Invidious Betrayal (8 page)

She wanted to scream. She should have listened to her father. She should have…

Aria closed her eyes and shook her head. She couldn’t think about what had happened. She needed to get herself together and figure out what she was going to do now. She opened her eyes and tried to untangle her hair with her fingers. Still, she wondered as she struggled to pull her curls free of knots how much those men knew about her. Had Gail known what all they’d planned to do with her?

By the time she was finished with her hair, another half hour had passed. Aria looked over her reflection again wishing the braid she’d put in her hair had improved her appearance. It hadn’t. She glanced over her nakedness and frowned before retrieving the bed sheet from the floor where she’d left it. Aria wrapped it around her body then sighed. When she opened the bathroom door steam burst out ahead of her into the empty room.

Ian was gone.

Aria made her way to the old, yellow telephone on the nightstand. Beside it sat a pile of menus. She lifted one and read the address at the top. She was alone in Baltimore, a city she knew by name only. She had no money and no one she could call other than her parents, and there was no way she was going to call them. With the condition she was in, she would have to tell them what had happened.

Her father, the powerful Sheriff Cole, with all the precautions he had taken, even being protective to a fault, would have to come to grips with his daughter’s gang rape. Without much physical evidence,
heck I just washed most of it away,
and no way could she pick her attackers out in a lineup, she and her family would suffer gossip, and her reputation would be trampled by expensive lawyers.

Ian reeked of money and power, and of course she couldn’t count on him to be on her side, especially given Ian’s involvement. Add in the fact that she really didn’t know anything about him other than his first name. None of that mattered anyway. Ian was gone and she refused to let her family know that she’d gotten herself raped.

She had to figure things out, alone.

Aria looked at the clock. It was a little after eleven in the morning. She paced the floor as she tried to think up a plan. She would call one of her friends, someone who could loan her some money, but was also discreet enough not to ask too many questions. When she considered her options she realized that her coworker Calvin fit the bill.

“God, what a mess,” she said. Aria stopped pacing and hugged herself. The wave of hopelessness that assailed her was intense and came on so suddenly that it took her breath away. A minute ago she had things in perspective, and knew what her next move was going to be; now she cried and gasped for her next breath.

Ian turned the key in the motel door, but was unable to fully turn the knob due to the bags he carried. When the door was pulled open, he looked up and froze. Aria stood on the other side with a sheet fashioned like a sarong around her body. Her eyes were red-rimmed and tear-filled, but they were still the most beautiful brown eyes he had ever seen in his life. Eyes that even when red and swollen he could stare at forever. Only, she lowered her head, breaking the trance she had him in.

Guilt threatened to overtake his thoughts again but he couldn’t give in to it right now. He could wallow after he helped her.

She slowly backed away, allowing him to enter as she wiped her face with her hand. When he placed the bags on the small table by the window and then turned to face her, he almost fell over when she slammed into him, throwing her arms around his waist.

Ian hesitated. Her need for comfort, from him of all people, was unexpected but he wrapped his arms around her anyway.

“I thought you left me here… alone,” she said, as her arms tightened around him.

Ian closed his eyes as his chin settled on the top of her head. A shudder went through him as he brushed his jaw against the softness of her hair. “I thought you might be hungry. I also got you a few things you might need and a small first aid kit.” When she moved away from him, he felt empty, cold, but he recovered fast enough that he didn’t think she’d noticed.

He lifted one of the bags and held it out for her. She looked at him, her brows pulled together for a brief moment before she glanced at the bag. Only when he extended it further, did she take it and peek inside. After another confused glance at him, she wordlessly headed for the bathroom, her gaze back on the floor.

As she shut the door Ian turned away and sat down for a few minutes, again pondering their situation. Then he cleared the small table and began unloading the food. He started to place her drink on the table but almost dropped it off the edge when he heard the bathroom door open and looked up to see her coming towards him. Ian gripped the top of the cup to prevent it from falling and ended up crushing the lid a bit.
She is truly beautiful.
He barely managed to get control of the cup without spilling any of the drink.

Even though she was bruised and battered, he was blown away by his attraction to her. The long sleeved, dark blue high-neck zip-up was slightly larger than what she needed, but she looked amazing in it. He’d chosen a matching pair of long athletic sweats that fit better, hugging her curves as if they were made just for her. In that short time she’d used the hair brush on her waist-length tresses and had her hair pulled into a loose knot at the back of her neck. The dark shades he’d purchased were held loosely in her hand and he could see she’d used the lip balm on her still swollen lips.

“You look—” he started to say, but stopped. Telling her she looked amazing was probably not a good idea.

She looked down at herself then raised her brows, no doubt figuring what he was about to say. “I’ve looked better, but thanks I guess. Thank you. The clothes are a little big, but… yeah, thanks.”

“Are you hungry?” Ian asked as he placed the slightly bent drink cup he still held in his hand on the table. “I didn’t know what you liked, so I got a few things.” He pulled a chair away from the table to give her some space. He didn’t know how she felt about what he’d done to her, but he definitely didn’t want her to be scared of him. Before he sat in the chair that he’d moved away from the table, he placed two bottles of pain reliever within her reach. He used his lap as a table for his food and the nightstand to hold his drink.

They ate in silence, although she looked over at him several times as if she wanted to say something. After she finished her food and cleaned up her mess, she looked at him again. “Golden Boy is what they called you...but I heard them call you Ian, too. Ian is your name, right?”

He sat up in the chair and said, “It’s Ian Howl.”

“Ian Howl,” she repeated. It was almost like she was trying it out, seeing how it rolled off her tongue and heaven help him, but he liked the way his name sounded on her lips. She began in a small voice, “You didn’t have to help me, but you did—”

Ian shook his head. Cutting her off, he said, “I hurt you, and I can’t tell you how very sorry I am. I just saw you lying there”—he paused, searching for the right words—“and even though I couldn’t see your eyes, you were the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. And you were for me…” He shook his head again, knowing that
that
wasn’t what he should have said. “What we did to you was wrong and—”

“It was just sex.” She cut him off this time with her words and the loud thud her fists made when she slammed them on the table. Her voice was strained and her hands shook as she flattened them over the wobbly surface. “It was just sex, that’s all,” she whispered.

Ian stared at her for a long moment, but said nothing about her downplaying what happened. He’d had a few drinks last night, not enough to shut him down, but the alcohol combined with his carefree mood and his high from celebrating had led to poor choices.

The fact that he had engaged in sex with a woman who was clearly more out of it than he was had been testament to that. He hadn’t orchestrated the situation, but he had participated even when he felt that something might be wrong. He’d allowed himself to accept the given explanation for her condition. She’d been raped, and everyone involved needed to pay for it, including him.

Ian knew that she was in shock last night and he should have driven her straight to the hospital, but again he’d allowed his emotions to decide for him, which was odd because he had never been one to base his decisions on emotions. It almost seemed that when it came to the woman in front of him, his brain shut down and his basest of instincts were in control.

Once he’d heard her tortured voice demanding no cops or hospital involvement, he felt he had no other choice but to do as she asked, even when that meant going against the logical course of action. Why she wasn’t crying bloody murder then as well as now was an even bigger mystery, but he wouldn’t deny his role if it came to that.

Exhaling, she spoke again, and Ian couldn’t help noticing how she never glanced at him when he was looking at her, even when she was speaking. “My dad always says that fair exchange is no robbery. Getting me out of there…” she paused, as if contemplating her next words, “…yeah, so I’m going to help you. The guy in charge, Sal, he said some things you should know about. He tampered with the condom he gave you, so that your DNA would be in me when I was found.”

“Found?” Ian asked with a perplexed look on his face.

She closed her eyes for a brief moment. Ian knew that she was probably reliving what happened to her last night. After blowing out a loud breath she seemed to strengthen with a resolve he admired, as if she had forced the thoughts of her ordeal away. Her voice was stronger when she spoke. “His plan was to kill me, and once my body was discovered, the medical examiner would have found no other semen inside me but yours. They…they… all ejaculated on me and I was wiped clean throughout the night. Well, everywhere but—”

Ian’s face darkened. He’d figured they’d raped her, but to know it now for certain was like a blow to his very core. Rape was horribly wrong, let alone brutally raping a virgin. The more he thought about it the more his anger rose. He wanted them to suffer as she did.

“They were going to kill me and frame you for it.”

Ian just stared at her for several seconds, contemplating her statement.
She’s been through something very traumatic, and
she’d been drugged
.

“Don’t look at me like that.” She interrupted his train of thought. “I know what I heard. You can do what you want with that information.” She stood and walked to the other side of the room, mumbling to herself as she watched him through narrowed eyes. She kneeled on the bed and reached for the rotary phone on the nightstand. He watched her as she picked up the phone to place a call. Then her face scrunched up like she’d eaten a lemon and she hung the phone up with a curse.

“You were drugged. It’s possible you were hallucinating,” Ian wasn’t sure what had happened with the phone just then, but he wanted to get back to the craziness of her previous statements.

She looked at him blankly for a few seconds, then blinked and chuckled dryly. “Hallucinating? I suppose I was hallucinating the entire night,” she said. She wasn’t yelling, but her tone was so even and lifeless, he would have preferred to hear her shouting. “Get on with it, Golden Boy.” She’d made an attempt to mimicked Sal’s husky accent. “You remember that? How about ‘it feels so damn good when you come all over me,’ or ‘Sorry, beautiful, I got you all messy’.”

Her words sent chills down Ian’s spine. She remembered what he’d said word for word. Ian looked away, not able to stand the way her accusing eyes bore into him. Uncomfortable with her probing look, he rubbed his hand over his head. Was it so farfetched that Sal would do something like this? The man had no qualms about gang-raping a virgin. But why set him up...could he believe that?

“Did he say why?”

She shook her head. “Just that some guy named Vincent ordered it.”

Ian didn’t think he’d heard her right—“Vincent…my uncle, Vincent?”

“Uncle,” she said incredulously, “You’re related to those animals?” Her breathing picked up, coming out shallow and faster, as she backed away from the bed until she hit the far wall. Her eyes were wild again and she was shaking.

Sensing her approaching panic, Ian held his hands up. “I’m not going to hurt you. I won’t let anyone hurt you, but you need to calm down.”

She shook her head, her wide eyes imploring. “Please don’t take me back to them.”

Ian slowly moved toward her. “You’re going to pass out if you don’t calm down,” he said in what he hoped was a calming voice “I’ll be forced to get you medical care,” he warned. Her gaze met his and she didn’t look away. Her breathing was still erratic, but her eyes were becoming focused and were no longer wild. “I got you out of there. I will not allow anyone to hurt you ever again. I promise,” he continued. As he spoke her breathing slowed. “What’s your name?”

“Aria,” she muttered. “You don’t believe me. Are you going to tell him where I am? He can’t know where I am.” Her voice had become high pitched. She looked to the door, then back at him.

Ian froze—he didn’t want to make any sudden moves that might frighten her.