Page 37 of Saved By My Buyers

As the tears rolled down her cheeks, she said, “We didn’t see, and now she’s gone.”

Fuck.

“I know,” I grunt, standing straight. My skin feels overheated from the memories, and it’s after midnight during the work week.

Bronwyn sighs, moving closer toward me. She's wearing an off the shoulder sweater, a pair of panties, and nothing else. When she left her dad’s house four years ago, I asked an acquaintance in the security industry to change her identity, provide her with paperwork to back it up, and she disappeared from every server looking for Bronwyn Davies.

Only I call her that now.

She moved in with me, enrolled in a public school to finish her high school education, but neither of us have forgotten Dahlia.

“Working late or nightmares?” Bronwyn asks, frowning. When she turned eighteen, she and I got really drunk together. She told me she wanted to forget, which led to us having sex, and my taking her virginity.

It shouldn’t have happened, she’s always been Dahlia’s, but after four years we still haven’t heard from her.

Everything is upside down and twisted.

“Nightmares,” I rasp. “My brain keeps torturing me with things he could have done to her. I dropped Dolly at the front door that night on her birthday, and then made a joke about how a gentleman makes sure she’s safe. But she wasn’t…”

“We didn’t know,” she whispers. “I have a feeling she was holding onto a lot of secrets. Even when we messed around when we were together, she wouldn’t really let me touch her. Sophomore year of high school, I found out that she was binding her breasts to hide them.”

“She probably didn’t want Gareth to notice,” I grunt. Bronwyn no longer acknowledges her father as a paternal figure, and calls him by his name now. “I wanted to respect her privacy, so I stopped pushing.”

“Gareth made sure I was always really busy during the summer, I’m guessing to isolate her. The fact that he used me against her…” Bronwyn shudders, reminding me I’m not the only one hurting.

This is one of the reasons we’ve fallen into bed together more often than I care to admit. We comfort each other as much as we hate ourselves for it, and she’s my only connection to Dahlia.

“I know,” I sigh, pulling her into my arms. “It’s been four years, if she was going to find us, she’d have reached out by now, right?”

My integrity has one flaw, and it's Dahlia. I’ve never hesitated to bend the rules for her. I stalked phone records to find her when she was living alone in New England, and now I periodically ask one of the people in my office to scan the video cameras for her likeness.

Each time the scan is a waste of time, Lorrie tells me she’s only checking the street cameras in Detroit and the businesses she can hack into. Dahlia could have left the city, which means there’s no way to find her unless I’m willing to expand my search.

I don’t know why I keep insisting that she hasn’t left yet. Maybe it’s hopeful thinking, maybe I’m just a fool.

“It’s too hard to write her off,” Bronwyn says tearfully. “I only knew Dahlia for a year, but things were clicking into place, she told me she loved me that day.”

“She told me,” I confirm. “I wish I could have said I was surprised, but she always looked as if the world lit up when she talked about you. Dahlia adored you.”

Holding her body against mine as she buries her head in my chest, I can feel more than see her nodding. Deciding it is too cold for her, I lift her into my arms. Bronwyn’s become a curvy bombshell as she’s gotten older.

I never paid attention to it when she was in high school, outside of reminding her and Dahlia to be aware of their surroundings when they went out with friends. I was protective of Dahlia, and by extension, Bronwyn as well.

Bronwyn’s breath shudders as she cries softly, making my heart clench. Four goddamned years! I want to scream. Not knowing is killing me. If Dahlia doesn’t want us in her life anymore, I would rather she tell me that to my face.

“Jack,” Bronwyn whimpers, brushing her tears away angrily. Her cheeks are ruddy from the crying jag, her red curls tumbling around her. After a certain point, you just get tired of crying.

“You know you were her hero, right? No matter how everything ended up, she told me that you were always there for her.”

My chest rumbles as I growl, beginning to walk toward our shared bedroom. Neither of us sleeps well without the other anymore, so we stopped trying.

“I’m no one’s hero, baby girl,” I mutter, crawling into bed with her cradled in my arms. Laying on my back, I wait until she’s curled around me, pulling the blanket over us. “My one goal in life was to show her how amazing she was and keep her safe. I don’t know if I succeeded at either.”

“You’re so hard on yourself,” she says, sleep already pulling her away.

Playing with her hair, I gently rub her head until she falls asleep. Gazing up at the ceiling, I while away the hours until sunrise by thinking about the good times I’ve spent with Dahlia.

I tried to never miss a birthday, make her feel special, but Gareth still found a way to terrorize and hurt her by using that connection against her.

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