When You Dare - Lori Foster [5]
“No, not hurt.”
Her definition of hurt differed greatly from his. With a raised brow he eyed several bruises and scrapes on her delicate skin. “Someone hit you. More than once.”
Her eyes clouded again, and her voice went gruff. “Yes, and it was the worst experience of my entire life. But I’ll be fine.”
“Are you convincing me, or yourself?”
“I will be. I promise.”
Lots of promises, Dare thought. He glanced down at his bloodied, ruined shirt, and tossed it toward an overflowing garbage container in the parking lot. Intending to find a new shirt, he reached around her for his overnight bag.
Gasping, she covered her face and scuttled back into the corner of the seat. But she almost immediately caught herself and sat up again as if in challenge.
Unwilling to press her, Dare paused. “We’re on the same side, remember?”
Pained, she closed her eyes and nodded.
Gutsy little thing, he decided. He pulled on the fresh shirt and then waited, arms crossed. If she didn’t want to pass out in the van, she’d have to hurry it up and make a decision. Already she looked on the verge of keeling over.
After swaying from what looked like a wave of dizziness, she cleared her throat. “If you could arrange for a room tonight, I’d be really, really grateful.”
“I could do that.” Her continued formality confounded him. Most women would be babbling and crying for their mommy or daddy, or maybe a husband. Did Molly have a husband, a significant other?
Avoiding his gaze, she rolled her lips in again, took a few deep breaths and then whispered, “One room please, but perhaps with two beds.” Tears welled, and she blinked them away before saying in a voice broken by fear, “God’s truth, I don’t want to be alone right now.”
NOW THAT SHE WAS safely inside a small but clean motel room, Molly tried to organize her thoughts. In order to keep from collapsing, she had to prioritize her most immediate needs, which were food, clothes, sleep, shower…
One glance down at herself, and she shuddered. Shower first, definitely. Now that she was free, she wasn’t about to spend even one more night sleeping in her own filth. And as hungry as she was, she refused to eat with such dirty hands.
Mustering her flagging courage, she turned to Dare. He was so damn big, and very gruff. Seeing him without his shirt when they were still in the parking lot should have alarmed her; even in the moonlight, she’d detected several scars over his chest, rib cage and shoulders that looked like healed knife and bullet wounds. Even now that he was dressed again, doing no more than settling into the room, he looked powerful, with noticeable strength.
But after being threatened endlessly for nine days by the most corrupt animals imaginable, Molly knew foul intent when she saw it.
Dare wasn’t foul. She had the feeling he used his incredible strength to protect, not to inflict pain. Though he hadn’t been sent for her, had no promises of payment for his efforts, he’d rescued her rather than leave her behind.
And now, whether he realized it yet or not, he was stuck with her.
She would pay him—once she got his agreement to keep her safe. “Excuse me, please, but if I could impose further…”
“Look.” The big man turned away from the twin bed where he’d set a battered leather overnight bag. “Enough with the proper bullshit. You’ve been through hell, yes?”
Blue eyes, fringed by the thickest lashes, took her measure. The pulling of his black brows drove home just how disgusting her physical state was right now.
Molly nodded. “Absolutely.” Hell times ten. Never in her wildest imagination—and as many could attest, her imagination could be pretty wild at times—had she envisioned the awful scenario she’d survived.
But she had survived it. And now she had to figure out how to proceed while still protecting herself.
“I don’t need you to be formal.” He set the bottle of water on the nightstand by her. “I don’t need you to put on a good front, either. You’re a small woman, probably not