Page 29 of Traitorous Lies
Monique shrugged and didn't answer, but he wasn't letting that slide.
So far, he’d been working hard not to push her, fighting against his instincts to find out all her demons so he could slay them one by one. But not any longer. She’d opened the door by apologizing for something she hadn't done wrong, and he was going to walk through it.
Barge through it if necessary.
“Tell me,” he said, firmly but gently.
Ever so slowly, her gaze crept back to his, tears shimmering in her gray eyes. He could feel her resistance, but he also sensed a desire to share her pain, allowing someone else to shoulder it with her.
“I'm here for you, princess. This is a safe place. No judgement.” From what little she’d said, he could put the pieces together and come up with a vague idea of what she’d been through, but he wanted—needed—to hear it from her. Even if listening to the words cut him up inside.
“When I was fourteen, I was abducted from my school,” she began, her voice taking on that faraway tone that told him she was reliving this while speaking the words. “It was a kidnapping for ransom. One of the teachers had a gambling problem, was in deep with several loan sharks, and thought I’d be an easy target since I was introverted and didn't have a lot of friends. He kept me for three days before my dad paid the ransom, and he let me go. Since I knew who had taken me, I told the cops, and he was arrested. I don’t know why he didn't do a better job of hiding his identity. He got sloppy, and it led to his downfall.”
The story all sounded so neat and tidy, but her words from earlier, telling him she’d sold her body, told him that a lot more had happened in those three days than she was letting on.
Reaching out, Jax scooped up the sleeping fox and set it inMonique’s lap. The little creature stirred but quickly settled, and he gathered them both and put them on his lap, circling his arms around Monique, trying to create a bubble of safety for her.
Giving her time to get herself together, he didn't push, just smoothed his palm the length of her spine, offering her comfort and he hoped strength. Not because Monique didn't have strength in spades, but because every now and then, everybody needed a little boost.
“There was another girl. He didn't mean to take her. She was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Saw him shoving me in the back of his car. He didn't have a choice. Had to take her or she’d tell. She was younger than me by a couple of years and so scared. He said she was expendable, not worth anything because she was a scholarship student and didn't come from a family with money, but she was a human being,thatmade her worth something. It’s not money that gives us worth. When he got the money, he was going to kill her and let me go, but I begged and pleaded, and in the end, he asked what I was willing to pay to secure her life.”
Monique didn't have to say what she’d paid for the other girl’s life with.
Her own body.
Raped when she was only fourteen.
“When I got home, my dad and grandparents wanted me to act like it never even happened. They said I was alive, and dwelling on what I’d gone through wouldn't be productive. Any time I cried or had a panic attack, they acted like I was being unreasonable. So over time, I learned to bury my feelings, let them out only when I was in private.”
Trauma on top of trauma.
By not letting her deal with her ordeal and getting her help, they’d only compounded things. Things like that never just went away, and you didn't just get over them, especially when you were only fourteen years old.
“That night, when we were run off the road, I thought it was because of me. That they were taking me for ransom, and you were going to be collateral damage.” Tilting her head up she met his gaze squarely. It was still swimming with tears but so far she’d held them in. “I don’t think this was a ransom abduction.”
The urge to tell her everything was on the tip of his tongue, but instead, Jax just shook his head. “I don’t believe it was.”
“And I don’t think it was because of me, was it? These were your enemies. You said sorry to me in the car after the crash. Everything is blurry, but I remember that.”
“My enemies,” he agreed, offering her what truths he could without piling on more pain when she was already so emotionally vulnerable.
“The weather is getting colder. Soon it’s going to be too cold for us to survive even with the fire, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“And we’re still lost.”
“Still lost.”
Shifting the sleeping fox back to the ground, Monique shifted until she was facing him, her hands framing his face. “I don’t think we’re going to survive.”
“I’m going to do everything?—”
She cut off his words by crushing her mouth to his. “I know you’ll do your best, and I don’t blame you,” she whispered against his lips. “But if we’re going to die out here, I don’t want it to be without having made love to you. Please don’t say no this time.”
November 4th
6:40 P.M.
