Page 104 of Ripped Veil (Ripped Bratva)

I hurl the word at her like the lash of a whip. I want to see what she’ll do. How she’ll react. If my suspicions are right or if my gut knows her better than my head does.

She flinches as though she’s been struck. Her face falls and hurt floods her eyes.

I’ve never been confronted with someone so sensitive that every reprimand is absorbed and internalized. She doesn’t even fight back. Her only method of dealing with my accusation is to turn her back on me. To walk away.

She doesn’t want me to see how deeply she’s hurt by my accusation, but she’s not great at hiding. I catch sight of the swirl of tears in her irises as she turns.

Then, like it’s all happening in slow motion, she slips. She falls downward in an eerily graceful arc. Not even fighting it. Just accepting that this is how it all ends.

Until the last moment, that is. Right before she breaks the surface of the water, she extends her hands as though she’s reaching for something.

Reaching for me.

I stand still, waiting for her to pop up. But she never makes it that far. Instead, she’s thrashing around desperately in the water, but her efforts are split in all directions. That’s when I realize: she can’t swim.

Her head bobs up for one moment. I have only long enough to register her eyes, wide with terror, before the water consumes her again.

A number of thoughts flit through my head in the seconds that follow.

Should I save her? Letting her drown would tie up a loose end. Will I be able to live with it?

I think about the dark-haired child somewhere inside the house right now. I may not know with certainty if I’m his father. But I know for sure that Elyssa is his mother.

Can I rob that baby of the only person he has in the world?

I don’t know quite what this woman means to me. She has re-entered my life as strangely and as inexplicably as she had disappeared from it a year ago.

But I do know that, whatever the bizarre connection is between us, watching her die will not resolve it.

That final thought is what sends me into motion.

I coil, spring forward, and dive into the pool, knifing through the water cleanly.

I reach her in one stroke. My arms curl around her slight frame. The moment I have a good hold on her, I kick off the bottom and carry her up towards the surface.

We burst back to the air, but she’s still struggling desperately as though she can’t trust the rescue.

“Stop,” I command. “Calm down. I’ve got you.”

My words have an immediate effect. She stops flailing and melts against me, breathing in huge, ragged gasps. Together, we kick back to the edge of the pool.

I haul her out. The moment she’s back on the deck, she splutters out water and coughs. She’s shivering badly and her clothes are clinging to her like a second skin. I try not to focus on the fact that the top she’s wearing is almost completely see-through, revealing the black bra she’s wearing underneath.

Even after she’s coughed up a significant amount of water, she stays on the deck, her body trembling uncontrollably. I walk around and squat down in front of her.

“You okay?”

She doesn’t answer. Her face is aimed down at the deck. Water drips off her in thin rivulets.

Before I can second-guess the instinct, I scoop her up into my arms and carry her into the house. It feels like she weighs nothing to all, despite her soaked clothes. She doesn’t open her eyes or resist at all.

The laundry room is empty when I walk in. Two huge washing machines loom on one side of the room and two dryers on the other.

In the middle, between the machines, is a long wooden table that the maids use for folding and organizing. I set Elyssa down on top of it, fighting the wave of nostalgia that hits me instantly.

We’ve done this before.

I saved her. Carried her to freedom. And then…

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