Page 24 of Baked

Her head shook immediately. “No, sugar, it doesn’t bother me. It’s part of who you are. I don’t want you changing, especially not for me.”

He didn’t know how badly he needed to hear that. Not until this very second.

Letting his eyes close, he swallowed down all the new emotions clogging his throat and took a deep breath. It must have been at least a minute before he opened his eyes, and when he did, she was still looking at him, understanding clear on her face.

“We should go pack some stuff for you, honeybun,” he managed to ground out.

“Okay.”

***

Rachel was in his bed. In his arms. He’d dreamed about this moment for a long time, yet nothing could have prepared him for the real thing.

The moment they’d arrived back at his, she’d asked where her room was. Hunter had directed her to his room, not because he wanted to trick her into sleeping with him but because it was the only room with a bed.

She’d of course cottoned on to that fact pretty quickly and insisted he sleep with her. And as much as he liked to believe he was a gentleman, nothing was going to stop him from taking her up on that offer. Especially not after what had just happened. She needed him.

So now here he was. Lying shirtless in his navy cotton sheets, a tiny fairy curled up against his chest, her warm breath on his skin doing nothing to combat the goosebumps breaking out over the entirety of his body.

“He wasn’t always a bad guy,” she whispered into the darkness.

His hand on her bare shoulder began gliding up and down the top of her arm again. “Yeah?” He knew she needed to get this out.

“Yeah. Before the ...” She stopped herself. He had a good idea what she was going to say though. “He saved up enough money to get me these ballet classes that I’d been begging for. And then, when it turned out I had like zero talent when it came to ballet, he tried his best to help me. Even went through my routines with me. And I got to say, seeing a man like Leo do a pirouette was really something to be seen.”

“What happened?” The question had been on the tip of Hunter’s tongue for a while, but it had never felt right to ask before now.

“My mom ...” Her voice wobbled. “She left. That’s when Leo started drinking.”

“Left?” He couldn’t hide the disgust in his tone.

She snuggled closer, as if trying to burrow under his skin. “Yeah. I was seven, I think. Maybe eight.”Jesus Christ.“It wasn’t much of a loss if I’m being honest ... not for me anyway. My mother had checked out long before she left us.”

Hunter squeezed his eyes shut. She was breaking his heart. Not having the first clue what to say to something like that, he kept quiet and waited for her to continue.

“At first, he would try and hide it. You know, empty whiskey bottles under the couch, behind cabinets, in the laundry hamper. But then one day, I don’t know, it’s like he stopped caring. Because they were everywhere.”

She paused, and Hunter found himself leaning to lay a kiss on top of her hair, quietly urging her to continue.

“Soon after that, he started forgetting to pick me up. From school that is. The ballet lessons were long forgotten. And ... then his friends started coming over. Friends I’d never seen before. Dodgy-looking dudes. Like greasy-looking, if you know what I mean.”

Hunter’s heart rate began to speed up. He didn’t like where this was going. But he needed to hear it. And she needed to say it. “What happened after that, honeybun?”

He felt more than he heard her swallow hard. “I think I was around ten the first time he hit me. Like really hit me. He didn’t punch me though—that would lead to too many questions. It was more like hard smacks. My back, my thighs, my arms ... anywhere marks could be covered by clothes. Oh, and he’d drag me around too. I remember he used to sink his fingers in and pull.”

A growl had started in his stomach and was now making his whole body shake. Rachel noticed, her head lifting. Even in the darkness, her sapphire eyes shimmered. But witnessing the sparkle wasn’t enough to stop him growling. Something she realized as she began to climb his big body.

Now fully on top, she curled herself around him, her head resting on his shoulder, her arms circling his torso, and her legs wrapping around his waist, until she was straddling him.

Goddamn, that feels good.

Good enough to plug the rage threatening to spill out of him and onto the mattress. And good enough to spark a new feeling. A much better one.

“I didn’t mean to upset you.” Sadness laced her quiet words.

His arms came around her. “It’s not you I’m upset with, honeybun.”

“I know.”

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