Page 68 of Savage Redemption

“But never by me. I never saw you that way.”

“You must have…”

“I found you in that safe flat and offered you a choice. Come with me to Madrid or remain where you were. Or, I suppose, go anywhere else you wanted. You chose to come with me, and as far as I was concerned, that was it. You could just as easily choose to leave again. I wouldn’t have stopped you.”

“Yes, you would. I was a valuable piece of merchandise.” She stiffens her shoulders as though challenging me to deny her worth.

“Holy fuck,amor, you were fucking gorgeous. I loved having you around and I’m a selfish bastard who never stopped to consider what you might like. What you wanted. But valuable? Yes, probably, but not in any financial sense. I valued you foryou.”

“Me? Why? I was… nothing.”

“You made me laugh. You were good company. I need hardly add you were exciting and responsive in bed. The best I ever had, actually.”

“Now I know you’re lying.” She wrenches herself away from me. “You could have had any woman. You still can.”

She has a point. There’s always plenty of pussy on offer to a man like me, but it never much interested me before I happened upon Rosie in that flat. I wanted her from the beginning and could have simply taken what I fancied and moved on. Butthere was something about her. Vulnerability? Inner strength? A challenge?

I was relieved and delighted when she opted to come back to Spain with me, and I never stopped to consider much beyond that.

I groan. “Jesus, Rosie, if we could just put the past behind us and… and start over, don’t you think I would? Like a fucking shot. But it’s not possible.”

Why not?

“It’s too… too complicated.”

“So you say. It seems simple to me.”

“It would. You’re young, and sweet. And… innocent. You deserve better than me.”

Her jaw firms, and her eyes blaze. “You patronising bastard.”

“What? I don’t?—”

“You heard me. You’re as bad as my dad, convinced I don’t know my own mind. For the avoidance of any remaining doubt, let me take this clear. I am not a kid. I haven’t been a kid since I was abducted and trafficked into slavery. That sort of experience has a way of making you grow up fast.”

“I know that, but?—”

“For fuck’s sake, shut up. I know you’re sorry. I know you regret what happened, what you did. I know if you could you’d go back and do things differently. But you can’t. We can’t. We are where we are, and that’s right here, right now. Our history is what it is, and I for one have heard quite enough about it. There’s only one direction to go in now, and that’s forwards. We can’t change the past, but we don’t have to wallow in it. Frankly, I’m not interested in the past. It’s the future that matters, and that wecanchange. It’s ours to create.”

I open my mouth to utter more platitudes but close it again in the face of her righteous fury. “Amor, I?—”

“Enough. Enough excuses. Tell me what it is youwant.”

“Want?”

Her brows lower. “Yes. What do you actually want?” She marches away from me, across the room, then whirls to face me. “I know you want Erin. I know you want to be her father, and you are. You will be. But is that all?”

“No,” I manage, catching on at last. “That isn’t all.”

“Go on.”

“I want you. I want… everything. If you’ll have me.”

She gestures to her state of semi-undress. “Have I not made it obvious enough?”

“Not just for now. Not just this once.”

“Now is where we are. Now is what we have. The future is yet to build.”

---