Page 89 of Degrading Her

He pulled me into his arms, hugging me tightly.

“You need a doctor,” I murmured.

“It’s okay,” he said into my hair. “You did so good, Fiona. You’re safe.”

I closed my eyes, sucking in his scent. With his arms around me, he seemed relieved. Like I was all he needed. And I was safe.

Finally, the tears came.

Chapter 22

Sawyer

I heldher in my arms, repeating those words.You did so good. You’re safe.Soon, her tears reared their full, ugly heads, and she sobbed into me. I never stopped saying those words. She was okay, and I was never going to let anyone touch her like that again. I didn’t care if she never wanted me back; until the day I died, I would make sure she was safe.

Eventually, she stopped crying, each exhale coming out in a smooth, mellow breath. She needed to be hydrated and given time to rest, but we could deal with that later. Right now, she needed comfort. We both did.

She looked up at me. “Do we need to go?”

I nodded. Erica had a silencer, but eventually, the cops would show up. And though our contacts in the police department would help us, we had to keep up our end of the bargain: making sure that everything was as clean as possible. I called one of my hunters who was the best at taking care of the cleanup.

“On their way,” I told Fiona. “What do you need?”

She blinked up at me, trying to focus. “What?”

“Food. Water. Bathroom.”

She laughed softly, stunned by the words, as if she didn’t expect me to ask about those things. She fell into my arms then, and I held her as close as I could, smoothing her hair, enjoying this small moment when she was truly coming to me for comfort. And I knew, then, that I was going to protect and nurture her forever. As long as she’d let me.

But after this, she might never come to me again.

Though it killed me, I had to let her live her life. She needed a game of her own, a chance at her dream, even if it was without me.

Eventually, a team showed up, ready to make the place look like Erica had disappeared off of the grid like her husband had. And if someone raised an eye at Hatchcom Focus dissolving at the same time, we had the paperwork to ensure that nothing was amiss.

Though they moved around us, shifting around the house and washing the stains, I kept my arms wrapped around Fiona, matching her deep breaths, trying to make sure she felt calm and secure.

One of the men stopped over the corpse, nudging it with his foot.

“What do you want to do with it, boss?” he said.

Fiona glanced up at me, raising a brow.

“Load it into my car,” I said.

“You’re calling Erica an ‘it’?” Fiona asked.

I stared at her, knowing that anything I would say might hurt. The guilt was surfacing in Fiona, making her want to protect Erica’s memory.

But Erica hadn’t cared about her.

“You did it to protect me,” I said, trying to reassure her. She shrank back down, and after a minute, she pressedherself close to me. It was a lot to process. I had grown up around death. There were things you did to cope. Call a corpse an ‘it.’ Kill as a way to blow off steam. You couldn’t let the corpses disturb corpses, or you’d become one yourself.

But Fiona? Her life had been sheltered from all of that. And yet, she was here, nestled under my arm.

I helped her into my SUV, her body still off-balance from the drugs, then got into the driver’s seat.

“Where are you taking me?” she asked.

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