Page 57 of Triggered By Love
She shook her head and glanced up at him, blinking back the tears. “No, it’s your turn to share.”
“Me?” He was the strong, stable one—well, maybe not while she had her mouth around his cock, but he was on an even keel.
“Yes, tell me about your mother.”
And just like that, she landed a bullseye on his heart.
His muscles tensed, and his first reaction was to push her off and escape. But somehow, with Avery, her gentle, no-nonsense tone lured him to hold her tighter.
“Jase?” Avery’s voice cracked through his gloom. “What was she like?”
He lay back on the bed, pulling her on top of him. She was so beautiful and lovely, her honey-blond hair cascading over him, and her blushing face, still damp with tears, lowered to cuddle next to his, cheek to cheek.
“She shouldn’t have died.” He heard the croak in his voice. “I didn’t get there in time.”
“What happened?”
He liked that about her. Other women would have said something along the lines of it wasn’t your fault, or I’m sure there was nothing you could do, even if they didn’t know the details.
It was because they didn’t really want to know the pain he held. Just wanted to gloss over it and get on with the romance or whatever agenda they’d had with him—hot sex, likely.
“You don’t want to know.” Okay, now he was being ornery, or was he testing her?
“I can sense pain and guilt,” she said. Her voice was flat and completely nonjudgmental. “How long ago?”
That was an easy question and didn’t give anything away.
“Fifteen years. When I was sixteen.”
“Was it an accident?”
Oh, she was a persistent one. Probably made a great investigator.
“No.”
“Was she sick?”
“No.” He was getting tired of twenty questions. Might as well drop the boom. “My father beat her, and she died of internal bleeding. She was waiting for me to come home, but I took extra hours that evening at Gino’s because one of the waiters called in sick.”
She hugged him tighter. “What happened to your dad?”
“Convicted and rotting in prison where he should be.” He liked that she didn’t go into the platitudes, the false reassurances that did no good.
“You couldn’t have known she was waiting for you,” she observed.
“She always waited up for me. Wanted to hear a joke from Gino. But that night, when I got home, she was unconscious. Head injury and internal bleeding. She died on the way to the hospital. If I had been there earlier, I could have stopped him cold.”
“You would have stopped it then, but not the next time your dad beat her.”
“I should have killed him.” Jason’s muscles bunched up as his fists clenched. He turned on his side, facing the wall, dislodging Avery. He wanted to curl up and crush these violent feelings into his shell.
Instead, Avery’s arms and legs enveloped him from behind, spooning him, and now, she was comforting him, stroking his arms and nuzzling him with her face.
“You’re not a killer,” she declared. “You’re a protector.”
“I’ve asked myself over and over. If I had to choose between them, there’s no choice. My mom was worth so much more than him.”
“I know how you feel,” she said, surprising him. “Brando’s life was worth so much more than mine. He was the hero, the guy who rescued others, who was so good and loving. He would have saved more if he had lived.”
