Page 86 of Scorching Sienna

She finally looks up at me.

“I was happy, Si.” I can see she feels tormented about this. The image of a sweet twelve-year-old Dee being abused floats through my mind, and I, too, am happy her abusers are dead. What does that make me? What does that make us?

“Marcel called me that same day. He had left that place and made a name for himself in some tech firm. He knew who had killed those evil bastards.” Her eyes drift over to Damon before meeting mine again.

“It was never confirmed, but he told me a contract had been taken out on that couple. A contract that had been completed by a man referred to as the darkness himself. The man rumored to have done this owns the club where you work.Sin.All speculation, of course. Nothing was ever proved. But I know it is him. I just know. And I’m grateful, Sienna. I wished so many times I could doit myself. And if someone put those two in front of me and put a gun in my hand, I would kill them. Without hesitation or conscience. What does that make me? No different to him. A bad person.”

I am stunned. Gobsmacked. Her words and her past are not what I expected.

“No, Dee. You are not a bad person. You’re not,” I say with conviction as I watch the uncertainty swim in her eyes.

“When those people were killed, they had five children in their care. All adopted from orphanages. The authorities knew what was happening there. I went to the police station when I ran away and reported them. You know what the cops said?” She looks at me with anger on her face and venom in her tone, so unlike what I am accustomed to when talking to her.

“They told me I was lying and trying to extort money from people who were only trying to help ungrateful shits like me. And I wasn’t the only one. Raina also went, and some of the children who were at the house after us who had suffered the same abuse. But money buys silence, and they bought their silence and their ticket to continue abusing young children.”

If she were the kind of person to spit on the floor, she would. I could feel the pure rage and venom from her.

“Anyway. Sometimes, to take down a monster, you need another monster. A six foot three tattooed club owner who can do what the rest of us cannot.”

She turns to face me, her words adding to my confusion about Damon.

“I don’t condone what he does, Si. But I don’t condemn him either. I think it is a matter of choosing whether you can accept him as he is with all this darkness. I know he is dangerous, but the way he looks at you…I think he would kill anyone who tried to hurt you. I wish I had that when I was twelve.”

Those words were already true. Just look at those who had watched the video on the internet. The rapists and pedophiles. But would that situation even have happened, and would it have been necessary if I hadn’t met him?

“What are you two so wrapped up in?” My brother's entrance into my mind's bubble of focus makes me jump guiltily.

“Girl stuff,” Dee says, her hands rubbing my shoulders comfortingly as she plasters a giant smile on her face and then turns, wrapping her arms around my brother. It is the perfect distraction while I gather my thoughts and feelings.

“They’re out.” I spin around to see that Damon now has two sleeping children in his arms.

“You must be catnip to my kids 'cause I swear to god I have never seen them this docile,” Dee says quietly, taking Alicia from him while Liam takes George, named after our father.

They disappear down the hall towards the children’s bedrooms, leaving Damon and me alone, which is not something I am sure I am ready for. But at the same time, I wanted whatever this confusion I had to be over. I didn’t want to be unsure. But I was also scared.

After last night's conversation, I had very little sleep, his words tossing around my head on repeat. The car ride here had been awkward and silent. I had hoped Damon would have broken that silence, but he was waiting for me. Giving me time to figure things out. What if all the time in the world wasn’t enough? What if I never figured things out?

His dark chocolate eyes sweep my face, and he frowns, probably noticing the residual tension and telltale signs of tears from my conversation with Dee. But he doesn’t say anything. Instead, he moves around me to take Dee's spot beside me. With a precision that makesme wonder if he, too, can add chef to his repertoire of skills, he starts slicing the tomatoes. I pick up the cucumber and resume chopping, the silence between us more comfortable than the one in the car driving here.

“You are good with children,” I state, starting with neutral territory.

“They are easy. They have no judgment and are transparent with what they want and need.”

A very Damon thing to say.

“Do you want children one day?”

“Yes.” There is no hesitation in his answer, not even a sliver.

“How do you reconcile that life with the one you live now? With what you do?” He looks at me and raises an eyebrow.

“I mean, do you see yourself looking after a baby during the day and then at night running off to kill people?” I whisper, looking around to be sure my brother hasn’t appeared and is somehow in hearing distance.

“Okay, so firstly, I don’t go out and kill people every night. My main line of work is facilitating meetings atSin.Everything else is secondary to that and more infrequent than you have created in your mind.” He taps my head lightly before dragging his finger down my cheek and then over my lips, the sharp intake of breath on my part out of my control.

“Secondly, I never anticipated ever meeting you, rainbow, or the children we will have. I never had another purpose before, so my life has revolved around the activities you now judge. But all that will change. Now that you are here.”

How can he say words so easily and with such conviction that it is as if our future is set? I envy his certitude.

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