It’s wild.
I sob as I reach for the soap on the shelf and begin rubbing it into wounds that reopen and bleed.
The pain takes everything else away. It’s all I can focus on. I turn the heat up on the shower. Scalding their touch from my body. Sterilizing my wounds. Cauterizing emotions I can’t name.
The bathroom door smashes open, falling off its hinge. And I see Saint through the steam.
His face looks like thunder as he slides the shower door open, stepping around me. “Jesus, no, babe. Not like this,” he says softly, turning the heat down.
He’s still dressed in boots and jeans and a leather vest that identifies him as an Iron Outlaw. Tall with broad shoulders, he could easily overpower me.
I’d be at his mercy.
I shy away from him, pressing my back against the corner of the shower. With all that I am, I try to cover my naked body, but it’s no use. My knees give in, and I sink to the floor.
Why won’t my brain think? Why won’t my legs work? Did I escape one monster to end up in the bathroom of another? I was so reckless coming to the home of a stranger.
God, and now I’m berating myself on top of everything else.
I put my hands out in front of me to keep him away.
He switches the shower from the overhead to the handheld unit, running it onto the back of his hand before he looks at me. Then he crouches about two feet away from me. “Me telling you you’re safe doesn’t mean shit, I know. But you are.” His voice is calm and quiet. “Let me rinse you off so we can get you dry and treat these wounds, yeah?”
There is nothing left in my tank, so I nod.
“Close your eyes,” he whispers.
He tilts my chin back and gently rinses my hair and my face. He takes my fingertips in his hand and elongates my arm so he can rinse it thoroughly, being careful around the cuts on my wrist.
When he tugs me to my feet, I let him, forgetting I’m naked. Tears fill my eyes as I receive a tender touch I never thought I’d feel again, but I don’t open them. I can’t look at this man. He’s a stranger. A reminder of what happened to me.
I simply need to get through this night.
The shower stops, and I open my eyes.
Saint isn’t looking at me in any way that’s sexual; it’s more like he’s assessing me as he wraps a towel over my shoulders. Then he tries to wrap one around my hair though it immediately starts to slide off as he gets a third and wraps it around my waist. Then he pats me dry.
Tenderly.
“Thank you.” It’s all I can think to say.
“You’ll get through this,” he says. “You washed a whole bunch of evidence away, though. I wish you’d gone to the police before showering.”
“I have my reasons.”
“You wanna share ’em?”
I think about what I have to lose and gain here. “On the night they took me, they joked about being able to kidnap me. I threatened to escape and tell the police. But they laughed. Said they have cops on their payroll to make things disappear. That they’d been watching me. They knew I had no real friends. That I lived alone. It wasn’t random. They targeted me. A date through a dating app two days earlier. I answered every question he asked honestly.”
“Shit, Briar,” Saint says as he dries my feet and then sits me down on the side of the bath. “I’m going to put some antiseptic on you. I’m sure it’s going to sting, but it’s the best I can do.”
Exhausted, I nod. “Just do it.”
I watch him as he works. He’s an attractive man. Kind, blue eyes and sharp cheekbones. His beard is out of control. A wiry mess. His hands are rough.
He’s also a danger to me. I know about these clubs, what they do. The weapons, the drugs, the misogyny.
But for tonight, I’m willing to let him be my safety.
