Page 62 of Filthy Hot

CHAPTER

TWENTY-FOUR

KYLE

“Tell me something.Anything that nobody knows,” I ask as I lie against his chest. “I told you something about me, about my relationship with Xavier. I want to know about you.”

The room is bathed in silence, and I watch him, wondering if he’s going to tell me anything. The things I know are surface level for the most part. I know how he makes me feel.

He’s told me that he knows Shawn and Ryan and has actually known Ryan practically his whole life. He’s made it clear that the men he shares this vest with are his family. But that’s about it.

I can’t build a life with someone without knowing a little more about them. And this is the man who I want to build a life with. I’m falling in love with him, and I don’t know anything about him.

“My last name is Cruz,” he begins. Then he clears his throat. “And my mother committed suicide. It was my fault.”

My heart stops inside of my chest. Completely stops beating at his words. “What?” I ask on a whisper.

“It’s part of the reason I know I’m not good enough for you. I killed my own mother.”

Shaking my head, I crawl over him, straddling his hips, my naked body on display for him. He reaches out, gripping my waist gently as he looks up at me from his place on the pillow. I watch him in silence for a moment.

“You didn’t kill her, Rider. I don’t even know what happened, but I know that much is true. It was not your fault.”

I cup his cheeks. He has stubble, and it’s sexy as hell, but I’m trying not to get turned on right now. This is a serious moment. Very serious. Probably one of the most somber moments we will ever have together.

“I told her my father cheated on her. I was pissed off because I wanted to go to a party that I was too young for. It was payback for denying me. I didn’t know that she was teetering on the edge.

“I didn't know that she’d had a miscarriage and my father had fucked around over the years. I didn’t know any of that shit. And she was depressed. I didn’t know,” he says, repeating the words over and over.

Tears fill my eyes, and when they fall, they land on his cheeks. It wakes him up. It must, because before I realize what’s happening, I’m flipped onto my back. Rider’s hands are on either side of my face, his elbows straight, and his eyes focused on mine as he hovers above me.

“Do not feel sorry for me,” he grinds out. “Do not.”

My teeth sink into my bottom lip as I look up at him. My gaze searches his own, and as much as I try to blink my tears away, it doesn’t work. They continue to slide down the sides of my eyes and onto the sheets beneath me.

“Don’t,” he warns. “Do not feel sorry for me.”

Lifting my hands between us, I cup his cheeks again, sliding my thumb across the apple of his cheek as I search his eyes. Hedoesn’t want me to feel sorry for him, which I understand, but he’s also having a hard time with me feeling compassion for him.

“My parents abused me. Not just neglected, but abused,” I whisper. “My mother was cruel. She would throw things at me. Anything. Whatever was in her hand—glasses, dishes, coasters.”

His body turns solid against me, and I know he’s holding on to his control by a thread, but only for me.

“My father would hit me. Take out his anger on me. Bruises, breaks, all the above. But beyond that, he was controlling. He had to know my every move, and he would approve or deny it, including clothes. My mother liked playing games. She would tell me I could do something that she knew he wouldn’t approve of, just to take joy in the abuse that would come out of it,” I continue.

Admitting this to another person for the first time makes me feel… weird. Maybe this is how he was feeling a few moments ago when he told me what he did. It's just… weird and vulnerable.

And a little nervous, as if control was slipping, but not self-control with his anger, more like emotional control. Because that’s how I feel with this confession.

“I thought Xavier was going to save me from that life. He acted as if he was. He wanted to have all these things with me. I was too young, and he promised me the world, something that he could not give me.”

I should end my story right this moment. Let it lie at this and not add anything else. But something inside of me decides that I need to continue. I feel stupid, because I was stupid to even let it go on as long as it did, but I continue anyway.

Maybe because I want to make it clear that I came from horrible humans, so I had no way of realizing that I was running into the arms of a horrible man. I just really want Rider not to judge me for my past, for my relationship with Xavier and forallowing it to go on for as long as it did… which was far too damn long.

“Xavier was like my parents. Controlling and eventually abusive,” I whisper.

I see the shift in his face. It’s not pity I see, though. Instead, it’s anger. He told me not to feel sorry for him, but in turn, I want him to not be angry for me. My next few words come out as quickly as I can get them out.

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