“What’s going on, Regi?” Decker asked with a frown, as his eyes bounced between Krew and me.
“Regi doesn’t want nothing to do with us,” Krew said, his voice lacking the conviction it had moments before.
“I didn’t say that.” My emotions were spinning out of control, especially around these two men. “I want to leave—that’s all. I have a life. A job,” I grated out, folding my arms across my chest like some petulant child, then I realized I didn’t have a bra on. I glanced at the end of the bed and saw my backpack.
I reached for it, but Decker nabbed it first. “You can’t leave, Regi. Not without us.”
“What the hell—you can’t keep me here against my will.” I cursed. The bottle I’d long ago poured my anger into uncorked, and everything erupted out of me like a geyser. “I hate you both. For leaving me. For everything afterward. You have no right holding me here against my will. I have my own life and don’t want you two in it. Do you understand that?”
Every hateful word that spilled out of my mouth had Krew flinching back, and there was rage in Decker’s eyes. I didn’t care. I needed to get away from them. They were a constant reminder of what had happened to me. The rape had stolen these men—and the life I could have had with them, from me.
“I can’t do this anymore.” My anger spent; I began to bawl. Great, heaving, ugly sobs. I stood there, chin to my chest, and cried to the point where I could hardly breathe. Fat tears dripped down my chin onto the nasty gray carpet.
I was a mess. I never cried so much—so hard, in my life. Well, not in a long while anyway. The walls I had constructed to protect myself had all but crumbled to dust the moment they reentered my life.
I felt so out of control that I didn’t know what to do. These two men had ripped giant holes in all of my safety nets. I began to mentally curl in on myself and reach for that dark space in my head again.
Then Krew was there, his beefy arms wrapped around me. With one of his massive hands, he cupped the back of my head and held my snotty face nestled against his muscular chest. His familiar scent—musk and sweat, comforted me in ways I wasn’t expecting. Even though I didn’t want to accept his comfort, I still nuzzled in against him.
I didn’t deserve it—not after the shit I had just spewed at him—at both of them. But I was drowning in so much desperation that I didn’t see the full scope of what I was doing and fiercely grasped onto Krew like he was a lifeline, until it was too late and I was a goner.
There was heat at my back. Decker.
Decker crowded my back. His solid presence, along with Krew’s, created a sense of safety I hadn’t felt in such a long time. The surge of emotions I’d buried so deep burst from my chest, and made my throat hurt.
Decker’s face nestled into the crook of my neck. Silent, and waiting. A memory I had forgotten surfaced. He’d told me once, years ago, that being nestled next to both me and Krew was one of his favorite places to be.
With their arms around me, it was just us, in the quiet solitude of the dingy motel room. The three of us, together again. I wanted to capture the moment, jar it up tight and put it away for those days in the future that I knew were going to be lonely and dark. Then I’d pull it back out and bask in the memory of this time.
The bubble popped when a pinprick of humiliation reminded me that I wasn’t whole. That the damage done to me, the defeat I kept battling in my head—all of it was a giant, mangled-up mess. I wasn’t the good girl they remembered me to be. Not anymore.
No matter how hard I tried to move forward in my life, the damage to my psyche—my soul, never fully healed. My heart had been permanently shredded into pieces, and no amount of stitching was going to mend it. The scars were too deep.
As I drowned in the quicksand of self-pity, I reminded myself that Krew and Decker deserved someone whole—and that wasn’t me. I could never give myself fully to them.
“Let it out,” Krew whispered to me in his comforting way. How could he be so nice to me when I’ve been such a bitch to him?
“I’m a mess,” I croaked, wanting to push them away. Instead, I clung to them both like some limpet, desperate for their touch. They were the air I needed to breathe into my lungs to survive.
Giving false hope wasn’t fair to them or to me. Maybe this was the time to come clean. To tell them what Teke had done to me.
“We’re here,” Decker affirmed with a tone that was slightly harsher—yet, somehow just as soothing as Krew’s soft, loving words. “We’re not going anywhere without you.”
Decker had no clue how his honesty affected me. Unfortunately, his unconditional support made me cry even more.
The guys let me have my moment, again. And I appreciated that.
I finally calmed down and raised my head, swiping the wetness from my cheeks.
Krew walked away, and then came back with a large wad of toilet paper in his hand. “Here.” He handed it to me.
“Thanks,” I uttered, half chuckling and half still crying. Krew’s sweetness continued to unravel my resolve to keep quiet about Teke.
The moment I locked eyes on Krew, I knew there was no way of hiding the past. Those eyes were always going to haunt me. The truth had to come out. One way or another, these men had to know what happened. At least to clear my conscience.
“Better?” Krew asked, and my heart lightened at seeing a glimpse of his smile.
“I’m sorry for being a raging shrew. It’s just that…” I blew out a breath, and tried to ease the thrashing in my chest.
