Page 113 of Taming Seraphine

“Then why do you feel so strongly about this?”

An emotion flashes across his features. I can’t tell if it’s discomfort or indecision, but he closes his eyes and exhales. When he opens them again, it’s with a look of determination that makes me straighten.

“When I was nine, my mother married a police officer who started beating her shortly after. I tried to stop it, but I was too small, too weak. It went on for years, but she wouldn’t leave. One day, I found the bastard on top of my sister and something inside me snapped.”

“What did you do?” I whisper.

“I shot him in the head.”

I nod. “Good.”

He glances away. “But he refused to die. My sister and mother were horrified and looked at me like I was a monster.”

My lips part with a gasp. “But you saved them.”

The laugh he gives me is bitter. “There was blood all over the carpet and bits of brains on the wall. That bastard clung onto life like a demon, filling my sister’s room with his ragged breaths. It was a fucking mess.”

“What happened next?”

“My mother called her cousin. He finished off my stepfather, cleaned up the scene of the crime, and took me.”

I flinch, my jaw dropping. “Why?”

“They said the state of New Alderney would have tried me as an adult for murdering a police officer,” he replies, his voice laced with bitterness. “I had to disappear.”

“For how long?”

A muscle flexes in his jaw. “Forever.” At my frown, he adds, “I tracked my mother and sister down to California when I turned eighteen, and they were horrified. they wanted nothing to do with me.”

“Why?”

“They said only a psychopath could kill someone so brutally.” He shakes his head as though he still can’t believe what he heard. “My mother said the bastard had his faults, and I never gave him the benefit of the doubt. According to her, what I saw was a misunderstanding.”

“B-but didn’t your sister speak up for you?”

He grimaces. “She agreed with my mother, but what else explains why a man would pin down a half-naked girl and expose his penis?”

My lips part with a gasp. “Unbelievable.”

“They both had to pack up everything and leave town,” he snarls. “They said I ruined everything and that he was a good provider.”

“What?”

“As if putting food on the table and paying the bills justifies what he did,” he says through clenched teeth.

I rest my head on his chest. “Is that why you saved me?”

“No matter what they say, I will always eliminate anyone who hurts women and children,” he growls. “And when I found you, I wanted to erase every trace of Capello, including the version that lived in your trauma.”

Sliding both hands up his pecs, I tilt my head and meet his gaze. There’s no pain in his eyes, only fury. Leroi’s backstory explains so much, especially why he’s so controlled and hates mistakes. I don’t understand his family’s ingratitude.

It’s disgusting.

“If you came to me on that night five years ago and killed those men, I wouldn’t have been horrified,” I murmur. “I would have worshiped you like a god.”

Leroi’s eyes widen, and his face falls extraordinarily still. Without another word, he turns around and stalks into the bathroom, leaving me wondering what on earth I said wrong now.

FORTY-THREE

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