Page 82 of Claimed By my Father's Enemies
He is broad through the chest and shoulders. Muscled built to perfection. Dark hair across his chest, trailing down his abs, the defined lines of muscle at his sides disappearing into his waistband.
I am breathing hard. My heart seems to want to jump out of my chest. What is he doing?
"See what he did to me," he says.
He turns around.
His back is covered in scars. Long parallel lines crossing from one side to the other. Some have flattened with the years, gone pale and smooth. Some are still raised, the skin around them slightly different in texture and tone.
I know how those scars were made.
He turns back around and I know I can’t hide from him the shock that I feel.
"Your father did that," he says.
He closes his eyes for a moment and I sense that he has gone back in time and is reliving the situation
His jaw is set. His hands hang loose at his sides. He breathes in slowly through his nose, opens his eyes and what I see underneath everything, underneath the hatred, the disdain, the controlled fury is pain. Grief. Old, specific and still unfinished.
I have no words that will make his pain go away. I turn around.
The party below carries on through the glass, indifferent. Someone at the bar is laughing, shoulders shaking. The champagne towers catch the light.
I reach behind my neck and find the bow.
My fingers work the knot loose. The velvet falls away from my back. I hold the front of the dress against my chest with both hands. I feel the air of the room cold on my skin.
And I show him.
30
WILLIAM
The tattoo covers most of her back.
Wild flowers in a watercolor of blues and purples bleeding into red, stems curving across the line of her spine, petals reaching toward her shoulders. The color is vibrant even in the low light of the room and makes her look even more sexy.
But that’s not what has my attention.
Underneath the color. Running beneath the stems and petals where the ink doesn't fully reach.
Scars.
I take a step forward. I want to touch her. I need to touch her.
The scars are mostly pale. Some are raised enough to catch the light from the window, the party glow coming through the glass while I stand behind her trying to understand what I'm looking at.
"What the fuck." Almost a breath.
I put my hands on her shoulders. My thumbs find the tops of the scars before I'm fully aware of reaching. And I turn her, slowly, because I need to see her face.
She lets me turn her.
She is holding the front of the dress to her chest with both hands. She meets my eyes and she doesn't flinch.
"The belt was his favorite punishment," She says softly with her eyes steady on mine. "I'm sorry he did that to you. I didn't know—"
By the look of her scars she was terrorized by her father for years and she is apologizing to me?
