Page 63 of Lost in the Light

“Yeah. That was what I was worried Kane might have told you all this morning. I...I don’t want my brothers to know,” I sighed.

“Know what?”

“My nightmare last night. I know what Joseph did to me in that room, Adam. I…I saw flashes of it.” Adam’s arms wrapped even more tightly around me until he was squeezing me as tightly as I thought he dare.

“Did he…” I was relieved when Adam didn’t finish that question. Just the thought of the words I knew he would say were making my stomach turn.

“Yes.” It came out as a sob and I slammed my hand over my mouth to stop more from following.

“Fuck! I’m so sorry, baby.” Adam wrapped himself even tighter around me, his back arching, and his shoulders curling over me as he lay a kiss on the top of my head.

“They c-can’t know, Adam. I need you to tell Jordan and Kane too. Asher and Eli have been through enough,” I sniffled as I swiped angrily at the tears running down my face. “They can never know.”

“Asher….”

“No!” I cried cutting him off as I turned to him again, and pleaded with my eyes for him to give me this. “Asher is trying to be strong, but he’s just as broken by all of this. The man was his father, Adam! Please…j-just let me pro-tect him this time. He d-doesn’t need to know.” Tears were flowing and my words were jerky and broken by the time I was forced to stop talking.

“Okay,” Adam gave in as he scooped me up and turned me around, settling me in his lap against his chest as he held metightly. “I’ll talk to Jordan and Kane. I’ll make sure they don’t say anything.”

I cried against Adam for a while. The memory had been traumatic enough alone – all of the pain and blood. All of the fear and hopelessness, but to know it was my own damned father who did those things to me. It was just too much to even begin to process. Did Joseph Lyle know who I was when he did that to me? Did he know he was raping and torturing his own child? The things he’d said rattled around and around. He'd asked me if I knew who he was? Did he mean did I know he was my father, or did he mean did I know he was Joesph Lyle – the power hungry tyrant ofLyle Industries? From the little I knew about him, he could certainly have thought enough of himself to assume I should know he was a big shot business man, but somehow it just didn’t fit with the way he asked me that question. Then he’d said one day I would know.

He had to have known I was his biological child. I felt sure of that, but if he did, how could he have done the things he did to me? And the biggest question – was he the reason I ended up being taken and trapped in that soul crushing existence? Did he plan it all, and if he did, then why? I had no idea who he was. Why would he destroy me like that when I never even met him? Could he truly have hated the mere idea of me existing in the world that much?

I leapt up from Adam’s lap so fast he barely had time to relinquish his hold on me to let me go.

“What’s wrong?” he asked as he looked me over with concern.

“I…I need to shower…right now,” I cried, but I was already fleeing for the stairs to get to my room. My skin was crawling all over again. I could feel warm blood dripping slowly downmy back. I could smellhimall over me, and I couldn’t handle it anymore. Joseph. He had a grip on me that wouldn’t seem to relinquish.

“Addy, wait!” Adam caught up to me about halfway up the stairs and pulled me backwards against his front. “Just slow down and talk to me, baby,” he said more calmly.

“I can feel him…all over me. I know it’s n-not real but I…I can’t make it stop,” I whimpered, every word pushed through my tight throat. “Why won’t it stop, Adam?”

Adam turned me and I once again found myself pressed against his hard chest, his heart beat grounding me a little.

“Let me help you, okay? We’ll make it stop together,” he said softly, and I nodded. I just needed it all to stop, and I was pretty sure I wasn’t going to be able to make that happen alone.

Adam scooped me up with so much ease, then carried me to my room, closing the door behind us. I was in the middle of my adjoining bathroom when he set me on my feet again.

“Get undressed for me, baby. We’re gonna go in the shower together, okay?”

“Okay,” I agreed easily. I focused on stripping out of my jeans and sweater as Adam set the shower flowing and closed the glass door.

I was unsure about removing more clothes. I currently stood in my underwear and a camisole, so most of my scarred and messed up back was covered. I knew he could still see the few scars that littered my legs and ran over my shoulders, but for him to see the patchwork on my back seemed like so much more to present him with. The realization that Kane and Jordan must have already seen my scars when they were forced to showerme without my cooperation the night before flitted through my mind and caused panic too. Would they even still want me when they saw the state my body was in under my clothes?

“Baby? Talk to me,” Adam’s words jolted me and I looked up, shocked to find he stood before me in only his black boxer shorts, which were a perfectly snug fit around his wide thighs. God, he was so beautiful. His entire body was lined with ridges of muscle. His legs were wide and powerful. His body was packed with muscle all the way up his stomach, to his tight pecs and up to his corded neck. His shoulders were twice the width of my own, and they, along with his biceps rippled with tightly packed muscle, the dark, almost caramel tone of his skin accentuating it all in a way that made him almost too amazing to be real. He was a work of art and I had no clue why he wanted me. He could have his pick of women I was sure, and not one of those women, that he’d be able to choose from, could possibly be as screwed up in the head as I was. I wasn’t sure I had ever felt as insecure in my whole life as I did in that moment. “Addy?”

“Huh?” I looked up to his face and realize I had zoned out again.

“Is this too much? Do you want me to get dressed again and leave you alone?” he offered.

“No!” I cried. “Please…don’t go. I…I want you here….need you. I just…I’m nervous.”

“Nothing to be nervous about. We’re just going to take a shower together. Nothing happens that you don’t want,” he explained as he stepped a little closer and cupped my cheek in his right hand.

“No. I mean, I know that. I trust you, Adam. I just…I’m worried about….about the way I look. I’m not perfect…not like you. I know it’s selfish, but I don’t want to lose you.”

“You are never going to lose me. In fact, I think you’d have to fight pretty damned hard to get rid of me at this point,” he chuckled, then he leaned in and kissed the end of my nose. “You’re beautiful, baby, and so fucking sexy. I have never felt anything like the feelings I have for you and nothing will change that.”

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