16. Madelyn

CHAPTER 16

Madelyn

W e fucking did it. We finally got Torres.

“Yes, yes, yes!” I cheer in my empty office, even doing a little dance in my seat.

This. This is what makes working for the FBI worth it. I might not be here for the right reasons, but there’s this insane relief that comes with knowing I helped to keep the streets of Chicago safer by putting away vermin like Torres. The man deserves to spend the rest of his life in jail, and I’m glad we finally get to make that happen.

As soon as I see the van arrive through the security cameras, I jump up from my seat to welcome them. When I step outside, though, the energy feels unusually charged. Tight expression greet me from my coworkers and I glimpse a couple of unhappy faces.

Conversation halts as soon as Dominic, Joshua, and the others walk in. And then it picks up almost immediately. A few people offer them smiles, probably out of relief that they’re okay, but the mood in the room isn’t exactly celebratory like it usually is when we catch a criminal.

“I’m happy to see you’re okay, Benson. But could you please explain what sort of mission you all went on and why the entire team wasn’t made aware of it?” Laura, a senior agent with sharp features and a shaper tongue, is the first to voice her displeasure.

She crosses her arms and fixes Joshua with a pointed stare. Our boss looks a little disheveled and there’s no missing the tightness in his expression—which, now that I look closely, Dominic seems to be mirroring. Actually, Dominic just looks pissed, which is miles away from his default blank expression. They should be happy the mission was a success. What the hell happened?

Joshua raises his hands in a placating gesture. “The reason not everyone was told about the mission was to ensure transparency and because of worry about internal informant?—”

“A spy. So what you’re saying is that you took a small team on a mission because you simply don’t trust the rest of us. You didn’t trust us to keep it under wraps,” Laura interrupts, her tone biting.

“That’s not what I’m saying,” Joshua insists, his voice steady but tired. “This was about minimizing risk. We all know how slippery Torres can be. I didn’t want to give him a chance to vanish again.”

I’m trying to focus on what they’re saying but my gaze keeps getting drawn to Dominic. He hasn’t seen me yet, considering I’m at the far back and the rest of our coworkers have formed a sort of circle around them. His face is set in stone, his dark eyes scanning the room. It’s hard to miss the tension radiating off him.

His gaze finally locks on mine and everything else fades into the background. He doesn’t say a word, doesn’t give me time to react. He just starts toward me. My lips part in surprise.

“We need to talk, Flowers,” he says brusquely, and before I can respond, his hand is around my wrist and he’s guiding me away from everyone else.

“Hey, wait a second,” I protest, but he doesn’t stop.

He’s already steering me toward my office, his grip firm but not rough. Behind us, I hear Joshua trying to calm Laura down, his voice strained but steady. Dominic doesn’t even look back until we’re inside my office.

The door closes with a quiet click. I cross my arms over my chest and narrow my eyes in his direction.

“I was in the middle of something, Dominic. I’m not your fucking puppet. You can’t just pull me away from everyone else like that,” I tell him.

“I can do whatever I want to do,” he retorts tensely.

My jaw drops. “No, you fucking can’t. Especially not when it comes to me. Let’s get one thing straight—we’re not even in a relationship. And even if we were, you don’t own me, Dominic. You don’t get to tell me what I can and can’t do.”

He stalks toward me at that. My breath catches when he invades my space, standing so close that I can see the shadows in his eyes, the barely restrained anger. But I know it’s not directed at me, and I also know he would never hurt me.

“You’re mine, Madelyn. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve been inside of you. I’ve memorized every inch of your body, so don’t give me that bullshit. Not right now,” he grits out.

I know I’m sick because instead of those words raising red flags, all they do is make my heart start to race.

“It’s nice to know you care so much, but the caveman attitude won’t cut it—especially not in front of our coworkers. Got it?” I say, refusing to back down.

His eyes flutter shut, and when they open, he seems to have gained some modicum of control.

“Okay. It won’t happen again. Now can we talk?” he asks calmly.

My brows furrow in worry. “What’s going on?”

Dominic steps away, giving me space to breathe. But I can tell he’s still rattled. It takes him a moment to speak.

“Baby, I’m going to ask you something and your gut reaction is going to be to fight me on it. You’re not going to want to tell me, but I need you to understand that this is important,” he tells me.

“I’m not making any promises,” I mutter.

His lips twitch. “Of course you wouldn’t.”

“Enough with the suspense. Just tell me what’s wrong,” I prompt.

He hesitates, and that more than anything bothers me because Dominic never hesitates.

“I know your last name isn’t Flores,” he finally starts.

I suck in a sharp breath. “What? No, you don’t,” I say in disbelief.

“Don’t freak out, Madelyn. Just listen to me, okay? I know a lot of things. I know you’ve been in witness protection with the FBI since you were twelve. I know they changed your identity. Your real name isn’t Madelyn Flores, it’s Madelyn Solis, which was your mother’s maiden name before she died. I know you had to move schools and locations three times after your mother’s death. I know Collin Benson was in charge of your mother’s case. You might not know this, but I’m pretty sure he was responsible for sponsoring your education until you graduated college. He can be annoying, strait-laced, and boring, but he’s nice like that. Joshua’s dad?—”

“Wait, wait, slow down,” I breathe, lifting a palm in the air to stop him. My head swims with all the information he’s just provided. “How? How do you know all of that?”

“I know a lot of things, baby. But there’s only one thing I don’t know, and it’s eating at me. I don’t know what happened to your mother. How did she die?”

I scoff, running a hand through my air while trying to get over the shock of this situation. “Are you fucking kidding me right now, Dominic?”

He doesn’t reply, his jaw clenched.

“I knew there had to be a reason you approached me but this… what would you even do with that information? Why do you care? Have you been using me all this time?”

“Of course not,” he snaps. “You think I could have been faking it this entire time? Do you really believe that every touch, every look, every single fucking thing we’ve had together has been a lie? Look me in the eye and say you believe that.”

My fists clench and I look away because he’s right. He might be a cold-hearted asshole at times, but he’s an asshole who cares about me.

“I don’t like talking about my mother, Dominic,” I say tiredly after a few more tense moments.

He steps forward again, standing in front of me. The scent of his cologne has a strange calming effect on me and I inhale softly, breathing him in. It’s amazing how much peace he’s able to bring me. One look into those gray eyes and my heart melts.

He slides a stray stand of hair behind my ear and I lean my cheek against his warm palm.

“I’ll protect you,” he says softly.

I stare up at him, confused. “From what?”

“From the pain.”

“How could you possibly do that?”

“I’ll make it stop hurting. I’ll take it away. Just tell me and I’ll do it. I promise, baby.”

My heart speeds up. I’ve always known that Dominic possesses a darkness I’ll probably never be able to understand. But that darkness has always called to me, tempered mine, and if that darkness could assist me in finally finding the closure I deserve, then I have every intention of depending on it.

I suck in a deep breath before the truth tumbles out of me.

“As you already know, I was twelve when she died. My mother was amazing, bright, full of light. A lot like me, actually, but in her case she was genuine about how much she loved the world and people and nature. I sometimes wonder how someone as wonderful as her ended up with someone like my father,” I say on a snarl, then I shake my head because he’s not the one we’re talking about right now. Mom is.

“The day she died, we went on a walk. It was late in the afternoon. I didn’t have school that day, and because we’d spent most of it indoors, she suggested we leave the house for a bit. My mom was awful at staying still,” I say fondly. “We lived in a small, nearly abandoned neighborhood back then. We were walking down the street when a car suddenly parked right beside us.

“Mom was confused. She tried to approach, wondering who it was and what the person wanted. Then he stepped out. A tall man wearing a skull mask, bald with blue eyes. I was so scared when I saw him. My mom was obviously concerned, but she wasn’t scared. Probably because it was broad daylight. I remember she even asked if the man was celebrating Halloween early. That was my mom, always making jokes in uncomfortable situations,” I say with a bitter smile.

“A lot like someone I like,” Dominic says softly, running his fingers over my cheek.

I feel a shiver run through me as the memories from that day assault me.

“You’re okay, Flowers. I’m right here.”

I nod once, exhaling a soft breath.

“Things took a turn pretty quickly. It all happened so fast. The man in the skull mask didn’t even speak. He just pulled a knife out of his jacket. Which is about the time my mom decided to start backing away. With each step we took backward, he took another one toward us, until eventually we were just running. She screamed as loud as she could for help. But either no one was around to help us, or they just didn’t care. He caught up to us, dragged her down to the ground and away from me, and then he stabbed her in the side.”

“He wore a skull mask?” Dominic murmurs, and I notice he’s grown tenser.

“Yes, he did.”

“Okay, keep going,” he prompts. “You’re doing great, baby.”

We’re getting to the worst parts now. The reason I have nightmares. Watching my mother get murdered was traumatizing, but what’s stuck with me more over the years was the guilt. It’s the main reason I joined the FBI. I need closure about my mom’s death. I need to find him, to ask him why he chose her, to ask him why he took her away.

“I tried to help her but he was right there and she was on the ground, and then she was telling me to run as fast as I could. And so I did. I left her alone. I ran despite her screams behind me. I heard a struggle and it was pretty clear she was doing all she could to keep him away from me. To make sure I had enough time to escape. I heard her being murdered and did nothing about it. All I did was save myself,” I say with my head bowed.

Dominic places a hand under my chin, forcing me to look up into his gray eyes.

“Hey, you were twelve, okay? You were a twelve-year-old who just wanted to survive. And you did. I’m sure your mother was happy that you survived. You saved yourself, Madelyn. And then you raised yourself. That’s inspiring. You were brave that day. You told me you were proud of me for surviving on my own, and I’m saying it back to you right now.”

Pressure grows behind my eyelids at his words. I manage a watery laugh.“Thank you,” I whisper.

“One last thing—your mom… did she have something carved onto her body at all? The bastard that killed her. Did he leave a mark in anyway?”

I shudder at that. That’s a part of the ordeal I try to repress because it makes me feel ill that whoever killed her was sick enough to mark her like that. When I find him, I’ll make him pay. I’ll unleash ten times the pain my mom felt on him.

“Yeah,” I tell Dominic. “He was a serial killer. It’s why I had to go into witness protection. My escape was a fluke. He usually didn’t leave behind any survivors. At the time, he was terrorizing the streets of Chicago and had been doing so for a couple of years. I think my mom and I were his last victims before he went underground and disappeared forever. Most people don’t even remember him anymore, and I think the FBI likes it that way—best to keep one of their biggest failures a secret. This man murdered nearly fifteen people. And he enjoyed it. It’s clear from the sick way he marks his victims. He does it on their wrists, carves a letter there to show that he was responsible.”

“S,” Dominic murmurs darkly. “The letter is S, isn’t it?”

I stare at him in shock. “How do you know about that?”

He falls frighteningly still for a couple of moments.

“Dom, are you okay?” I ask, placing a palm on his jaw.

That seems to snap him out of it. He looks at me for a moment and I see raw pain in his eyes, pain and disbelief. My heart aches at the sight.

“Dominic—”

“I have to go,” he says cutting me off. “I’m so sorry, baby. But I have to leave.” He places a kiss on my forehead. “Thank you for telling me the truth. I promise I’ll explain everything to you eventually. But for now, I just need to go. Okay?”

A part of me wishes he’d explain everything to me now, but I can see the desperation in his eyes.

“Okay,” I breathe.

He leaves, and I realize I never asked him how long he’d be gone.