Page 19 of Tactical Lies

For the moment, it didn't really matter. Whether this was because of him or a random assault, the end result was the same. He had to get Becca out of there before she got hurt. Well, hurt worse than she had already been.

Unsure if she had been scared for him or just in general, Connor reluctantly released his hold on her hand and shifted so he was sitting. Doing a visual once over of Becca before he did anything else, he noted the small trickle of blood running down one side of her face from a small gash about an inch long on her left temple. A bruise was forming around it, but her dark blue eyes were clear, so he didn't think she had a head injury he needed to be worried about.

The way she sat, slightly hunched, one arm braced around her stomach did concern him. She’d been hit in the ribs as well and the last thing they needed was for the blow to have cracked or broken them. That was an injury that could impede her ability to escape, and worst-case scenario, lead to a punctured lung and death.

“Are you all right?” he asked, maybe a little harsher than he had intended but fear for her made it hard to think.

“I’m okay,” she said, and while they both knew it was a lie, she met his gaze squarely and gave a small nod. His girl had been through a lot and suffered more pain than he could ever imagine, and he knew she was telling him that she was hurting, but she could manage it.

“Did they put their hands on you again?” Anyone who touched her was going to die just like the man whose neck he’d snapped. If he could manage it, he’d make their deaths as slow and painful as possible, but getting Becca out of there alive was his number one priority, not revenge.

“No. Well, not really. They just put us both in the back of the jeep and drove us here.”

Waving her hands around she indicated to what appeared to be a tent. It was about ten feet by ten feet, there looked like metal posts were in the corners making a frame. The floor was dirt, and he noticed a metal ring cemented in the middle of the ground, with two chains running from the ring to where he and Becca were sitting.

Looking down his body, he saw that his shoes had been removed, and a cuff had been placed around his ankle attached to the chain. A glance down Becca’s body showed she was similarly bound.

“They didn't hurt you?” he asked again because he needed the reassurance of knowing that his need to kill the man who had hurt her, leading to him being beaten and passing out, hadn't wound up causing her pain.

“They didn't hurt me, Connor,” she assured him. “They dragged me to the jeep and threw me in, then dragged me back out and into this tent. They took off my shoes and yours, then shackled us both to the ring in the middle of the floor. Then they just left us here. You were still unconscious, and I was worried about you, so I pulled your head into my lap and …” she trailed off and her cheeks tinted pink.

She didn't need to finish her sentence.

He knew this woman inside and out.

When he was sick, she used to sit in the bed beside him, his head on her lap, and sing to him. Her sweet voice was like an angel’s, and it always washed over him in a soothing wave, cocooning him in a blanket of warmth and security.

Today she’d been scared and even though she was angry with him, had every reason to hate him, she’d still sung to him like she used to.

While Connor would love to believe that meant something, indicating he still had the teeniest, tiniest chance of winning back her love and trust, he couldn’t allow himself to believe that. Not yet. Maybe after they spent some time together, maybe when they weren't in danger, maybe then they could talk a little.

Still, he couldn’t let her comment pass without responding to it. He needed to make her understand how deeply he regretted his freak out that day twelve years ago. Connor was perfectly prepared to apologize for his mistakes every day for the rest of his life, but in the end, whatever happened next was up to Becca.

She held all the power.

“You sang for me,” he finished aloud what she hadn't been able to say.

“Doesn’t mean anything,” Becca muttered, shifting her gaze so it was fixed on her lap. Right where his head had been when he’d regained consciousness.

On the contrary, Connor thought it meant a lot.

Becca still loved him. At least part of her did. But she didn't trust him, which gutted him even as he knew he had no one else to blame for that but himself.

“I made a huge mistake that day, Becca,” he told her. “I let the stress of the previous months and all my pent-up emotions burst out in the worst way possible. I will regret that for the rest of my life.”

She sighed. A deep, weary sound, that spoke of pain and suffering. “Don’t you think I would have liked to bail on my life back then, Connor? But unlike you, I didn't get that luxury. Unlike you, I didn't get to decide this latest trauma was too much and just walk away. You promised me you would always be there. That nothing could ever make you leave me. You lied. You left me.”

Tears burned his eyes. “I know, baby. I’m so sorry. Sorrier than I can ever express.”

“He was yours,” she whispered, her voice a mere hint of sound.

But her words were powerful.

After he’d left that night and returned to their apartment to find her gone, no one had allowed him to contact her. Becca had blocked his number and blocked him on all social media, her family had shut him out, backing up their daughter and sister, as had their shared friends. He’d never known what happened to her pregnancy, if she’d had the baby or if she’d given it up for adoption, he just knew she wasn't raising a child now.

“H-he? It was a boy?” he asked.

“A boy. I lost him a month after you left. I needed to know …” Finally, her gaze lifted to meet his and he saw the tears swimming in her midnight blue depths. “I needed to know if it had been my rapist’s baby or if I'd lost you over nothing. My parents thought it was a bad idea and there was no good outcome either way. But they were wrong. When the DNA tests said he was yours, there was relief. I didn't want to be carrying that man’s child inside me. But there was also pain. Because you left me over something that didn't even exist. You left me because I was pregnant with your son.”

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