I didn’t try to pull away as he lifted our hands and inspected my narrow wrist. “Well—I’m the monster on the hill,” he said, lifting his head to look at me.
My brow scrunched. “You’re wrong.”
“You think so?” he said, moving my hand towards his face. The kiss he planted on my pulse point sent a thrill through my arm.
“Yes,” I replied breathlessly, my stomach swimming with desire.
As he lowered his hand, his thumb played havoc with my heart rate as he continued to touch that pressure point. “You’re like a fucking drug to me, Molly but you’re too sweet. I’m not a nice guy. I’m the villain of the piece.”
“It must be exhausting always trying to be the bad guy,” I whispered, enjoying being alone together in my room.
“Not so much.”
Turning on the bed to face him, I pulled my hand from his and did something I had wanted to do for ages. I lifted my fingers and ran them through his hair. Taking in the full extent of his bruised face for the first time. The lamp continued to cast shadows over his torso.
I then placed my hand against his chest, feeling the pulse of his heart against my palm as I said.
“So, what now? What’s next? Will there be a funeral?”
“No. Not after what he did to my mother.”
I swallowed. I knew I needed to tread carefully.
“Your mother?”
He nodded, and sadness was wrapped around every word. “She died too.”
I mushed my lips together, wondering whether to push him. Hudson could be a live wire. I didn’t want to ruin the moment. “Do youwantto talk about it? About how she died?”
Beads of sweat ran down his chest. “In the worst way you can imagine.” I felt the shudder run through his body. In a split second, I noted that I was about to find out what Hudson deemed asthe worst way you can imagine, and I had a feeling it would be far worse than what happened to my mom.
“Would telling me about it help, do you think? Maybe it’s better to get it off your chest?”
“It’s not that easy, Molly,” he husked, banging his head against the headboard. I twisted so I was kneeling next to his legs, leaving my hand against his heart.
“I mean it, Hudson. I’m here for you.” My hair fell forward, almost curtaining my face. “We can just relax and be in each other’s company. We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t feel ready.”
His eyes roamed over my hair and face. “You’re so fucking beautiful, Molly. You’re too perfect, I don’t want to taint your mind with images of what I’ve seen. The things I’ve done.”
“I’m not a piece of glass. I may look perfect, but I’m just as busted up as the next person. I have demons, too, things I regret. Shit I’ve done. You’re not alone.” I hoped that reassured him, as I meant what I said.
We were in my bedroom with the faint ticking of my mother’s old clock. And then, Hudson’s maskslipped. And I saw beneath it. The tough guy who walked around school like a king was gone. And there was the boy I knew.
My heart thudded in my chest. And after a deep-seated growl, he told meeverything, and Hudson Gage’s backstory was much worse than I could ever have imagined.
The tension in the room amplified.
I saw the terror of the past in his eyes.
During parts of his story, I pulled him into my arms and held him close. Hudson became choked up when he explained how he watched his mother being beaten to death in front of him.
All the emotions I had felt on the night my mother was taken from me camerushingback. But this time, the despair I felt wasn’t for me. It was for that fourteen-year-oldboy who had seen his mother murdered and then been led away in handcuffs as if he were responsible somehow.
I felt sick. Hudson’s Dad had been putting his hands on his son in anger for years. Both he and his mother had been victims of domestic abuse.
Hudson only gave me several scenarios of how he was beaten as a child. The shit he suffered at the hands of a man who called himself a father was shocking and messed with my ability to breathe easily. He showed me some of the scars on his arms and back, partly hidden by the detail of his tattoos. They, in turn, told their own heart-wrenching story.
Once he was spent, we sat quietly, sharing each other’s company. Even Roger had moved closer to Hudson. It was like we were frozen together in that horrid moment of truth. There was now no escaping it.
