Page 37 of Unlocking Ruin

He rises, ready to block or catch me.

I swing, my nail raking his bottom lip, leaving a thin red line. He grabs my wrist, and I scream—wild and feral—my voice tearing through the room until my throat is raw and my lungs are on fire, but adrenaline keeps me going.

The door swings open, and massive hands grab my waist, lifting my feet off the floor.

“Don’t touch her!” he shouts. “Leave us.”

He yanks me back to him, twisting me, caging my hands behind my back.

My thrashing and yelling become so intense that he’s unable to hold me, so he wedges me between himself and the mattress. I expect his retaliation; his bottom lip is already a little swollen from my claw mark.

Instead, I feel his hands wrap around me.

Is he hugging me?

Each inhale feels like acid on my raw throat.

“Shh. I’ve got you.”

I scream again and again, until my shouts turn into cries, pleads, begs, and then just tears over how fucked up my life is.

He pulls me closer and then turns me so that he’s holding me against his chest.

The twisted truth is that no one has ever hugged me, held me, or cared. Not once in my entire life.

I rebel against the action. Continue to kick and thrash. I hate it, the overwhelming sense that someone is here for me.

It’s all I ever wanted. That’s why I hacked for Frank and my mom. I wanted one single hug from her. One memory where she looked at me with pride, not like I was a nuisance.

It’s what I fear the most: that someone will love me, only to turn out like my mom and leave me behind.

I stop thrashing and freeze in his hold. “Let. Go. Of. Me.” Each syllable shatters like glass.

His eyes show sadness as he relents. “When was the last time someone caught you, Rylan?” he asks as he slides off the mattress and stands at the edge of the bed.

Never.

Tears stream down my face as I stand with my chin raised. My hands collide with his chest, slipping down the fabric of his shirt. I shove him. Hard. Again and again. My gaze roams over his muscular body, lingering on those powerful arms that attempt to hug me.

Slowly, he opens his arms as I continue to shove at him. “You can hug me,” he murmurs in a gentle tone that feels like an ocean wave caressing me.

“Excuse me?” My hands clench his shirt as I snarl.

“Hug me,” he repeats. “I don’t want to be your cure, Rylan. I want to be your support.”

I recoil as though I’d touched a hot stove. “Fuck you.”

With arms still spread wide, he shrugs. “The offer still stands. When you need me, I’m here. You want to hug me? Hug. You want to fight, hit, and scream? Do it.”

“How saintly of you.” My backward step causes me to stumble onto the mattress.

He drops his hands, yet his fingers remain spread and full of hope. “I’m sorry you’re tangled up in this web, Rylan. I wish I could free you, but to be honest, even if I could, I fear I wouldn’t be able to.”

Blinking away the tears, I watch as he licks the cut on his lip, not in fury but rather in joy that he got a taste of my claws marking him. “Why?” I ask.

“Because someone is always going to be after you now,” he replies with a deep look of regret.

“You truly captured me to protect me, didn’t you?”