Page 22 of Torn In Two

A tear dripped down her cheek. “Okay.”

If I hadn’t been in a hospital, only separated from other patients by flimsy green curtains, I would have cheered. It took everything in me not to slam my lips down on hers. “For the record, my favorite food is pizza. I’m pretty basic like that.”

Her smile was so blinding it short-circuited my brain, ruining it for anything other than making her happy. She smiled up at me like I’d just made her whole day by admitting I had a thing for greasy carbs with too much cheese.

When I hadn’t been watching Kara heal, I’d been cleaning my shitty apartment, hating that I lived in such a dump. I wasn’t even a particularly messy person. But the apartment was old and dingy, and even though I’d scrubbed the tiled floor on my hands and knees, it wasn’t much better than when I’d started.

My fingers shook as I unlocked the door and held it open so Kara could enter. “We’ll get something better,” I promised her. I didn’t know how, with neither of us having a job, but I would. I’d be the man she needed me to be. I’d step up and make her a home. Take care of her.

But guilt plagued me. I’d been part of the most traumatic events of her life. I’d been part of the reason she’d fled back to her parents’ home for that trauma to continue in a whole new way.

I owed Kara more than money could buy and I knew it. I didn’t think for a second I was worthy of her, and yet that connection between us refused to allow me to let her go.

Kara gazed around the small space. The tiny living room and kitchen were barely bigger than her hospital room, the bedroom only big enough for a bed and little else.

But if Kara saw the cracked tiles in the bathroom shower, or the dirt in the carpet that no amount of vacuuming would remove, she didn’t say anything.

Instead, her eyes lit up at the furry trio that all ran to her like she was goddamn Snow White calling her woodland friends.

The traitorous kitten assholes ignored me completely, winding their way around Kara’s legs, meowing for her attention.

“You didn’t tell me you had pets!” She smiled up at me with that happy smile I wanted on her face at all times.

“I’ll go buy you more if you keep looking at me like that.”

She laughed, crouching to pet the kittens who were growing like weeds now that someone was actually feeding them daily. “I rescued them,” I told her. But I didn’t tell her from where. No need to remind her of that hellhole I’d kept her in.

The guilt slammed me hard and was made even worse by her acting like I’d hung the fucking moon just because I’d saved a few kittens.

Hawk had accused her of having Stockholm syndrome. Of forming feelings for her captor that weren’t real.

The idea left me so damn cold inside I refused to pay it any attention. I desperately wanted to believe she was here because the connection between us was real. And not because she was traumatized.

“I always wanted pets,” she confessed. “Small, huggable ones like this. We have cows and sheep and chickens at the commune. Some horses that we weren’t allowed to ride for fun because they were to be saved for work.” She lifted one of the fuzzballs and stroked her fingers over his head and the back of his neck. “What are their names?”

I shrugged. “I just call them all Cat.”

She laughed and shook her head. “You can’t do that!”

The kittens were obsessed with her. One had crawled into her lap. The one in her arms had fallen asleep. The third was insistently demanding her attention with tiny mewling noises. None of them had ever cared quite that much about me. It was like they sensed the good in her.

It was hard not to. I did too.

I put down the bag Rebel had grudgingly packed for her and dropped off at the hospital. She’d been about as happy about this new living arrangement as Hawk had been.

“Can I get you anything?” I asked Kara. “Tea? Coffee? Water? Snacks? A roast dinner?” I grinned at her. “Okay, maybe not the roast because the kitchen here is pathetic.”

She shook her head quickly. “I should be the one getting that for you.” She glanced over at the kitchen that was really nothing more than a hotplate and a sink. “Oh.”

“I do most of my cooking at the restaurant,” I admitted.

She smiled softly. “Snacks are always nice.”

I pointed at the couch. “Go sit. Relax. Put a movie on. I’ll get something together and join you in a second.”

She hesitated, watching me pull lunch meats and cheeses from the refrigerator. There was chocolate and a range of different types of crackers in the cupboard. I might not have been able to cook for her, but that didn’t mean I was going to dump a bag of Doritos into a bowl and call it good either. I had every intention of making sure she ate well while she was here. I’d find a way to make her whatever she wanted.

I didn’t want to remember the way Caleb had withheld food from her and the other women when he’d forced me to keep them hostage. I’d snuck them in as much food as I could when he hadn’t been around, but it had never seemed like enough.

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