Page 30 of Owen (Storm Enterprises)

“Owen?” Her delicate hand grazes over my back, and my eyes snap open. The warmth of her touch seeps through the material and into my skin. “Are you okay?”

I choke on a sardonic laugh and shake my head.Am I okay?

She’s the one who has been widowed, run from her family home, and beaten, yet she’s asking me if I’m okay? Typical Laya. “He only did it once,” she mutters.

I jolt at her words, then spin to face her. Only?

Her head is down, and she fidgets from foot to foot, that fucking shirt of his hanging off her like it has a right to be there. Like it’s deserving of covering her skin.

Using my finger, I lift her chin to face me, hating the uncertainty that flashes in her eyes. Her usual steely confidence is missing, replaced with a vulnerability that I want to stamp out. “Once is one time too many, Laya.”

She lifts her chin higher, and that strong, ballsy woman I know her to be glares back at me. “I know that. Do you think I don’t know that? I was going to leave him.”

My heart thumps harder on her admission, and I lick my lips. “You were?”

“Yes. But then…” She darts her eyes away before closing them as if it pains her to remember.

“Then he got himself killed.” I finish for her.

She flinches on my words, and I tug her toward me. The moment she wraps her arms around my waist, a sense of calm washes over me. I breathe her in. “Nothing will ever hurt you again. You hear me?” I step back so I can lock eyes with her. “Nobody will ever hurt you again. That’s my promise to you.”

Tears well in her eyes, and I grit my teeth at the shirt she wears and tug the collar with my hand. “This his?”

She narrows her eyes on me, and I elaborate. “The shirt. Is it his?” The deepness of my voice tells her I’m pissed, and the way her confusion turns to annoyance would make me laugh if I wasn’t so angry right now.

“My husband’s, yes.”

My temple throbs as I try to regain some sense of calm, but I’m struggling. Boy, am I fucking struggling. Husband?

I want to tell her the fucker is dead, where he belongs.He isn’t your husband anymore, but I bite my tongue, knowing how much she’s been through.

“He isn’t the one looking after you right now, baby girl.”

Her jaw tics, and she crosses her arms over her chest. The fire in her eyes makes my cock hard with a need to punish her disobedience.

“Go take it off.” I tilt my head toward the bathroom. “And while you’re fucking at it, get in the tub. Please.” I tack on the latter, hoping to soften the bite in my tone.

Her eyebrows shoot up. “The tub?”

“Yes. The fucking tub. Gonna wash him from you.”

“Wash him from me?”

I nod, liking this plan the more I think about it. “Exactly. Make you mine.”

“Yours?”

I nod again.

Then she releases a heavy sigh. “I really don’t have it in me to argue.” My lip twitches at her compliance, then she spins on the balls of her feet and marches toward the bathroom, leaving me to check the closet. We need a crib for Romero.

We won’t stay here for long, but while we are, my boy needs to sleep in his own bed so his momma can sleep properly in mine.

Exactly where she belongs.

FIFTEEN

LAYA

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