moment Ivan had shoved himself inside of me for the first time. I put the moment away. I’d had to. Ivan’s cruelty had taught me how to play the game if I wanted to live. And despite it all, I’d wanted to live even though there’d been no reason for it. I’d known my parents weren’t coming for me. I’d known when Ivan tired of me, he’d rent me out to anyone who was willing to pay for me. He would have allowed his men to make me their plaything or he would have simply put a bullet through my brain.

Yet I’d wanted to live. I’d fought for it. I’d planned and plotted. I’d packed each and every assault, cruelty, and torture in a box inside my head because I’d instinctively known if I didn’t, I wouldn’t have survived more than a few days as Ivan’s pet. My salvation hadn’t come in the form of being rescued by someone who’d cared enough to even look for me. No, it had been the moment I’d opened Ivan’s computer after realizing that between his broken mind and his need for drugs and alcohol, I could buy myself moments of reprieve. Instead of just a reprieve, I’d found a whole new world that I’d never known existed.

I wasn’t sure how long I lay there in Dalton’s arms before the present returned to me. Thankfully, whatever was holding that box inside of me closed had held up, but it felt like tiny holes were puncturing the box more and more every day. It was all I could do to keep the damn thing closed, so I had no idea how to shore up the holes.

“Are you warm enough?” Dalton asked, breaking the silence between us. I was tired but not cold. Not with my own living furnace wrapped around me. I nodded. “We can go inside or take a break…”

I wasn’t sure if Dalton was stalling or if he needed more drink and pills to numb himself before he told me how he’d ended up where he had. I’d only had tiny glimpses of what I suspected to be the true Dalton, the man he’d been before alcohol and drugs had taken over, but I instinctively knew that few people, if any, had seen those same moments.

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