Page 143 of Resurfaced Passion
“Sony was always a fucking freak, Paige. You know that much.”
She did.
She’d tried to treat him as a brother, but he never made her life easy.
A thumb worked over her knuckles and she concentrated on that motion.
“I came home to take you out to eat and I walked in on Sony beating hell out of you. You were unrecognizable. It still gives me nightmares about being two minutes too late.” The way Reaper closed his eyes she could sense he was reliving that moment and her heart pinched.
Did she think Sony was capable of such violence? Sadly yeah. Was she glad she didn’t remember? Also yeah. Her stomach scrunched in sick grabs having the information of why her life changed so drastically.
“I just saw red.” He husked. “I wanted to fucking kill him, Paige. Even now I don’t know what happened before I got there. I don’t know if he was trying to force you back to your hometown, if you argued with him, if he broke in. All I know is the fucking nightmare I walked into.”
“Did you—did you?” She hesitated to put more words to that serious question, remembering her father’s accusation and when Reaper’s head lifted, their eyes clashed, she had the answer.
“He battered you beyond recognition. Yeah, bug, I did.”
“Oh…”
Reaper’s jaw clenched; his fingers grew tighter around hers. “I’d do it again. Not a fucking doubt, Paige. I’d do it again. He hurt what was mine. He took from me. He took from us.”
“What…. what did he take?” That tightness in her belly turned to slick bile sloshing from side to side. She’d always felt the weirdness from Sony. The way he tried to hold her even when she told him to stop and his eyes following her, the times he walked into the bathroom when she was changing when he knew she was in there.
Her mind was taking her to the worst possible scenarios.
“Did he… did he do..?”
“No, baby. You were fully clothed. We’d texted each other only half hour before so I can only surmise he arrived sometime after that.”
Her heart began beating again.
“Then what?”
Reaper dropped his head and inhaled.
There wasn’t another soul around and she felt like they were the only two people left in the world. His sadness reached out and curled its limbs around her, leaving her no choice but to crawl closer, she cupped the side of his face, his skin was hot and his breaths harsh and halting, she waited for his eyes to raise. “I won’t freak out. You can tell me, Reaper.”
He kissed her palm.
“You were pregnant.”
“Oh.”
It was strange to hear those words and not feel the appropriate emotion to go along with knowing they’d made a baby together and then lost it. Her heart pinched, and then hurt some more when she realized he’d dealt with not only her amnesia but his own grief too.
“Did…did dad know what you did?”
“Unless Sony told him where he was going that day, he’s only taking shots in the dark about Sony’s disappearance. The amount of times I had to warn Sony to keep away from you, it wouldn’t take much for your father to put two and two together. He knew what that freak was doing and did nothing to stop him.”
“Why didn’t the doctors ever tell me I was pregnant? They gave me pain meds and a follow up appointment I never went to, they only said about being in a car accident.”
“That’s what I told them when I brought you in. I didn’t want cops sniffing around when I had a body in our apartment. As for telling you, after your episode when you woke up with no memories, they said it was better for your mental state to remember in your own time.”
Her stomach flipped again.
And the strange thing was, she wasn’t disgusted in what he’d done. She might not remember being loved by him back then, but she knew what it was like to be loved by Reaper now, and the man would do anything for her.
“Every second of every waking moment we were apart, every thought, my every tortured breath, each pained beat of my heart knowing I felt dead inside, it was for you, because of you.” Two beats of silence, then he added. “I was so sure you’d take one look at me that day we met in here town and know who I was. I was both equally terrified and hopeful at the same time. I knew I had to protect you against all my own heartache, your brain injury was so delicate, I couldn’t risk you losing it again. All I could do was stay close and wait. I wanted to tell you so many times, but I was afraid. You were my only priority, Paige. No matter the things I had to do to ensure your safety from remembering what happened to you … our baby. What I’d done.”
