Page 42 of Bound

“But we just met.”

“They don't give a shit about that, it doesn't matter. That's why I have to protect you, that's the whole reason I took you.” Turning onto his side, Porter softly touched my ribs, tracing one bone at a time. “If I had let you go home, you'd either be dead already, or held captive as bait.”

“What are we going to do?”

“We'renot doing anything. You're going to rest and get better, and I'm going to kill each and every last one of them. They've already taken so much from me, I won't let them take you too.”

“So last night, you were at the club—”

Cutting me off, he blurted out the truth. “I was hunting, but I didn't think anyone was there.”

The way he said it sent shivers up my spine. The hate had returned, the coldness revived, and growing as he thought of the men who were after him.

“And your family? They know about all this?”

“I had kept it a secret for a long time, until the night it all came crashing down. I left, I tried to hide, leaving and going invisible with the hopes that they would just move on. But, it doesn't work that way. They went after my family trying to get to me. They killed my brother, Emery, they destroyed my life. Now they have to pay.”

Scrambling to sit up, I nervously played with my fingers in my lap. “So, they know we're here, they can find us?”

“No not here, my parents moved away, they did everything they could to stay safe. But my brother wouldn't give up on me. Franco told me he had gone out one night to look for me, that he needed to know I was alright. They found him, they were waiting for one of us to make a mistake.”

“Oh my god, Porter, I'm so sorry.”

Shaking his head, he tilted to look up at me. “Don't be, it's not your place to be sorry. You didn't do anything wrong.”

“I know, but that's so sad. When did it happen?”

“I took off about a year ago and went into hiding. I thought that would stop all this, I thought that if I was out of the picture, they'd leave my family alone. It didn't work that way. My brother died three months ago, and it still doesn't feel real. This all feels like a bad dream, but it's not, it's my life.”

“What happened?” Holding up my hand, I said, “I'm sorry, you don't have to tell me, that was a dumb question. I'm sure it's hard to talk about.”

Pushing out his bottom lip, he shrugged his shoulder. “It's fine, I've already told you more than I had planned on. I was five when my mom met Franco. . .”

Using my hands, I turned on the bed so I could look at him as he told me his story.

He started in the beginning, about how his stepfather had been a dick, and treated him like an outcast. There was so much verbal abuse from his stepfather, it stung. I felt for him, I cried for him.

The tears rolled down my face, falling weightlessly onto the blanket and disappearing into the cotton.

How do you deal with that?

How do you keep breathing when your family hates you, and you've lost so much?

I had a new respect for this man. He was stronger than I could ever be.

Porter wasn't a man who backed down, he didn't plan on giving up.

And now he wanted to protect me.

I was lucky to have someone like him looking out for me.

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