Arrested: A Salvation Society Novel by Nicola Rose & Salvation Society

Author:Nicola Rose & Salvation Society [Rose, Nicola]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Wild Thorns Press
Published: 2022-01-08T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Grace

Present…

‘What do you want right now, Grace?’ His words ricochet around my head, teleporting me back in time.

With a mischievous smirk, I answer him the same way I did back then. “Treat me like one of your whores.”

His gaze snaps up, startling me with its venom. “Wrong fucking answer.” He swipes his desk, sending a stack of papers to the floor. “You’ve learned nothing in all this time?”

“It’s just a joke! Trying to lighten the mood,” I croak around the alarm in my throat.

He kicks his desk and storms from one end of the room to the other and back again, fists pumping at his sides. “Do you know how hard I’ve worked to control this rage? Five minutes in town and you’ve transported me right back.”

He punches a filing cabinet.

He yells.

Then he turns to glare at me, but it’s not malice, it’s sorrow. Such oppressive heartache, painful to witness. He suddenly looks exactly the same as the broken boy from ten years ago.

“I see you, Kane Walker,” I whisper, tears in my eyes.

He flinches at the words that mean so much to us. “No, you don’t. There was a time, that brief moment, when I thought you did. But when the shit hit the fan, you saw me just the same as everyone else.”

A single tear tracks down my cheek. This is victim blaming! I’m the one hurt, not him.

“Did you never stop to think that I might be angry with you?” He stares at his red knuckles. He knows this is warped bullshit or he’d continue meeting my gaze. “That maybe, the way you ran, the way you never even tried to talk to me about it, might have hurt me? I thought you were different, I thought you understood me, that you saw beneath the asshole charade to the real me. I thought you might help me become a better person.” He snorts, glancing around the room and tapping his badge. “I guess you still did, in the end.”

I take the bait, ready for the fight that should have happened a decade ago. “You can’t have honestly expected anything else from me but dismissal?”

“I’m not a princess, Kane.” He pins me with the full ferocity of his attention, mimicking words I once spoke. My vision blurs with more tears. Head swinging from side to side, I silently will him not to say the rest. Not to repeat those words that have played on a loop through my mind ever since. Words I just spilled moments ago as if they were a joke, trying to reclaim them under the guise of fun. He forges on. “Everyone treats me like one, but I don’t want that from you. Don’t treat me that way. Treat me like one of your whores.”

The floor tilts.

I asked him for it.

I knew what a monster he was, and I literally asked him to treat me the same way he did with all the rest.

My hands tremble.

He curses under his breath. “That was low, I’m sorry.

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