It’s impossible not to overhear Carmen’s conversation with Izzy. The dormitories on Guardian HQ proper aren’t meant for long-term occupancy. They’re temporary lodging given to new hires until they arrange permanent living quarters. In this, we mirror military operations.
While most military families get a month of temporary lodging on base when they move to a new duty station, we’re a bit more lenient with the time limit. In addition to new hires, the quarters operate much like a hotel for contractors working at Guardian HQ on a temporary basis. All that’s to say, the quarters are sufficient, but limited in space, and the walls are thin.
I give Carmen the privacy she needs, but there’s no way not to overhear every horrible word. My heart breaks knowing she grew up bearing such an incredible burden.
Revenge a decade in the making?
Inconceivable.
When Izzy leaves us to find the others and bring them here, I hold a very frantic Carmen in my arms. Her flight or fight instincts kick in, and my girl is choosing flight.
That’s not happening.
Up close, her light fragrance floods my senses and penetrates deep into my mind—the primitive part of my brain. Ignoring that rush of sensation isn’t easy.
It’s downright impossible.
“I never should’ve left. I’ve made a mess of things.” Carmen stops resisting and places her palm flat against my midsection. She leans in, laying the side of her face against my chest.
Her entire body shakes, which makes me want to wrap my arms around her even more, as if my embrace can protect her from the pain of her past, not to mention the ongoing nightmare she lives with daily.
She leans into me, fingers clutching the fabric of my shirt, as she repeats that phrase over and over, slipping in and out of Spanish with each breath.
“Shh…” I wrap an arm around her, tugging her close. She smells amazing and fits perfectly in my arms. “We’re going to figure this out.”
“How?” She tips her head back to look at me. “You don’t understand.”
“I know more than you realize.”
“The last thing Lucinda said to me was to tell no one about our plan because there was no one I could trust.”
“You can trust me. You can trust everyone here.”
“I’ve made a horrible mistake.” She pushes against me, and while I don’t want her out of my arms, against my better judgment, I release her.
“You haven’t made a mistake.” The need to touch her overcomes me. “Do you believe in fate?”
“I don’t know what I believe anymore.”
“You were put here for a reason. Have faith this is where you’re meant to be. I can help you.”
She doesn’t resist my touch. Doesn’t yank out of my grip. If anything, Carmen folds into me, seeking solace. Taking a deep breath in, she tries not to cry, but when her eyes close, tears fall.
“You smell good.” With her hand against my chest, her fingers slowly brush against the soft cotton of my shirt.
“You smell even better.” My eyes close as I breathe her in, letting her light scent infuse every pore and sink into every cell of my body. It’s as if she’s part of me.
“I doubt that.” She burrows a little deeper into my embrace.
Silence passes between us. It’s one of those elongated pauses in conversation that normally feels awkward, but for us, it feels just right.
“I couldn’t help overhear your conversation with Izzy.” I thread my fingers through the length of her hair. Silky smooth, the strands slip through my rough and calloused fingers. I pause, uncertain how to express what I feel.
“You must think me a monster.” She gives a little sniff and pulls away.
This time, I don’t release her. Instead, I pull her closer, unwilling to let her out of my arms.
“Not at all…”
“After what I said? About doing nothing while…”
“To me, it sounds as if your father is the monster. Not you. Your childhood was horrible.” Once again lost for words, it’s hard to articulate what I feel. “It was much different than mine.”
“Tell me about your childhood.” Her palm presses against my chest, right over the pounding of my heart.
“My childhood?”
“Yes?”
“Now?”
“Please.”
An odd request, but I sense this is her way of taking a step back. “It was carefree.” Does it mean something that she wants to know more about me? “Two loving parents. Lots of friends.”
“I bet you were a wild child.” Her gaze lifts to linger on my face, then dips to my muscular build.
“I could be insufferable, but mostly I was a good kid.” I can’t help but laugh. The change in conversation feels good, like we need a bit of levity to wash away the horrors of her past. I keep my tone light. “When I was ten, I was in Little League, proving to the world I was the hottest thing since sliced bread.”
“I bet the girls liked you.”
“Girls were a nuisance. They barely deserved to be noticed and were kind of gross.”
“Gross?” A tiny bit of laughter escapes her.
“Back then, I was small for my age. As for keeping secrets, at ten, I couldn’t keep one if my life depended on it. I made so many mistakes.”
A shadow passes over her delicate features when I mention keeping secrets at ten. I should know better and grimace with the poor choice of words.
“I don’t believe you.” She presses a lacquered nail in the middle of my chest, poking me. There’s a lilt in her voice, but I sense the desperation in her tone to keep this upbeat. Because of that, I play along.
“Oh, it was baaad.”
“How bad could it have been?” Lighter in tone, her expression lifts. Some of the shadow recedes.
“I blabbed to get attention, lost friends in the process. Spilled their secrets to gain myself new friends. I didn’t care about the ones I lost. I hurt the new friends too, with stupid lies meant to lift me up and push them down. I repeated the whole cycle far too many times. I’m not proud of that. It took me a long time to grow up and see how hurtful I was to others.”
“I don’t believe it. I imagine you differently.”
“Believe it. I blabbed my way through childhood and the majority of my awkward preteen years. Not my best decade. I’m much better at keeping secrets now.”
“I would hope so.” She lifts her hand to my face, and I lean in toward her touch. Her delicate fingers trace the hard line of my jaw. “I see you protecting the other kids and making the girls giggle.”
“At ten, my biggest concern was what to put on top of my pizza after a game. It sure as shit wasn’t keeping a secret like you did, protecting anyone, or having anything to do with girls. They were Girl-gross.”
“That’s funny.” Her smile returns, lifted up by the story of my youth. “We were dealing with very different things when we were ten.”
“I hate that for you. I didn’t have to worry about my father killing my mother.” My words make her flinch. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say it like that. That was incredibly insensitive.”
And dumb.
I want to smack myself in the head for being such an insensitive prick. Not the best way to make an impression.
“No need to be sorry. We grew up in very different worlds.”
It boggles the mind. For all her privilege, Carmen’s life has not been easy. She kept a life and death secret at ten while I was busy being a Grade-A jerk.
“Our worlds were very different.” I take her hand in mine and run the thick pad of my thumb over her knuckles. “Sadly, I didn’t get any better as I got older. I was a gangly and awkward preteen, with arms and legs growing faster than the rest of my body. My brain struggled to keep up with the changes in my body. Seventh grade, I was just starting to take note of girls my age, but I was still a total jerk.”
“Did the girls start noticing you? How old were you in seventh grade?”
“Twelve.”
It doesn’t escape my notice that when Carmen was twelve, she learned what men did to little girls; how they bought and sold them at will.
“I’m trying to imagine you as a kid, but all I see is the man you are today.” She pulls back for a minute. Her gaze takes me in and there’s genuine appreciation in her expression. Perhaps, dare I hope, interest? “I wonder what those girls would say about you now. I bet they didn’t think you were a jerk.”
“Trust me, they did. When I turned thirteen, my life reached a major turning point. Sadly, it wasn’t an improvement.”
“How so?”
“I suddenly realized those bothersome girls weren’t as annoying as I once thought. They smelled good. Looked pretty. Their eyes sparkled. The new curves on their bodies brought my dick to life and put wild fantasies and other things in my head.”
“Oh my Lord, you were precocious—and direct.”
My dick comment definitely stirs a reaction. I take a mental note to tone down my language. There’s no reason to scare her off.
“More like a precocious prick. The most important thing in my life at thirteen was how to get close to the girls so I could feel their boobs and brag about it to my friends. All I cared about was figuring out how to kiss a girl.”
“I wish I had known you as a boy.”
“If you had, there’s no way you’d let me touch you now.” It’s not escaped my notice how she snuggles into my embrace. Nor does she pull away when I point it out.
Carmen’s light touch makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end and wakes up other parts of my body. My dick twitches, stirring for the first time in far too long.
“You give good hugs.” She lays her cheek against my chest. “I know I don’t know you very well, but I feel safe when you hold me. I feel like I’ve somehow known you my entire life.” She looks up at me. “Is that weird?”
“I don’t think so.” Truthfully, I feel the same, and I’m not sure what to make of it.
I’m deeply religious, more so than I let the other guys see. My relationship with God is between me and the Almighty. With that said, I know what people say about soulmates. Not that Carmen is mine, or that I’m hers, but it feels like I’ve known her longer than the span of a few days.
“I was never around boys growing up.” Her voice turns wistful. “Never had the youthful experience of getting fondled like that.”
“I hope not. Otherwise, I’d have to track down the losers who groped you and…”
“No need to hunt anyone down. I lived a very sheltered life.”
“I bet you were breaking hearts left and right. You’re absolutely stunning.”
“To break hearts, I would’ve needed to be around boys.”
“How is it possible you weren’t?”
“It was simply the way it was. I knew boys existed, but none ever came to the house. My interactions were confined to seeing boys at Mass on Saturdays. That environment didn’t encourage things like groping and kissing. Although, when I turned fifteen, it was abundantly clear the boys were interested in me. If it wasn’t my father scaring them away, Lucinda kept the boys away from me. I was excited for my Quinceañera. That’s when a girl becomes a woman and can start to date. Unfortunately, there wasn’t a single boy who asked me out. Lucinda disappeared and my father actively discouraged boys from approaching his daughter.” When she says disappeared there’s a hitch in her voice. “I bet all the girls flocked to you when you were fifteen.” The quick shift in topic back to me is telling.
“Guilty as charged. My voice deepened. My body shot up in height. Testosterone kicked in. My muscles bulked up and those spindly arms and legs turned strong and powerful. I went from being small for my age to freakishly huge. The chicks definitely noticed when I grew hair on my face and pubes popped up in my groin. My dick grew and had a mind of its own.”
“I can’t imagine you ever having spindly arms, and how did the girls know about hair on your pubes? Did you flash them?”
She draws a laugh from me with the way she pronounces pubes. It’s obviously not a familiar word.
“Naw, but word got around. It took several years for me to grow into my body, but I did.”
“I still would’ve liked to have known you then.”
“Lord no! I was such a mess. Testosterone raged through my body and only two things mattered: the next girl I was going to fuck and which asshole needed to be taught a lesson. I kissed all the girls and told everyone how far they went. I definitely brought tears to pretty faces. Too self-absorbed to realize why such a thing might hurt, I didn’t care about anyone but me. I went from jerk to a self-absorbed prick.”
“You’re too hard on yourself.” Her head cants to the side.
“There’s no excuse for the way I acted. I have a lot to make up for.”
“Why were you teaching assholes lessons?” She’s absolutely adorable, savagely beautiful, and for now, wrapped securely in my arms. It’s nice holding her close.
Feels right.
“If I wasn’t kissing a girl, I was out during lunch period meting out justice to whatever random bully decided to pick on my friends. I was always the biggest kid in class and made it my personal mission to protect those weaker than myself. I’m also a bit of a closet nerd, which meant all my classes were with the nerdy kids. They got me on a level the jocks never understood, but as nerds, they attracted the attention of the bullies.”
“You’re a born protector. Despite the rest, you had a kind heart.”
“Don’t know if it was kindness, but it pissed me off when bullies abused my friends because they were nerdy, or geeky. And you’re right, although I didn’t see it at the time. I wasn’t a total ass. I stood up for those who couldn’t stand up for themselves. Inserted myself right into that conversation with my fists. Didn’t matter if it was wrong or right.”
“If they were hurting others, and none of the adults were stepping in, you probably made a huge difference in the lives of those kids. I couldn’t imagine how horrible it must be to feel unsafe at school.”
I blink, not sure I hear her right. She can’t imagine feeling unsafe?
From the time she was ten, her every breath was unsafe. Instead of pointing that out, I continue telling her about my childhood. She seems to enjoy listening to me. Not to mention, it feels good to share bits and pieces of my past.
“I don’t know about protecting others, but it made me feel good; like I was doing right in the world. I was bigger, badder, and scrappier than my peers, and I wasn’t afraid to take a hit. Detention meant nothing other than a spike in my reputation. That came with a whole new host of sexy girls to kiss, fondle, and fuck.”
“Sounds like your extracurricular activities were extensive.” The way she emphasizes the last word brings a grin to my face.
“I was just trying to figure out life and have fun. I kissed all the girls, fucked those who would let me, defended my nerdy friends when needed, and taught the bullies a lesson about picking on my friends.” I suck in a breath with the memories flooding my mind.
“Go on.” She gently encourages me to continue.
“I was nothing like you.”
“How’s that?”
“I wasn’t mature enough to bury the deepest secret of my life and pretend like it never happened. I didn’t have to live knowing atrocities were being committed within my own home. I can’t even wrap my head around the personal strength that had to take. You astound me.”
“Me?” Her resilience, perseverance, and faith shake me to the core. “I’m barely holding it together. I’m a mess.”
“You’re a beautiful mess.”
“You’re just saying that to get in my pants.”
I huff a laugh, not sure why it’s funny when she uses colloquialisms in her speech.
“Not touching that comment with a ten-foot pole.” No way in hell am I telling her exactly how much I want to get in her pants.
“You have a filthy mind.”
“You have no idea, but you astound me.” My awe of Carmen Angelo grows each day.
“Flattery?” That comment brings laughter to her lips. What a pretty and delicate sound. I could listen to her laugh all day long.
“You don’t see what I see.” And that’s the honest truth. “I hate that you grew up in such a horrible place and that you witnessed such horrible things.”
Despite my natural inclination to protect, I can’t go back in time to save the little girl she once was. The helplessness she endured guts me. It kills me that men will kidnap and enslave those weaker than themselves, abusing and using them for pleasure. The inhumanity of it never fails to leave me enraged.
If I could, I’d kill every one of the bastards. The problem is finding the dark places where the fuckers hide.