“But you can’t go running off. People care about you, a lot of people. Katherine cares about you. You know I do. If it were up to me, you would stay with us forever, you know that. You’re family.”
My breath catches. I’m not family, but he’s treating me like I am. Tyler said almost the same thing.
Katherine appears on the stairs. “Wine?”
I nod.
Gabe gives me a brief one-arm embrace before heading to the kitchen. He opens a bottle for us. “I’m going to hit the sack. I’ll take breakfast duty with the kids.”
Katherine steps into his embrace and runs her fingers through his thick, dark hair. “I’ll wake you up when I come in.”
I’m pretty sure I wasn’t supposed to overhear that, but the sexy promise makes me miss Tyler even more. I turn away from their kiss and pour two glasses.
“Night, Amy. See you in the morning.” Gabe’s already walking to their bedroom beyond the stairs.
Katherine picks up her wine and hands me the other one. “Let’s sit in the living room so we can be comfortable.”
I snatch the bottle and follow her, settling on one end of their couch.
“Gabe said the missing gangster might have killed Betty.”
I shiver. Betty is a nightmare, but no one deserves to be on the wrong end of Enzo’s violent streak. “He’s a very violent man. I know this from when I dated him. Briefly.”
“You dated the guy trying to kill you? Is that the real reason you were in protection?”
“No. Well, not really. Maybe subconsciously, I turned in the family for falsifying tax records to get out of my situation. Enzo Junior was adamant about keeping me, but he was abusive. We’d only dated a couple of months before I broke it off. His father backed me up—made it clear I was not to be harmed—because he liked having me as his accountant. Even sent Junior out of the country. In hindsight, that might have been what tipped me off to look closer.”
“What do you mean abusive?”
I take a sip of my wine. Am I really going to explain my kink and the risk it poses to my friend? Having tasted it at the club with Tyler, I don’t want to lock out that side of myself again. But if Gabe knows, so does Katherine. I might as well come clean. “Have you ever heard of BDSM?”
“I lived in New York, and after that shady trilogy of books came out and hit the end aisle display at the bookstore, the secret was out.”
“Well, I like some kink in my sex life.” I bite my lip, unable to meet her eyes as I wait for her response.
“Still doesn’t explain your relationship with Junior.”
Warmth that isn’t due to the wine slides through my heart, and my muscles relax. She isn’t judging me. “He took it too far. Didn’t respect my boundaries. He…um…he basically raped me before we broke up.”
Katherine sets her wine down, crosses to me, and wraps me in a hug. “That fucking bastard.”
“Yeah, he was.” I’ve never said it out loud. I couldn’t go to the police when it happened. It was too much to explain, and if I had turned his son in to the cops, Enzo Sr. would have made me disappear before the paperwork on the investigation was even started. Admitting what he did to someone else makes my experience more real, not just a figment of my memory or imagination. The echo of my assault—physical, emotional, mental—blankets me, and I’m in the past for a moment. It still stings and shames me, but not so intensely. He was responsible for violating me. Nothing I did or didn’t do wasaskingfor rape. I sniff back the building tears. “If I could go back and, change anything to avoid that night, I would in a heartbeat.”
Katherine leans back and looks into my eyes. “It wasn’t your fault. Using your preferences against you, hurting you beyond your limits, and taking actions too far are inexcusable. Did you get counseling after?”
“I probably should have, but it didn’t feel safe to tell anyone in St. Louis.”
“You could see someone now.” Katherine grabs a box of tissues and hands them to me. I didn’t realize I was crying.
“I might. After Tyler—” A sob breaks free at the thought of him leaving without me.
“How long have you known him? Does he know about your preferences? About what happened?”
“I never told him what happened. Not specifically. He might suspect.”
Katherine narrows her eyes. “He’s more than your handler.”
“I met him at a club in St. Louis. I started going after I broke things off with Enzo. I was so stressed, and I had to have a release. Get out of my head but in a public place. Somewhere safe.”
