Page 73 of Fracture

“I don’t even know how she’s functioning. Our girl’s a fucking fighter.” I meet his eyes, and he frowns. “Iverson gets a bad death. Painful, slow as fuck. I want that bastard to suffer til his last breath.”

Levi’s gaze turns steely as he nods. “She told you what happened?”

“What she remembers. Her dad drugged her.”

Levi hisses in a breath, leaning heavily against the door as his head drops to his chest. “Fucking son of a bitch.”

I open my mouth to tell him what his mother did, but decide that’s a conversation for another time, and one he should have with Stella. But not now, not today. Stella has been through enough for one day.

“This reporter going to be a problem?” Levi asks, crossing his arms over his chest.

“I doubt it, Stella won’t talk to anyone.”

Levi rubs his neck, hissing in a breath through his clenched teeth. “My goddamn mother, and her fucking interview. What the hell is she thinking?”

The room feels too small, all the hurt and misery and what lies ahead of us weighing down the air and threatening to choke me. This day has been too much already, for all of us.

“Hey.” I walk toward Levi, who eyes me warily. “Let it go for today. No more thinking about it.”

Levi’s mouth quirks into a smile, and his eyes scan me up and down. “You plan on distracting me?”

“I plan on distracting both of you.” I put my hands either side of him against the door, and kiss the corner of his mouth softly. His eyes flutter closed, and his shoulders drop. “Now, no more heavy shit today. You and our girl are going to let me look after you both.”

“Sounds good.” Levi turns his face to brush a kiss on my lips.

“Dylan?” Stella’s voice wafts softly through the air, and Levi moves so I can pull the door open.

“I’m here,guera.”

I walk into the bathroom to be met with Stella standing on the mat in a towel, her hair up in a messy bun on her head, a soft smile on her face. Her eyes move over my shoulder to Levi, then back to me, and she sighs happily.

“You’re both here,” she says,

“We sure are, baby girl.” Levi moves around me and towards Stella. “We’re not going anywhere.” He puts his arms around her, and Stella leans into his chest, the smile growing.

This is right. How it’ll work, that will come later. For today, it’s us, just us. Exactly how it’s meant to be.

CHAPTER 16

STELLA

By the timethe boys have finished pampering and loving on me, I’m a little cloud of happiness. I’m covered in baby oil from the massage Dylan gave me, and Levi somehow conjured up raspberries, and fed them to me while I lay in his lap and Dylan read to us from one of my smutty romance novels. He laughs when I tell him he should get into audiobooks, because his voice makes me want to melt.

The sun is high in the sky when Dylan heads out to get us lunch, and I stay in Levi’s lap, wearing nothing but a pair of floaty French knickers. It feels so natural to lie against his chest, to have his arms wrapped around me. He nuzzles into the crook of my neck and kisses me, telling me how beautiful I am, how much he loves me, how much he missed me all those years we were apart.

It’s sheer bliss.

“You know, for a man who has a basically naked woman in his arms, you are displaying an amazing level of self-control,” I tease, tilting my head so I can look over my shoulder at him.

He smiles softly, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. “Baby girl, it’s not all about sex, you know?”

“I know.” I turn so I can cuddle him, wrapping an arm around his waist. “It took me a long time to figure all that out. That it wasn’t OK if a man just wanted sex from me.”

“Of course it’s not OK.”

“And that wanting things because I want them is different to having them done to me. Because that’s not about sex, that’s about control. Like the choking thing. I like that, I like… I like being overpowered.” I gaze up at him. “I like losing control to someone I can trust. Someone I’m safe with, who’s doing it for me.”

“And that’s how it is with us.” Levi’s fingers stroke over my shoulder, down the divots of my ribs. “With me, and Dylan, it’s never about control. It’s about you, about making you feel good. And safe.”

---