Page 22 of Psycho Saviors

He was silent but oddly tender as he paused to stroke my cheek, those dark eyes soft as he held my gaze for a few moments.

“Thank you.”

I almost didn’t register the words that left his mouth, his lips pulling into the faintest smile. I nodded gently, and he sighed before he began peeling off the wet bandages on my arms. I watched silently as he pulled out a first aid kit from beneath the sink and re-wrapped my injuries.

“There, that’s better,” he said, offering me a faint smile before sweeping me up into his arms.

I knew there was more he was keeping from me. Things I still wanted to know. But I was exhausted, and I knew this side of him I was seeing was a damn privilege. A side I imagined very few ever saw.

So I didn’t push, I just held onto him as he carried me out into my designated room, my body wrapped in a towel. He set me down on the bed shedding his wet pants before climbing onto it with me and resting his head on my chest.

I wasn’t sure what I’d expected, but it certainly hadn’t been this.

He wrapped his arms around me, and I stared at the inked artwork on his back and shoulders as he laid on me, the moment oddly sweet and filling me with a strange feeling.

I didn’t say a word as we laid in silence like that, feeling like I’d just gained the strange trust of a wild animal. I traced my fingers over the large skull on his back, the hollowed-out eyes on each shoulder blade, surrounded by flames and darkness.

“What was her name?” he asked as he nuzzled my chest.

“Who?” I stilled my hands on his back, frowning down at his still-wet hair. He was still covered in droplets of water, but I didn’t care right now.

“Your daughter.”

I swallowed at the question. So Julian hadn’t relayed that part then. “Lily. Her name was Lily.”

“Lily. So beautiful and pure.” He sighed heavily as his strong arms tightened around me, his weight a strange comfort on top of my lower section. “I’m sorry she was taken from you. We’ll find him, kitten, and he will pay. I promise you that.”

I let my gaze wander to the window, staring out at the cityscape in the morning sun. Would they really find that bastard? I wouldn’t put it past him, but my stomach knotted at the thought.

“Did you have a name chosen for your son?”

“I wanted to call him Xavier, but we never actually spoke about it,” he said before kissing my arm.

“Why Xavier?”

“It was the name of my best friend. He died five years ago in a shooting with the Russos. We both got shot, I just somehow survived.”

I frowned at that. Did that have anything to do with how the Russos had said he was a dead man walking? A ghost? How he’d taken a bullet for his brothers once already.

“Did you nearly die?” I asked quietly as I continued trailing my fingers over his back, finding it oddly delightful how he relaxed, his weight sinking onto me more at my touch.

“I got shot in the head. Ended up in a coma for three months. They said it was a miracle I woke up, but I was different after that.” His voice had gone low, and I moved one hand to his hair. Where had he been shot? How on earth had he survived? That was a death sentence normally.

What had happened?

He quivered at the soft touch before reaching up and grabbing my hand. I paused, allowing him to guide my hand to a scar in his hairline. The jagged, raised skin there was hidden by his hair, but I could feel it. “They said I’d never be quite right. Sometimes, I wonder if it’s why I’m so…”

“Brutal?” The word slipped out before I could think too much about it. It was the best word for how he’d been towards me, and I wasn’t about to pretend like he hadn’t made my life hell. I wanted to call him out on his behavior, for everything he’d done to me, but right now, I could also see his walls were down.

I may be a psycho in my own way, but I wasn’t going to tear someone apart just when they were letting down their shields. When he was being beyond vulnerable with me. He’d saved me, taken a bullet for me, sure, it didn’t take back the things he’d done, but it was something.

“Yes.” His tone sounded off, and I felt his jaw clenched despite the towel dividing us. I continued trailing my hand through his hair, running the other over his back.

“Tessa came into my life while I was in rehab, I met her in the hospital, she was the daughter of some rich prick who had put her into the hospital for mental help. I was trying to relearn how to be… human, I guess, and she didn’t seem to care that I was different. That I was darker, more messed up. I guess meeting in a psych hospital isn’t the way to meet, but we don’t get to choose those things.” He let out a sharp laugh before sighing. “My brothers, they did their best to try not to treat me differently, but I could see it was hard for them. My brain didn’t work the same anymore, I can’t… I’m not good with the more business side of things. I get bored, have bad thoughts,” he admitted quietly, and I stared down at him. I would never have in a million years imagined him opening up to me like this, but I found it oddly sweet. It wasn’t an excuse, just an explanation.

“And she accepted you as you were?”

“Yes. I know our relationship was toxic, but being loved despite being so messed up, it was nice. The suicidal threats to control me, I know that was wrong, I know that. But when it was good, it was great, she was fine with rough stuff and experimenting. It helped me.”