Page 43 of The Preachers' Promise
“Do you think you might make it a quick bath? Because Mal is losing his mind down there. He thinks I’ve caused you irreparable psychological damage. And anyway … I really want to talk to you, we all do.”
I nod. “Thanks, Roman, I really do appreciate you all coming for me, and I want to spend time with you, too. I just need to decompress.”
He turns to the door.
“Hey.” I stop him as he’s leaving. “The drugs they gave me are still making me woozy. Could you make me a coffee?”
“For you, Ophelia? Anything.”
Our gazes collide and hold. For a long moment, it’s just me and him. This beautiful, broken, scary man and me. As I look into his eyes, a sense of peace settles over me. Yes, he’s scary, and unhinged, but he’smine.
“Let me get you that coffee.”
He closes the door softly behind himself, and I smile.
“Mine,” I say softly.
22
MALACHI
With Ophelia taking her bath,I don’t have anything else to do but explore the safehouse. Cain and Roman have already checked it out, but I haven’t had the chance yet. Though I trust they know it’s safe, I still want to assess the place for myself. If something happens, like we’re attacked, then I want to know the fastest and easiest way to get Ophelia out of here.
I think back to the facility we took her from and try to piece together the actions they’re likely to be taking right now. I assume they’ll let her father know she’s gone. Her father is most likely going to assume it’s the Prophet and his people who’d snatched her, but he won’t think that for long. That place had CCTV, and neither Roman nor Cain covered their faces when they entered. If they’d worn their masks, they would never have been able to just walk right in like they did. But it means the moment her dad sees the security footage, he’s going to recognize them from when we visited him at the house. He’ll know right away that we have her.
Is that going to make him feel better or worse? I’d hope he’d prefer Ophelia to be with us than the Prophet, but who the fuck knows how that man’s mind works. He’s also going to question how we found out where she was.
I hope he doesn’t look to Ophelia’s mother.
Mrs. Sinclair took a risk when she passed that note to Cain. If her husband finds out, who knows what kind of actions he’ll take against her. He’ll see it as a betrayal, and men in our world don’t take betrayal kindly. He’ll punish her for it.
He’ll want to punish us, too, but it might make a difference when he learns Ophelia was almost raped in the place he sent her to. Will it give him pause when he finds out we were the ones who stopped it? If he gives us the chance to speak before he shoots us, I’ll ask him to picture what would have happened to his daughter if we hadn’t got there in time.
I think to what Roman did to the man who tried to hurt Ophelia. Will that give her father a reason to consider us people who shouldn’t be messed with? Will it make him think his daughter is safer with us, or in more danger?
My head is a whirlwind of thoughts as I wander from room to room. I note how each of the doors and windows, while seemingly normal at first glance, have metal shutters that will be triggered upon an intrusion.
I chuckle to myself. What the fuck kind of work does Cain’s fight club friend do to need a setup like this other than running that club?
I reach the rear of the house and open another door. This room is dark, so I pat my hand against the wall, feeling around until I find a switch and turn on a light. To my surprise, I find myself in a soundproof room. For a moment, I think it’s a panic room, but then I note the objects hung on the walls and realize I’m in a recording studio.
“Well, fuck me,” I say in amazement, stepping deeper into the room. I drag my hand through my hair and turn in a circle.
I’m still no wiser as to what business Cain’s friend is in, but I find I have a newfound respect for him.
I glance around, trying to spot any cameras, but there are none in here—at least none that are obvious. Electric guitars are clearly the star of the show, hung on the walls as though they’re works of art, but an acoustic guitar is on a stand in the corner. I go over and pick it up, marveling at the quality. With the weight of the instrument in my hands, I finally feel calmer. The past twenty-four hours have been crazy, but we’re safe now. Our girl is upstairs, taking a bath, and I have a guitar in my hand. For the moment, I can’t want for anything else…
Except for one thing—for Ophelia to have hugged me back.
I take a seat on a stool and settle the guitar on my lap. I know now that Ophelia was traumatized, not only by what Roman did, but by the man who tried to rape her. Had my touch reminded her of him? I hate that possibility. Will she think of him every time one of us is intimate with her? My fingers tighten around the neck of the instrument, and I force myself to loosen my grip. I don’t want to damage it.
It’s not easy to control my emotions when it comes to her.
I’m frightened for Ophelia, even now we’ve gotten her back. I hated seeing her drugged once again. It reminds me so much of how my mom used to be when I was a kid—the glazed eyes, the distant half-smile, the sense that it was impossible to get through to her. My mom used to drink and pop pills because it was her escape. She’d been forced to marry my father, who was a violent man, at a young age, and had given birth to me not long after. She’d been younger than Ophelia is now when she’d become a mother. Of course, I hadn’t understood that when I was growing up. She’d just been my mom, and all I’d known was that she was never there for me. I lost count of the number of times I’d cleaned her vomit from the floor, and—as I’d gotten older and bigger—picked her up and carried her to the couch or to bed. I’d always wanted to hide the worst of it from my father, not wanting him to see her like that. If he did, he’d get evenangrier, then she would drink more or take more pills. It was an unforgiving cycle, and one I’d been caught in the middle of.
She had another side, though, as most addicts do, a fun and charming one. When she bestowed her full attention on you, it was like the sun coming out from a cloud, and you were bathed in warmth. She loved music, and some of my happiest memories were her picking a vinyl to place on the record player. It was almost a ritual, how she did it. First cleaning the stylus with a little brush, then wiping the record on the turntable with a large velvet brush. It was fucking conflicting how much I loved her in those moments, and it made me want to protect her, even when she was messed up.
It never lasted, though.
