Page 39 of The Anchor Holds

That made me want to squirm in my seat. I was not going to let something similar happen again. Luck might’ve smiled at me once, but I was under no illusions that it would happen a second time. Only idiots relied on luck to keep them rich, healthy or alive.

Though some of my past decisions might’ve been morally questionable, I was no idiot. And I was no man’s pawn.

Resolve hurtled through me, newfound, and making me desperate to form a concrete plan to get myself out of this mess.

Not something that could be figured out on the short journey to the waiting jet, but I made a promise to myself: I’d never be in that situation again.

We had stopped in front of my plane, the stairs down and ready for me to climb in to get the fuck out of here, yet I stilldidn’t relax. It felt like my body was coated in a thin sheen of filth despite the shower I’d had at the penthouse Jasper had led us to after the game so I could change. I’d slathered my body with hundreds of dollars’ worth of luxury lotions, had put on a custom-tailored pantsuit… I looked like myself. Yet I felt worse than ever. Had it always been this way? Had I not noticed? Had I not cared?

I resisted the urge to lurch out of the car. I looked at Jasper—the picture of composure, of cold, handsome cruelty. He was watching me as he had been the entire ride.

He didn’t speak, though. Whatever was going through his head, he wasn’t going to share. Not unless I asked. He’d always given me what I asked. As long as I was willing to pay the price for that knowledge.

“Did you know?” I asked him, my hand on the door handle.

Jasper didn’t question what I meant. His brow arched a millimeter, but otherwise, his face remained an indifferent mask.

“Did you know Gregory was sending someone to…” My mind sank down into the memory I didn’t want to think about. I drew in a deep breath as I remembered who the fuck I was and looked him square in the eye. “Did you know he was sending someone to beat and rape me in order to scare me into submission?”

His expression didn’t change, nor did he recoil at the ugly words. Outwardly, he did not appear to be bothered, but that was not an indicator of anything. I would’ve liked to think his history with me would’ve caused him some kind of ire. But he was not protective over me. He didn’t think it was his job to shield me from the horrors of the world. If anything, he considered it his duty to shove them upon me like a plague, just to see how I’d survive them. To ensure I’d become immune, just like him, and so there was no one else for me to turn to.

“I knew he was sending him to physically remind you who you were dealing with, yes.” There was no shame in his admission.

I gritted my teeth and gripped the door handle so hard, wanting to rip it from the car. I wanted to tear the whole vehicle apart. Fuck, I wanted to tear Jasper apart with my bare hands. Rip him to shreds to see if I could find even an ounce of humanity inside of him, some kind of salvation to justify why I’d given so much of myself to him.

Worse than all that, I wanted to cry. Me. I wanted to wail and sink down to the bottom of the world and cry because he hadn’t protected me. When I was stupid enough to think I didn’t need a man to protect me, then in the midst of the most horrible parts of it, I’d begged the powers that be for Jasper to come in to save me.

But that wasn’t who Jasper was.

And there was no greater power but me, my will and my ability to survive this. Survive him.

So instead of giving him the satisfaction of seeing my rage or my sadness, I gave him nothing but a stiff nod. “Good to know.”

I opened the door, my body screaming in pain, betrayal, loss.

“Dove.”

My body went rigid at the nickname he’d only used as teenagers, one he’d dropped when we started masquerading as adults, as monsters, until it became clear we weren’t masquerading at all.

Though he still wore that fucking dove brooch. Every day. A reminder of who I was to him.

“I didn’t know he was going to rape you.” He said the repulsive word in the same baritone as the others, as if it were casual to him. I knew it wasn’t. As much as Jasper didn’t have a code or even a soul, I knew that he would never commit that sin.

Just be party to it, I guessed, even if it was after the fact.

“He died slowly,” he added, as if it was any kind of comfort. “For you.”

It wasn’t.

I pursed my lips.

This was my monster, his admission akin to a cat leaving a corpse at its master’s feet. His way of giving me a gift the only way he knew how.

For a moment, I squeezed my eyes shut. “If you’d wanted to do anything for me, you would’ve let me kill him myself.”

I slammed the door in his face before he could reply, walking toward the jet without so much as a hitch in my step.

I knew he watched me the entire way.

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