Promise Me Light (23 page)

“Let me go, Gavin!” I screamed, watching as Cash brought his
fists up and nailed Ryder on the side of the head.

“NO!” Gavin yelled, holding me tight as I struggled against
him.

“I’m going to kill you!” Ryder roared, pushing Cash out of the
way. Rushing toward us, his deadly stare focused on his brother. “Back
away from her, Gavin!”

Roger propped his gun against the doorframe and awkwardly ran across
the room, the arthritis in his knees bothering him in the cold weather.
He grabbed Ryder by the upper arms, hauling him back to the edge of the
bed. Brody jumped into the mix, standing in front of Ryder with his
solid body.

Seeing them wrestle Ryder down made tears roll down my cheeks. It
became hard to breathe. Hard to not hurt when I saw Ryder filled with so
much pain and anger.

He fought them, his eyes swinging to me every few seconds, full of
desperation and fury. I tried to go to him but Gavin stepped in front of
me, blocking my view.

“You okay?” he asked.

I nodded, too upset to answer.

“Maddie!” Eva exclaimed, rushing to me. “Did he hurt you?
Because I swear…”

I interrupted her. “I’m fine, Eva,” I said around my tears,
watching as Janice ran into the room. I could still hear Ryder
struggling to get away, yelling at everyone to get their hands off of
him.

“You sure he didn’t hurt you?” Gavin asked, his eyes running
over my face.

“I just hit my head,” I answered, trying to see around Gavin.

“I told him if he ever hurt you, I’d kill him,” Eva said,
pivoting around. “PTSD or not.”

Before I knew what she was doing, she flew across the room.

I looked around Gavin just as she stopped in front of Ryder. Pulling
back her fist, she let it fly, punching him in the nose.

“EVA!” I screamed, watching as Ryder’s head snapped back.

“That’s for hurting my best friend,” she spit before walking
away. “Next time I’ll aim lower.”

Ryder’s attention zeroed in on me, his face paling at Eva’s
words. He didn’t try to fight as Cash and Brody held his arms.

Gavin stepped in front of me, blocking my view of Ryder. His hand
went to my waist, holding me still.

“Let me check your head,” he said. Before I could protest, he
started running a hand through my hair, checking for injuries on the
crown of my head.

“Is she hurt? Fuck! Someone tell me if she’s hurt!” Ryder
yelled. I peeked around Gavin and saw the frantic look in Ryder’s eyes
as he struggled against Brody and Cash. He became a wild man, fighting
to reach me.

“Ryder, calm down before you open those stitches back up!” his
mom scolded, not afraid of Ryder’s wrath. When her hands touched the
broken skin above his eyebrow, he stopped struggling.

Ryder’s eyes never left mine as he moved his mother’s hands away
carefully. He started to take a step toward me but Cash stopped him,
holding him back.

“Maddie, talk to me,” Ryder said, his hands dropping to his
sides.

“Come on,” Gavin muttered, taking my arm and pulling me toward
the door. “He’s too unpredictable.”

“No!” I cried, trying to escape Gavin’s hold.

“Don’t touch her!” Ryder roared, struggling against Cash and
Brody.

“Let me go, Gavin!” I shrieked, trying to pull my arm away from
his firm hold.

“No, stay away from him!” Gavin yelled. “He’s screwed up! You
can’t be around him until he’s right in the head!”

I yanked my arm away, tired of Gavin’s hands on me. Tired of this
life. Of being separated from Ryder. Tired of what this war was doing to
us.

I turned, my long hair flying through the air. Rushing across the
room, I pushed past Janice and shoved past Brody and Cash. I needed to
be beside Ryder. I had to let him know that I was okay. That we would be
okay.

As soon as I was in front of him, I wrapped my arms around his neck.
Rising on my tiptoes, I buried my face against his chest. He was hot,
burning against my cheek. His chest rose and fell, breathing hard. I
could feel his heartbeat beneath my ear, a quick thumping that matched
my own.

Ryder went deathly still, the fight leaving him. All the tension in
his body evaporated as my body pressed against his.

“Let me go. Just let me go,” he said hoarsely, begging the men to
release him.

Slowly, making sure he wouldn’t make any sudden moves, Cash and
Brody let Ryder go, still ready to pounce on him if they needed to.

They didn’t.

Ryder’s arms wrapped around me, holding me like I might break.

“What happened?” he muttered against my hair, rubbing a hand down
my back.

I shook my head, refusing to tell him. Tears ran down my cheeks. He
was hurting. I wanted to take away his pain. I wanted to make it mine so
he didn’t have to deal with it.

“You okay, Maddie?” Cash asked, standing a few feet away.

I nodded against Ryder’s chest, refusing to move.

“Why don’t you sleep somewhere else tonight so Ryder can rest,”
Janice said behind me.

“No,” I muttered against his chest at the same time he said no. I
heard Janice sigh with resignation. I didn’t care what any of them
thought; I wasn’t leaving him.

A minute later, I heard the bedroom door close. We were alone.

Pulling away so that he could see my face, Ryder looked down at me.
“What happened?”

I shook my head, avoiding his eyes.
I can’t do
this. I can’t hurt him more. If he knows he scared me, it will kill
him.

“Maddie, talk to me,” he repeated, his hand going beneath my hair
to cup my nape.

I took a deep breath. Just like always, I couldn’t resist him.

“You were having a nightmare…”

“Yeah, I remember,” he said when I paused. “The terrorists were
beating me and I was trying to escape. But it was only a…” He
stopped, frowning. “What did I do? Eva said I hurt you.”

“You thought I was one of them.”

“Oh, shit!” he swore, letting go of me to plunge both of his
hands through his hair. Turning away, he started pacing back and forth
in the small bedroom, looking like a caged animal.

“Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!” he spit.

I flinched, tears in my eyes. I didn’t want him to hurt. I hated to
see him suffer.

He paced, wearing a path on the hardwood floor. We were standing in
his childhood bedroom, the place where we used to play. The place where
we told secrets and laughed as kids. Where we made dreams and talked
about the future. Now here we were, not laughing. Not talking about the
future. Just falling apart together.

Abruptly Ryder stopped, towering over me in the darkness. Through the
moonlight, I could see the tautness in his body and the firm set of his
jaw.

“Did I hurt you? The baby?” he asked, his voice scratchy.
Fragmented.

“No.”

“Then why was Gavin checking your head? He was touching you. His
damn hands were in your hair, like they belonged there,” he said,
taking a step toward me.

I looked away, biting my lower lip with nervousness. Worry made it
hard to answer and hard to breathe.

“Oh, shit! I
did
hurt you, didn’t I? Eva
was right.”

Despair crossed his face. His hands went back into his hair, his
knuckles white as they grasped fistfuls of the light brown strands.
Suddenly, he let go of his hair and took two swift steps until he was in
front of me, inches away.

“I’m sorry, Maddie. God, I’m so sorry,” he said, looking at
me with bleak eyes. “You’re the one person I never wanted to hurt.
The one person that means the most to me.”

“Ryder, I’m
okaaay
.”

“If I ever hurt you…” his voice trailed off. Spreading his
legs, he gathered me close to him. His arms enclosed around me, his
hands cradling my head.

For what seemed like eternity, he just held me. Time ticked away.
Everything disappeared. The war, his nightmares, my worries - they
vanished. It was just the two of us. Best friends. Two people still
believing in love, still believing in friendship. I would do anything
for him; he would do anything for me. He held me like I was his only
lifeline. His only link to the present, his only link to the past. His
only hope. My only future.

Finally, his voice rumbled against me, breaking the silence. “Every
day, I sat in that hellhole, beaten and barely holding on. Watching
people die around me. But when I closed my eyes, there was only you,
Maddie. You made me survive. They couldn’t break me. They tried. Hell,
they tried so damn hard, but they couldn’t take the memory of you away
from me.”

His hands moved to my neck, his thumbs brushing against my skin. His
eyes followed the movement, watching me under the moonlight.

“Thoughts of you are what carried me home. I had to see and touch
you one more time. I survived because of you. I’m here because of you.
It’s always been because of you.”

Leaning down, his lips captured mine with tenderness that made me
want to cry. His hands moved to cradle my face as he placed small kisses
in the corner of my mouth, taking his time.

“I asked God for one more time with you. I begged for another
second beside you. Another night inside of you,” he said, brushing a
thumb across my lower lip. Lifting his head, he watched as my tongue
darted out to taste the salt left behind from his skin.

“But I don’t want to hurt you, Maddie. I’m broken. I always
have been. My own mother didn’t want me. You need to stay away. For
your own safety.” His eyes looked deep into mine, his next words so
low I almost didn’t hear them.

“Leave me. Run as fast as you can.”

“Never,” I whispered. “I’m not running unless it’s to you.”

Ryder’s nightmares continued. Sometimes, he just struggled in bed,
fighting invisible forces. Other times, he screamed at them, begging
them not to hurt him. I sat by his side through it all, refusing to
leave. Refusing to be scared. I held him when he woke up, sweating and
shaking. I cried when I saw the terror in his eyes.

But I never gave up on him.

When Ryder seemed better, we all moved to his house, even Janice and
Roger. It was safer, more secure that way. We were further back on the
property, hidden from the main road.

I remembered the numerous times I had spent in his home. We were just
two friends having a good time. Wanting each other secretly and doing
nothing about it. Now there was nothing secret about it.

Ryder’s arm slid around my waist, pulling me closer to him. My back
was flush against his chest, my body fitting to his perfectly. From
behind me, he lowered the collar of my shirt down, placing his lips on
my bare shoulder. A tingle went through me, making me wiggle against
him. His lips traveled up the back of my neck, pushing my hair out of
the way to reach the spot behind my ear. When his hand reached beneath
my shirt, I arched into him. My bottom pressed into his crotch, finding
him hard.

I closed my eyes as his lips discovered every inch of my neck. He ran
his hand over my stomach and up toward my breasts. It had almost reached
its destination when someone knocked loudly on the closed bedroom
door.

We both froze.

The person knocked again, louder this time.

“Are y’all going to sleep all day and let us do all the work
around here or are you two gonna get up?” Brody’s voice shouted from
the other side of the door.

“Hell,” Ryder muttered against my skin, sending a shiver through
me. “We really need the house to ourselves. Maybe for a few days or a
week?”

He was right. It was crowded and loud. But there was an unspoken
agreement between all of us; we didn’t separate. We stuck together. We
survived together. We leaned on each other and protected each other. We
had been doing it for months and we wouldn’t stop now despite the
crowded living quarters.

Everyone had bedded down in the living room, sharing the heat from
the fireplace. Ryder insisted that the two of us stay in his room. Over
the last few nights, we had kept each other warm. And tired.

Brody knocked again, growing impatient.

Ryder growled with fake rage and rubbed his whiskered chin against
the soft skin of my shoulder, making me giggle and try to wiggle away.
He kept me close, refusing to let me go.

“I had
big
plans for the other parts of the
house,” he said, pushing up to lean over me. His hands went to the bed
on either side of my body, keeping me pinned in beneath him.

For the millionth time in my life, I was spellbound. In awe.
Mesmerized. This man - a hard, sometimes angry, dangerous,
fight-to-the-death man loved me.
Me.
His best
friend. A man who women swooned over. A man who grown men feared. A man
that had the bluest eyes, the most rugged, good-looking face and body
that I had ever seen. He. Loved. Me.

He wasn’t perfect. He had a past to get over. A mother that
didn’t want him. Believing he never belonged. Thinking he could never
be good enough for me. Fighting. Drinking. Screwing around. He was
tainted but I loved him anyway. It was easier to do than he thought.

Reaching out, I ran a hand over the coarse whiskers that had grown on
his jaw over the last few days. I loved the feeling of roughness against
my fingers. It reminded me of us; roughness against softness.

“Don’t we have some unfinished business to take care of?
Something that started in your apartment bathroom?” he asked in a
deep, husky voice that I felt in every fiber of my being.
How did he do that?

“I think we took care of that a few times,” I said, my own voice
sounding sexy.
I have a great morning voice. All sexy
and full of desire. Or maybe it’s because I’m thirsty
… But
I liked to think it was the first one.

Ryder leaned down, his mouth going to my neck as his hand disappeared
beneath my shirt again, running lightly over my abdomen.