She closed her eyes, the insides of her lids feeling like steel wool scraping against them. The scene in the basement kept playing over and over in her mind. All the things she could’ve done differently. How if she had just stayed and talked to Reid instead of running away to the party, everything could’ve been avoided.

Running. Always running. It’s what she did best.

“Ma’am.” The nurse’s hand on her shoulder made Brynn jump. The older woman smiled down at her. “I’m sorry, did I wake you?”

Brynn dropped her feet to the floor and shook her head. “No, I’m fine. Just waiting for visiting hours to start.”

She nodded at the door. “You’re all set. Doctor just finished with him. You can go in now.”

Wiping the bleariness from her eyes, she stood and thanked the woman, then moved past her and through Reid’s door. She had expected to see the same scene from the previous two days—darkened room, beeping machines, and a pale, sleeping Reid.

But instead, she was greeted with a lopsided grin and a gravelly voice. “Hey, sugar.”

Her heavy heart buoyed in her chest. “You’re awake!”

“So it seems.” He shifted higher on the angled bed, wincing

a bit. “How come every time you get near a weapon I end up in pain?”

Awake and sarcastic. She wanted to drop to her knees and thank the heavens. “’Cause you’re always standing too close to the bad guy.”

He nodded, some of the humor leaving his face. “So are you.”

She headed toward the visitor’s chair, but he patted the side of the bed instead. She sat on the edge near his feet, trying her best not to jostle him any. “How do you feel?”

He shrugged with his good shoulder. “Like I’ve been shot.”

“Right. Stupid question.”

The corner of his mouth tipped up. “I’m okay, I think. Doc said the bullet missed all the important stuff.”

“That’s good.” She wondered if the doctor had told him how close to hitting his heart it had been. Her breath left her thinking about the scant inches, the sliver of a miracle that had saved him.

Concerned eyes scanned her head to waist. “And you? Are you… okay?”

She nodded. “The welts are healing.”

He stared at her, as if trying to find the answer to his next question on her face. “Did he—?”

“No,” she said, cutting him off before he could say the words. “He was going to, after he finished the beating, but you got there before he had the chance.”

He closed his eyes briefly. “Thank God.”

She grabbed his right hand and squeezed. “Thank you. You didn’t just save me from that, you saved my life.”

His Adam’s apple bobbed. “The nurse said Jace is all right?”

“Jace’s fine. Davis knocked him out, but he only had a concussion.”

“And Kelsey?”

She looked down at her hands and sighed. “The police intercepted Roslyn and got Kelsey to safety, but she’s been through a lot. Davis posed as the dom who was supposed to be training her and brought her to his cabin.”

“Oh, no.”

“Yeah, The Ranch assumed Kels was a no-show, but Davis had her on-site for three days—fooled her into his bed. She figured out he was lying when he started asking questions about the evidence. When she tried to escape, he hauled her off to stay with Roslyn at the lake house and came back to pursue me for the information instead.”

“Jesus, is she going to be okay?”

She twisted the ring on her right hand over and over. “Kelsey’s tough. Right now she says she’s fine. She’s even willing to cooperate with the police on both this case and the one with the dealer. But I think when she slows down, all this is going to hit her pretty hard.”

“And what about you?” he asked quietly.

“I’m just glad to be alive at this point.”

Reid released a long breath. “I thought I’d be too late again—that I’d lost you for good.”

She fought against the lump forming in her throat. She’d thought she’d lost him forever, too. The moment the second gun had gone off had been one of the worst of her life. “Nope. You still have to put up with me every day at work.”

His fingers laced with hers. “What if I want to put up with you for more than that?”

She stared at their locked hands, the simple connection both warming her and bringing sadness all at once. Her mouth twitched. “You’re pumped full of pain meds and not thinking straight.”

“No, I’m serious,” he said, the firmness in his voice making her meet his eyes. “I’ve been up since four this morning doing nothing but thinking. I’m sorry I deceived you about why I was at The Ranch. I needed your sister for the appeal, but I won’t lie, I also wanted to knock you down a few notches. Get back at you. It was an asshole thing to do. But Brynn, as soon as you kissed me back at the initiation, it’s like I was right where I needed to be. Everything that happened after that was a hundred percent real, at least for me.”

She chewed her lip, considering him. “For me, too.”

His hand tightened around hers. “Then give me another shot to get it right.”

Her heart picked up speed, urging her to grab on to what he was suggesting. But she knew better. Nothing had changed since their conversation in the bathtub. “We want different things, Reid.”

“I want you.”

She frowned and extracted her hand from his. “You know I can’t be what you need.”

He glanced down at her body as if remembering the scars beneath, and she had the urge to cover herself with her arms. “You are what I need, Brynn. I know you’ve been through hell and it’s going to take time to work through that. But let me be there with you while you do it.”

“What if I never work through it, Reid?” she said, her voice hardening. “What if every time you touch me, I can’t help but think of all the horrid things he did to me?”

He frowned. “We’ll figure it out, sugar.”

“What? You’ll just give up being who you are if I can’t handle it? Isn’t that why you got divorced?”

His jaw flexed. “I got divorced because I didn’t love her like I love you.”

Her lips parted, the unexpected words halting all her thought processes.

He captured her wrist and forced her to scoot up the bed, then reached to cup her cheek. “My world cracked open when I thought I might never see you again. Give us another shot, sugar.”

She blinked back the tears that welled in her eyes. “Reid…”

“Yes, I am who I am. You’re the one who tried to teach me that all those years ago. And if you’re looking for a guy who’s always going to be polite and gentle and politically correct, I’m not him. But you have to ask yourself—is that what you want? I know you’re scared. But I would never hurt you. Don’t let what that bastard did change who you are.”

She dropped her gaze, staring hard at the seam on the sheets. “I’m not the girl you used to know, Reid. Things do change whether we want them to or not.”

“Then who was the girl with me at The Ranch?”

“Who was the guy who said he was done with relationships?”

He released a frustrated breath. “A guy who was too afraid to admit he had fallen in love.”

She bit her lip to keep it from trembling. “We’ve been through a lot. Trauma like this can mess with your head—make you think you want things you may not actually want. We’re both too emotional right now to make big decisions.”

He put a finger under her chin, forcing her to look at him. “Don’t give me the therapist speak, Brynn. Sure, shit like this can screw with your mind, but it also can bring things into laser-sharp focus, make you realize what’s really important. Can you look me in the eye and tell me you don’t love me back? That you don’t feel more alive when we’re together? Because that’s what you do for me.”

She swallowed hard, the duct tape holding together her fractured emotions threatening to bust apart. “I can’t… do this right now.”

She moved to get off the bed, but he grabbed her arm, his grip firm and his eyes blazing with determination. “You will not run from me, Brynn. Not again. You look at me and tell me the truth.”

She stilled, staring at his hand on her, then looked him dead in the eye and said the only thing she knew would free them both. “Texas.”

The hurt that crossed his face ripped her guts out, but she pasted on her stoic therapist mask—the only thing that saved her from falling to her knees in a broken heap of emotion. The sights and sounds of the rooms seemed to grind to slow motion, and the fight left Reid’s body. His hand slipped from her arm and he nodded.

Without another word, she rose off the bed and walked out the room, the tears falling as soon as she shut the door behind her.

TWENTY-FOUR

now

Reid glanced up as Jace pulled open the sliding glass doors and sauntered onto Reid’s backyard deck like he owned the place. “You know, knocking before you come into somebody’s house is usually customary.”

Jace grinned and handed Reid a beer. “I forgot. That head injury has made my memory shit.”

He snorted. “Right. Is that what you’re telling the girls you date when you forget their names?”

Jace laughed and sank into the lawn chair next to him. “The benefits of being hit in the head are vast. Although, it won’t impress women nearly as much as surviving a gunshot wound to save a damsel in distress.”

Reid closed the file he’d been working on and took a sip of beer. “Yeah, I’d have to leave out the part about her saving my ass right back.”

“Have you talked to her?”

He stared off in the direction of the setting sun, frowning. “No. Not since the hospital.”

And it was killing him. Brynn had been through her worst nightmare, and knowing she was facing all those demons alone kept him awake at night.

But she’d walked away. Didn’t love him enough to try. Some things he couldn’t command. No matter how much he wanted to.

Jace considered him, his normal humor gone from his face. “What happened in there?”

He sighed. “I told her I loved her.”

“And?”

“And she used her safe word.”

Jace winced. “Fucking brutal.”

Reid ran a hand over the back of his neck, wiping the sweat that had gathered there. “She’s terrified, man. That sadistic asshole fucked with her head, and now she’s convinced being with someone like me will rehash that terror every time I touch her. She was so close to pushing past her fear when we were at The Ranch, and now she’s scrambling backward.”

Jace’s tone hardened. “Makes me wish we could bring that fucker Davis back from the dead, just so we could have the pleasure of killing him ourselves. Slowly.”

“No shit.” He swigged his beer. “And this giving her space thing is driving me nuts. I wake up every damn day ready to pound on her door, throw her over my shoulder, and cuff her to me until she gives me another chance.”

Jace shrugged. “So why don’t you?”

He shot his friend a don’t-be-a-stupid-asshole glare.

Jace leaned forward, his forearms braced against his thighs. “Look, I’m not saying you actually kidnap her. But, whether Brynn wants it or not, she responds to submission—to you. She was so scared when I was getting her ready at The Ranch. I thought for sure she’d bail before the word ‘go,’ but as soon as she was with you, she relaxed and, unless she’s the best actress ever, enjoyed it. You need to remind her how it can be with someone who’s there for her pleasure not pain. Chase away the ugly associations she has about it by giving her a taste of your dominance again.”