Tonight, she’d left him watching a documentary on TV to go down to her workshop and pack some products. Ellie made it a point to make sure her orders got out for delivery quickly.
“I missed you,” Zane’s voice said huskily from behind her.
She’d heard him coming downstairs, but hadn’t expected to suddenly feel his hard body pressed against her back. She startled, nearly dropping the candles she was packing.
He stretched out his hand and caught the box expertly, setting it back on the counter.
Ellie’s heart still racing, she turned around in his arms. “You scared me,” she told him as she wrapped her arms around his neck.
“Totally unintentional,” he said remorsefully.
“I know. It’s not you. I guess I still have some involuntary reactions that I can’t control.” Ellie hated it when her rational brain didn’t connect with her body sometimes.
Zane took her hand and led her over to the media area with a sectional couch. He dropped onto the middle of it and pulled her into his lap. “Do you want to talk about it?”
No! No, I don’t.
Any time it came to really discussing her experiences during her horrific months in captivity, she preferred to pretend it never happened. Natalie never let her get away with avoiding it for long, and some of those sessions were brutally difficult, but Zane hadn’t ever pushed her.
She shook her head, but answered, “I don’t know. Sometimes I think I’m over it and moving on, but once in a while I still feel the scars inside me that haven’t quite healed. I’m not quite sure I’ll even have complete closure because he’s dead, and he died while I was still in the cabin.”
“The bastard took the coward’s way out. You never got to see him in court, and you never got to see him pay for what he did,” Zane replied angrily.
She nodded. “Exactly. It’s like he never existed. It’s weird because I was relieved he was dead, but I was angry, too.”
“It’s not weird, sweetheart. I think it’s natural to feel that way.”
Ellie sighed, knowing she’d never feel as close to anyone as she did to the man comforting her right now. She didn’t want to close him out, and she wouldn’t want it from him if he’d gone through something traumatic. “I don’t even know where to start.”
“Wherever you want,” Zane said gently. “Tell me the things that haunt you the most.”
“The fact that I didn’t get away with his laptop the day it happened. I think about what I could have done differently. Maybe I should have gotten out of the office quicker. Maybe I didn’t fight hard enough because I was hoping I could talk him down. Maybe I shouldn’t have run, and I could have pretended I didn’t know until I had the opportunity to steal his computer from him. There’s so many things I could have done differently that might have saved both me and Chloe some pain.”
Zane absently stroked his hand over her curls as he answered, “You did the best that you could under the circumstances. Any of those alternatives might have failed.”
“Possibly,” she agreed. “But I’ll never know. There was no opportunity after that to escape. I think I was unconscious during most of the drive to the cabin, so I had no idea where I was. It was disorienting, and he had me chained before my head could clear.”
“How often did he come up to the cabin? Did he leave right away?”
Ellie wished he would have left her alone. “No. He stayed that night, using every minute to try to scare me into submission. Every time I argued, he hit me. It was a really long night.”
She felt Zane’s body tense beneath hers as he asked, “Did he strip you, or did you do that yourself?”
“He used a carving knife to cut off everything I was wearing. A scare tactic, and it worked. I was afraid he was going to rape me, kill me, or both.” She took a deep breath before adding, “He took my clothing that first night. When he left the next morning, I was pretty torn up.”
“Fuck! I wish I’d suspected him earlier when I could have had him followed. By the time I went back to Rocky Springs convinced it was James, it was too late.”
“There’s no way you could have known.” Ellie stroked his cheek and whiskered jaw. “I’m just lucky you’re a genius or I’d be dead.”
“Why didn’t he leave more supplies? He only left enough for you to barely stay alive.”
Ellie shrugged. “I think he wanted me weak and barely living. He also got a kick out of me begging for more food and water. I tried not to, but while I was still semi-alert, I did. I was always thirsty, always hungry.”
“He was a sadistic prick,” Zane rumbled.
“Very sadistic,” Ellie answered sadly. “And when I begged, I gave him exactly what he wanted.”
“Don’t,” he said urgently. “Don’t ever blame yourself. Every time he hurt you, it was because he was almost pissing himself with fear because Chloe left him to go work for Gabe. Walker pulled her out of a bad situation.”
“Thank God,” Ellie replied, sounding relieved. “James never told me that. He just kept saying they were getting married soon. I felt so helpless to do anything to save her.”
“You worried about her, and she drove herself crazy trying to find you. I’ve never seen Chloe as distraught as when you disappeared. I think for a while she was in denial, believing she could find you. When she couldn’t, she was destroyed,” Zane confided.
“But we’re both happy now,” Ellie observed wistfully. “I’m not going to let an evil dead man destroy my life or Chloe’s.”