Chapter 6

Chapter

Six

April 13 th

6:53 A.M.

Axe had never been so glad for a headache in his life.

He strongly suspected that if it hadn't been for the explosion giving Beth the scare she needed to finally speak up and admit what she needed, he would have lost her forever.

Over the last few weeks, he'd felt her slipping further and further away from him.

Every time he looked at her, he could tell she was near her breaking point, and once she reached it she was going to ask to leave, get Eagle to set her up somewhere else, and make sure he didn't know where.

So many times it had been on the tip of his tongue to tell her everything. Her horrific childhood, how her uncle had sold her to notorious Russian trafficker Leonid Baranov, that the man had treated her like a pet, keeping her locked in a cage when he wasn't playing with her. The man had been intrigued by his inability to break Beth, who was already well-trained in surviving abuse since it had been her life since birth.

To tell her everything about their time together, how they'd been friends first and then she'd fallen in love with him. How he'd loved her from the beginning but given her what she needed at the time. About their wedding there on the grounds one magical Christmas Eve night, the fairy lights the guys had strung up around the trees, the way the moon had been shining brightly amidst a myriad of stars while they said their vows, but then after soft snowflakes had begun to tumble down.

The only reason he'd hung back was the doctor's orders that it would be too much for Beth to handle to learn everything about her tragic life in one go.

Although, if Axe was being honest, the only person he had to blame was himself.

He knew Beth, not some doctor. He should have known that she was strong enough to survive it. Strong enough to survive anything.

It had been his own fear of losing her once she learned how he had promised to always keep her safe and failed so spectacularly.

Now he'd lost almost a year with his beloved and adored wife, and if it hadn't been for his head injury—the headache now more an annoying background ache than anything else—he would have lost her forever.

"I'm sorry, wisp," he whispered as he leaned down and touched a kiss to his sleeping wife's forehead.

Feeling strong enough for the first time since he'd woken up a few days ago to get out of bed on his own, Axe carefully maneuvered out from under the covers, doing his best not to disturb Beth.

Learning that she had stayed by his side the entire time he was in a coma had surprised him at first. With the way things had been between them, the tension and distance, he wouldn't have blamed her for seeing his accident as a way out.

Instead, it had drawn her back to him.

Still a little unsteady on his feet, he headed down the stairs and into the kitchen. His wife had spent the last two weeks doing nothing but worry about him and be there beside him, taking care of his every need. From the weight she had lost and the dark smudges under her eyes, it was plain to see she hadn't been taking care of herself, and when he was feeling better, he was going to have a talk with his team. If he couldn't be there for his wife, he needed to know that someone else was doing the job. Doing it the same way he would. Things had changed, and his friends all had partners now, but he still needed to know that Beth would be okay if anything happened to him. That she wouldn't be alone. That his team would have her back.

And having her back meant forcing her to take care of herself if she wouldn't do it herself.

Finding the ingredients for waffles, he went to work making them. He'd just set the last of the batter into the waffle maker when he heard shuffled footsteps behind him.

"You shouldn't be up by yourself," Beth said, voice husky from sleep. The first real sleep she'd gotten in … months … since before she'd been kidnapped, and even then she never slept a lot, usually not more than a couple of hours a night.

"You were sleeping peacefully for the first time in far too long, I wasn't going to wake you."

Beth's harrumph sounded so much like the woman he had known before she was taken from him and returned with amnesia, that he spun around to look at her. Drinking in the sight of her, all sleep-rumpled, brown locks with natural gold highlights all tangled and messy around her face, her cheeks were perfectly pinked, and she looked far too good dressed in nothing but one of his old T-shirts.

Instinct had him walking toward her, and it wasn't until he'd hooked an arm around her waist and pulled her up against him, her hands lifting to rest against his pecs, that he realized what he was doing.

But when he looked down at Beth, ready to offer apologies for acting without thinking, he found hunger in her eyes as she looked up at him.

Desire.

More than that, love.

Knowing she wasn't ready for more than a soft kiss, he dipped his head and whispered his lips across hers. Something inside him settled at the contact, brief though it had been, and when Beth sighed and snuggled against him, Axe knew everything was going to work itself out.

"Distracting me with kisses won't work. You shouldn't be up by yourself," Beth said, her warm breath tickling his bare skin.

"What about distracting you with waffles?"

"Waffles?" Her head lifted, and interest filled her brown eyes. Eyes he finally saw his Beth in again. She wasn't all back yet, but she was within his grasp, and he was going to reach out to her, grab hold, and pull her back.

"Your favorite," he said, unsure if she remembered that or not. Not that it mattered, he was done holding back. It wasn't like he was going to sit her down and tell her every detail of the horrors she had survived, but she wanted to learn about herself, and he wasn't going to deny her.

Never again.

When she opened her mouth, he cut off whatever she was going to say with a kiss. "You better not tell me again I shouldn't be up on my own. I'm fine. Perfectly capable of walking downstairs and cooking breakfast for my wife." Damn, it felt good to call Beth his wife again and actually feel like it meant something.

Nudging her toward the table, Axe went to the fridge, grabbed some strawberries and cut them up, then grabbed the ice cream and carried everything over to the table where Beth was watching him, a thoughtful expression on her face.

Setting everything down, he took the seat beside her. "Ask me anything."

"Huh?" Beth put two waffles on her plate, added a few pieces of strawberry and a scoop of ice cream, and took a bite. Her eyes closed, and a moan of delight fell from her lips. "Mmm, so good."

Smiling, he reached over and caught a drip of ice cream rolling down her chin. "Whatever you want to know, ask me and I'll tell you."

Her thoughtful expression returned, and she took another bite as though thinking about what she wanted to ask. Given she knew nothing more than little flashes of her childhood, there must have been a million things running through her head.

"How did you find out waffles were my favorite? I don't have a lot of memories, but from what I know of my family, I can't imagine we sat around on a Sunday morning and had waffles for breakfast."

"When I first brought you home you were so tiny, so thin, nothing more than skin and bones. I wanted to get some meat on you, so I started making a list of every single thing I could think of making for you." That list included everything from mashed potatoes to lobster, macaroni and cheese, and cookies. With each thing he tried, he noted whether she liked, disliked, or loved it. He made sure to cook everything she loved for her as often as possible, anything to coax out her barely existent appetite.

"How many things were on your list?"

"Had to be a couple of hundred."

Her eyes widened. "A couple of hundred? Must have taken you forever to work through that list."

Reaching out, he covered one of her hands with his. "I didn't care. I loved taking care of you, knew you'd never had that, and it was my honor to look after you and make sure you were okay. As soon as I learned how much you loved waffles, I made them for you as often as I could."

Beth's smile was shy, but there was no hesitation in it. "You took good care of me. The best. I don't have to remember to know that. I'm … lucky to have you, Axel. I'm sorry?—"

Touching a finger to her lips, he cut off her apology. "You handled a horrific situation the best way you could. I'm the one who should be sorry, I'm the one who?—"

A small finger touched his lips, and he smiled against it. "If I can't apologize, you can't either," Beth told him.

Pressing a kiss to the pad of her finger, he took her hand and laced their fingers together. "We can't go back and do it over, but from now on out we're open and honest with one another. No secrets, no hiding, we're a couple, we handle this mess together."

"Together," Beth echoed. Her gaze grew troubled. "Axel, I'm scared. You were almost killed, Leonid Baranov is still a threat to us."

Fear—no, blinding terror—filled him, and he grabbed her and dragged her over into his lap. "I will not let him touch you again."

"But you can't?—"

"I can and I will make you that promise. No one is ever taking you from me again."

Whatever it took, he was protecting his wife. Losing her again was not an option.

April 15 th

12:13 P.M.

Everything felt so perfect.

That kind of perfect you got right before a storm hit.

Beth was no longer afraid that Axel was going to die or be lost to her forever. Although she hadn't had any more memory flashes since he woke up, she had learned so much about herself and her relationship with her husband that she didn't care that she hadn't experienced them herself. Learning about who she was and the kind of marriage they had shared from Axel's point of view was almost better than seeing it from her own.

It gave her insight that she could never otherwise have gotten, and it cemented in her mind just how much she was loved.

How could she ever have doubted this man who was standing in his kitchen— their kitchen—making lunch for the two of them? It was so obvious that he loved her more than anything. It was in each gentle touch, each soft look, the way he couldn't wait to get back on his feet for no other reason than he wanted to take care of her because no one else in her life ever had.

He was perfect.

No other way to describe her husband.

Despite every horrific thing she had lived through, Beth knew she was lucky to have come out the other side and found love, peace, stability, and a future with Axel.

So easily her life could have ended any number of ways. Her family could have taken things too far with their abuse and killed her, or they could have gotten tired of her and decided to end her life rather than sell her. Only four people had survived Leonid Baranov and his many houses of horror. If Axel and his team hadn't found her, she knew she wouldn't have either, but that they had arrived while she was still alive and gotten her out was a miracle in itself.

Lucky.

Call her crazy—as she was sure many would given what had happened to her in her twenty-four years—but she felt lucky. Lucky to be alive, lucky to have fallen in love, lucky to be able to live her life any way she chose.

But how long could that luck last?

Each special moment here with her husband, amazing as they were, was tarnished by the knowledge that neither she nor Axel nor anyone else on Bravo Team was truly safe.

Leonid Baranov didn't like to lose.

Already he had killed one of the other four survivors, and killed the daughter of another, seemingly abducting her as well. And he'd tried to get Beth back once and almost killed Axel and his team at that warehouse.

They weren't safe, none of them were, not until Baranov was dead.

Pushing away the darkness before it could curl around her, Beth got up from the table where Axel had insisted she sit while he made them both lunch.

"I'll grab the drinks," she announced.

"I can get them," Axel said, looking over his shoulder from where he was making two bowls of nachos.

"I know you can, but I can, too. And tonight, I'm cooking dinner for you." She huffed.

Sweet as her husband's desire to take care of her was, and happy as she was that he was recovering well and had already regained a lot of his strength, she wasn't a baby who needed someone to do everything for her, and she wasn't sure how much longer she could sit back and let Axel treat her as such. It was only because she knew it was helping him to feel like he could finally take care of her again that she'd acquiesced this long.

After choosing apple juice for both of them, she poured two glasses, set them on the table, and then stared at the carton.

True to his word, Axel had answered honestly every single question she had asked over the last few days. Mostly they were things about her, and about their lives together. Beth wasn't quite ready yet to confront her time as Baranov's prisoner and what Axel knew about it. She'd get there, but just from the evil she sensed when her younger self had been bought and put into that limo, she knew she wasn't ready for it yet.

"How did I learn to read?" she asked as she set the apple juice carton back into the fridge. "I know my family didn't send me to school. I was there to cook, clean, do the laundry, be the punching bag, and a toy for when the men were bored. Yet even though I don't remember anything after I was sold, I know how to read. Did you teach me?" That had been her best guess, although she had wondered if it had been Andy's nanny and former teacher, Mrs. Pfeffer, who had taught her.

"When you first came here you were traumatized, withdrawn. You didn't get hysterical very often, but you would just pull away from everyone and lock yourself inside your head. I knew it was your coping mechanism. Back then, I didn't know much about your past, only that you told me you had no one for me and my team to call and that your family had sold you to Baranov. It was enough to know that where you came from was just as bad as where I'd rescued you. I wanted to help, I didn't like you being locked away inside your head because it was the only safe place. I was selfish. I wanted to be your safe place. So, I started reading to you. Everything. Alice in Wonderland, Winnie the Pooh, Lord of the Rings. It didn't matter, I just wanted to give you something else to think about."

Warmth flushed through her. This man never ceased to amaze her. On the outside, he was every bit the alpha protector, but inside he was so sweet and tender that it made her eyes sting and her heart swell.

"You weren't selfish." Walking over, she pressed herself against him and wrapped her arms around his waist, relishing the comfort his presence gave her. "You were everything I needed. Everything I will ever need."

Lips touched the top of her head. "I think it was about a month after we brought you home that you told me you didn't know how to read but wanted to learn. Once I knew you'd never been to school, I wanted to teach you everything, not just reading. So, when my team wasn't out somewhere, we did our own school together. Reading, writing, math, science, geography, and history. We learned it all and you just soaked it up."

Nuzzling closer, she touched a kiss to his neck, then tilted her head up so she could brush her lips against his jaw. "See? Not selfish. The most amazing man. My man."

The smile he beamed down on her was pure love. "My woman. "

"My heart."

Something flashed through his eyes, and she wondered if she'd said something they used to say to one another. "My life," he whispered.

"I love you, Axel. I know I don't remember anything, but I swear I remember how much I love you and how much you love me."

"No apologies, remember," he teased, eyes soft. "Those memories will come, wisp. I believe it, keep believing it, too."

Withdrawing from the security of his embrace, she let him stick the first bowl of nachos into the microwave to heat while she picked up the bag of cheese to return it to the fridge. "I do believe it, Axel. I'm just scared. Not of remembering you and our lives together, I want those memories back so bad. But the rest … that's terrifying."

"Of course it is. What happened to you was horrific. It's completely normal, it would be weird if you weren't worried about it. Honey, I'm terrified for you to get those memories back."

Startled, Beth turned just as she opened the fridge door. "You are?"

Whatever answer he gave was lost when the cheese missed the shelf and tumbled to the floor. As it landed the bag opened, and pieces of shredded cheese spilled across the wooden floorboards.

Along with them came a memory.

Beth shrunk back into the metal cage she was locked into as the door to the basement was thrown open.

It was him.

It was always him.

No one else came down here.

She ate only if he decided to visit her that day.

With a metal collar around her neck, attached with a metal chain to the door of her cage, there wasn't really anywhere for her to go.

His footsteps sounded harsh on the cold concrete floor, fitting since the man was cold and harsh.

Violent.

Terrifying.

Worse even than her family had been.

He stopped in front of her cage, a handful of scraps in his hand. Beth hated that her mouth salivated at the sight, and against her will, her starving body edged closer to the food .

Grinning at her, he threw the food onto the floor, some landing inside her cage, the rest outside it where he would taunt her with doing things she didn't want to do to get to eat it.

With hunger too strong to ignore, she moved forward, scrambling to scoop up whatever he'd thrown down, not caring what it was, not caring she ate it off the floor with her hands like an animal.

In this place she was an animal.

"You keep surviving," the man said in pleasant surprise as though he liked the idea that he hadn't broken her yet, that she was a challenge. It wasn't the first time he'd said it to her, and she never knew what he wanted her to say in return.

Survival had been her entire life.

Of course she knew how to do it.

If she didn't, she would have been dead a long time ago.

When he reached down to unlock her cage and open the door, there was nowhere for her to go. The rusty collar dug into the bloody wounds circling her neck as she was pulled forward by the chain.

"Present," he ordered.

Weeks or months or years or however long she'd been here of training had her shuffling on her knees to turn so she was facing away from him. Lowering her head, she rested her forearms and forehead on the unforgiving concrete and left her bottom up in the air.

His hands gripped her hips painfully tight, and as he shoved his way inside her he leaned in to whisper in her ear. "One day I'll break you."