Page 114 of Painted Scars
The rest flows into the escape. Mace kicks Burt in the face before lifting me into his arms and carrying me to my desk to get my things, piling them on my stomach.
“You’re never coming back here, Glitter Bomb,” he grunts, hauling ass out of there, climbing down the stairs two at a time like I don’t weigh a thing.
I twist the finger in my grip. “This is epilogue material right here.”
Yeah, I’m high. Shock hasn’t landed yet. Adrenaline’s still in the driver’s seat. The vicious bitch in me is clapping like she’s front row at a dark romance book signing. If only the pain didn’t kick my ass.
“Fuck!” Daddy’s back, snatching it from me and tossing it down the sewer. “Hope the rats like meat medium rare.”
I splutter out a laugh. It’s all I can do to stop from breaking apart in his arms.
“You must really love me.” The words come out light and teasing, because the glitter is fading, the dull colors are muting me, and I’m on the verge of a breakdown.
He didn’t just come out of the shadows for me, he stepped into the Romans’ crosshairs for the second time. Put a target on his back. This isn’t a flirty drive-by rescue with benefits anymore. This is war, and he just openly declared it in my name. Which, in Book Girlie terms, means I’m the luckiest heroine in a dark romance… or the next tragic plot twist.
“I don’t cut off fingers for just anyone, Glitter Bomb.” He says it low and reverent, his version ofI’m Yours.
A shaky laugh escapes me as he lowers me to my feet to get his bike ready. “And here I thought I’d have to get my dismemberment fantasy somewhere else.”
“Guess I’m a full-service book boyfriend, Glitter Bomb.” His banter keeps me upright for another few seconds before the post-adrenaline crash hits.
Daddy inserts the key and turns the ignition on, pulls the clutch lever and presses the starter lever. While it warms, he fits me into his spare helmet, while I lose the battle with the shakes, rattling the thing. Daddy feels it, wraps his arms tightly around me, says something I can’t make out over the motor, then gets us both settled onto his bike.
He pushes the motorcycle hard on the back roads I don’t recognize. My mind zones out to everything but the cold chewing through my clothes, the rattling in my bones, and my body locked to his like he’s the only thing preventing me from tipping into traffic.
He watches the mirrors repeatedly for anyone tailing us. At one stage, I check too, out of paranoia. No dark sedans pursuing us, just dark streets with minimal lamps and traffic. We drive out of the city center to the commercial outskirts, where warehouses and factories keep the Shadow Lake economy alive.
Daddy pulls up to an abandoned building with a brick exterior, cracked asphalt, rust bleeding from corrugated metal pipes, warped sheets of tin for windows, graffiti spray paint, and torn barbed wire fences the same rusty color as the blood I wipe from my wound. Exactly the kind of building a GPS forgets exists, where Mace hides or operates one of the safehouses he mentioned.
My knees give up on me when I slide off the bike, and he carries me to a side door, unlocking a heavy padlock and chains, giving us entry. He leans me against a wall while he opens three deadbolts and cracks open a steel door. He ushers me in, locks the place back up and carries me upstairs.
His loft isn’t much to look at—concrete walls, mismatched furniture, the faint scent of coffee, and a mattress that barelylooks slept in. A place lived in, but not a home. One corner is a workshop with a steel table, an oven of sorts, and a rack of strange tools. Perhaps the glass-blowing furnace where he makes my ornaments.
A single industrial window stares at the city in the distance. Boats toot their horns in the harbor as they dock or leave. Waves of the port lap in the distance. I flinch at every noise. Pipes ticking, radiator popping, wind rustling the tin roof and the window seals.
“Where are we?” I ask as he lifts me and carries me through the center.
“My place,” he replies. “It’s not safe at your house tonight. Maybe ever.”
He steers me into a makeshift bathroom, where he sets me down on the closed toilet seat. The old faucet creaks as he twists it. Water gurgles out, and the pipes groan and shudder. He tests the temperature with the back of his hand.
“Does this mean we’re moving in together?” My joking smile falters, and I drop my face into my bloody palms.
Daddy sets the wet cloth on his sink and crouches in front of me, his knees bracketing mine, fingers prying my hands free. His touch is soft yet shaking just as much as I am. He’s taming the urge to kill.
“Not unless you want to,” he says, voice sanded down. “Look at me, baby.”
I do. He’s gravity in a world that teeters off balance.
He presses a warm, wet face cloth to my forehead and dabs at my wound like I’m as fragile as porcelain. Hell, I am. The heat seeps into my skin, and I hiss and wince. His thumb brushes my jaw, warmer than the cloth, each swipe burning away my brittle hold on reality.
“You’re safe now,” he reminds me. “You don’t need to worry about going back to that office ever again.”
I nod once, jerky.
Crescent bruises scream on my arm. Compulsion assumes control, and I scrub at them to erase any sign of him from me. They won’t come off as easily as the blood, and I drag my nails over them, grazing my skin. They’ll haunt me for days, reminders of what almost went down if it weren’t for Mace. I don’t cry even though I want to. Burt will not win.
“Hey, stop.” Grumpy Daddy clasps both wrists and pries them apart. “Let me clean you up, and I’ll get you in my shirt and sweater. It’s the only thing stopping me from punching a wall.”
