Page 98 of Nash

“Was he your ex-boyfriend,” I ask calmly, “or your nightmare?”

“He… he,” she stammers. She’s adding it up. “I haven’t seen him in years.”

I answer with silence.

Her eyes flare, disbelieving, “Did you?—”

“What have I always told you, Vale?”

“But I…” She backs away. “I just thought you?—”

“You thought I wasn’t a beast when I told you I was?” I approach her. “Believe it when someone shows you who they are.”

She steps back, fumbling for the boat’s edge. “So that means you… You killed?—”

“He was a monster, Vale.”

She stammers, dropping his glasses in the water like any piece of him still burns her. “So… so what are you?”

“I’m worse. I’m your beast who killed him.”

The white fiberglass is slippery in the soft rain, but it doesn’t stop her. She starts climbing over. “I don’t… I don’t want to think about him. I don’t?—”

“Vale, come back.” I reach for her, but she jerks away, stumbling onto the dock.

“I… I don’t know who you are,” she huffs, turning to run.

“Yes, you do.”

I jump out of the boat and chase after her. She can’t escape me. She can’t escape this truth. Not anymore. We need to talk about this. She doesn’t make it twenty feet down the slick dock before I grab her arm and whip her around.

“You know what I’ll do for you. You know who I am,” I growl, “and Iknowwho he was.”

Her beautiful face twists with agony, fighting the memory, but the terrifying trauma fills her grey eyes. Gentle rain mists her alabaster cheeks, flushing with pain as her giant tears fall.

They fucking kill me.

Her pain is my poison.

“I know how he hurt you, Vale,” I confess. “Alena told me years after, and god knows if I had known, I would’ve handled it thedayafter.” I soften my grip and tone. “It was your prom night, wasn’t it? I remember you coming to our house. I remember you crying to Alena. That’s why I made you breakfast the next morning. I knew something was wrong, but I figured you got in a fight with him and broke up. I’m sorry. I should have known and…”

More tears spill down her wet cheeks, her lips trembling, holding back her truth.

“You acted different after that night.” I’ll never forget it. It breaks my soul to remember, “Like he stole your light.”

“He stole my kiss,” she weeps before lifting her quivering chin, “but I got everything else back.”

I cup her cheeks, pressing my forehead to hers. “He was going to do it again. It was Alena’s twenty-first birthday. I was at the bar that night. I knew he was stalking you, and I watched him roofie your drink. You weren’t his only victim, we found out. But I swear to god I made sure there would be no more.”

Her eyes search mine, remembering, “But I thought I got blackout drunk that night.”

“You did. He made sure of it. But Axel made sure Alena got you home safely while I made sure Chad never hurt you or another woman again.”

She blinks, her tears still falling and mixing with the rain.

I can’t read the look in her stormy grey eyes. It frightens me, and that’s rare. That’s love.I can’t lose her. I can’t let her go.

“Do you hate me now?” I ask. “Do you really think I’m a monster, too?”

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