Jude's Salvation: This Love Series (9 page)

After falling asleep in my arms, I laid her down on the pillow and watched her.
I have considered going to her father and asking to continue my services when she returns to Boston but that will only raise his suspicions. Mr. Daniels isn’t the kind of man that likes to be told what to do. I have made that mistake in the past when I told him to have the threat extinguished. I could do it or someone on his team could do it but he turned angry at the suggestion, telling me it wasn't that simple and I should stay out of it if I knew what was good for me. Well sorry Daniels but if you can't take care of your daughter then I will. I have no intention of letting this threat to her life continue. While she is here in my care, I can continue wrapping up my obligations here in Paris and as soon as she boards that flight back to Los Angeles I will be right behind her.

I don't really know what to tell her yet about our future. I'll have to keep my distance because her father would have my head if he saw me with her and killing her father is unfortunately not an option if I want to stay in Eden’s life. How do I tell her that we can't go out in public together, that I can't meet her parents or her friends? I know Daniels has implanted a few spies in her close group to guard her. Lex may have too for that matter. Thankfully none of them joined her on this trip. I already had the three of them checked out and they all appear to be legit close friends of hers.

I'll have to just pray she likes the secrecy and the mystery, because I plan on visiting her at night. I'll explain that I have a contract position in New York, so I have commitments during the day but I'll hide away with her in her apartment each night, leaving by dawn. I’m not too concerned about her guards, I know how they work.

Just the thought of her warm body against mine at night makes me happy, for the first time in my life there is someone that needs me, wants me and maybe if I'm lucky may even love me. All my darkness and scars won’t matter to her. She makes all that disappear. I am selfish, I know this. I should walk away from her, let her live a white picket fence life, have babies and go to dinner parties but I won't. She is mine. We are meant to be together. There is a darkness in her, she has buried her scars. She has somehow been able to forget but I know it's there and so does her father. Whoever is after her knows this too. I will find them and bring them to justice, my form of justice.

Watching her sleep is the most precious thing in the world to me. I would die if I couldn't be near her, listening to her breathing. All I need is her breath and I will stop at nothing to protect it.

Her father must be concerned with more than her life. He has greed in his eyes. He stands to lose a lot of money if he folds, but why did he take her in the first place and why did his wife allow it?

When I heard Eden cry out before the gun was fired I had thought they killed Eden too. The silence after the shots rang out through the building nearly broke me. I was numb as I witnessed her body being carried out with her mothers. I had held in my tears, not wanting to show them to my uncle but I was hurting and not just from Lex’s stabbing threat to stay away from her the night before.

Byron had to drag me away from that warehouse. I didn’t have a weapon at the time, they took them from us when we entered the property gates. I would have been shot myself if I tried to intervene in Lex’s personal business. I tried to rationalize with myself, to gain control of my emotions, something I’ve never had to do before. If Eden lived then I had to as well. I would live the rest of my days making up for this.

If she had been shot she might still survive if her father really did take her like Byron told me he did. Finding her again was the only thing that kept me from attacking them all once I had my gun back.

My beautiful Eden had been destined for a life of abuse, pain and torment. I tried to convince myself that if she died she would have been saved from it all. Being Lex’s captive was not a good life and she would have been his to own if her father hadn’t taken her that day.

Byron had told me not to get attached to the prisoners, they will come and go from your life but her, Eden, I was deeply attached to her and died a little when they took her away from me.
I still don’t know
why Daniels showed up to take her. He must have made some kind of deal with Lex. It infuriated me when I found her and he hadn’t changed her name. He moved his entire family across the country but he never hid her identity. If I found her then so could Lex unless of course he’s known all along where she is.

She stirs and I go to her. She has nightmares that she doesn't understand but she will. I haven't told her that she has been crying out in the night and she never mentions her dreams in the morning. When I hold her against my chest she always falls into a deep, peaceful sleep.

I looked up memory suppressing medications on the web but couldn’t find anything so I called a psychologist that I knew in New York last night after she fell asleep. I asked him about the drugs, needing to know more about her type of amnesia. I asked him if he knew anything about these drugs or the type of non-excitability Daniels was talking about. He told me that her memories could come back in the blink of an eye, especially if she was put in another traumatic event or under any stressful situation. As far as the medications were concerned, he has never had any experience with them. He believes in helping patients overcome tragic events, return their brain functions and memories so that they can work through it and carry on with a successful life. He also said that a person could only suppress a memory that blocks so many years of their life for so long. It has no choice but to come back eventually, but that being said there are a lot amnesia patients that never have their memories restored but those ones are usually from severe head trauma.

I have to believe that her mind will demand her to remember. I need to be there for her when these memories do come back. No one else will understand, least of all Mr. Daniels. I still don’t trust his motives or his actions. He must be protecting himself somehow, using her as a shield.

I can hear her whimpering louder now. Sometimes she calls for her mother and it breaks my heart. I know what it feels like to lose everyone you had no matter what they did to you. My parents had put their dedication to their empire ahead of me, having me sent off to train away from home at twelve. I appreciate being able to defend myself and protect Eden now but at the time I wanted to play sports and study like my friends were. It was difficult to have to leave them, to give up my youth and my innocence.

My father and my uncle have been involved in the export business for years. They have built up a small dynasty here in Europe and with clients in America. Most of their dealings are not in London. I guess I was groomed for the family business but I never signed on for the exporting of humans or the torture of innocents. My father told me repeatedly he is not involved in that and knows nothing about it. His business with Lexter Lewis was about money and Byron shouldn’t have been there if he was holding innocent hostages.

My father’s illegal affairs start and stop in banks and board rooms. It's all white collar crimes and based on the accumulation of money. I grew up in luxury, the best schools, expensive cars, suites and dream vacations. I had everything except someone that truly loved me for me. I used to think that was lame, I could have any woman I wanted and I went through a number of them but no one looked at me the way Eden did then or the way she does now. Like I am her world, her dream, like she can't live without me. She looks at me like she knows me. I suppose a part of me would like it if she remembered me from six years ago, but I don't want her to know the truth, not about me.

When I met her I was in the middle of my training. The mental training part of my job and she was held hostage at a warehouse in New York. Her mother, Marisa had smuggled funds from the wrong people and they wanted payback. She said she didn't have the money and I believed her but my uncle’s business associate didn't. I remember telling him not to let Lex hurt a woman and her kid.

"Why is the kid here? Why didn't you leave her at the house?" I shouted when Lex finally made his appearance at the warehouse, feeling angry I vented.

“
You will have to excuse my nephew, he’s new to the business. I’ll take him out and we’ll meet later to discuss my proposal,” Byron had tried to excuse my outburst to Lex. I was fuming. Lex just smiled and looked from my uncle to me.

“
This is a good lesson for the boy. This woman is not an innocent. She is a traitor. She has bitten the hand that feeds her. She needs to be taught a lesson. Her beautiful daughter is here to witness what happens to betrayers so she will not follow in her mother’s footsteps,” Lex had explained in a calm, steady voice, as though it was completely understandable. As though his actions were justified. I guess in his demented head they were. I knew I couldn’t fight him. He was surrounded by his well armed bodyguards and I was weaponless. I just nodded and walked out of the room.

I went to see Eden when Lex and Byron went into their closed door meeting. Eden had looked up at me with cold, vacant eyes. She was in shock already. Her mother had been interrogated and then placed in a separate cell. She was only fifteen and her fear of me was evident in her stare. I took it upon myself to try and ease her discomfort, at least as much as I could while we were there. I gave her water when she refused to eat the food I brought her. Brushing her long curly hair back into a ponytail, I wiped her silent tears from her cheeks.

“
You are going to get through this Eden,” I told her, trying to believe it myself. I think she began to trust me over the next few days I was there with her. Byron insisted I leave her at night. We were staying at a hotel close by until the deal between Lex and Byron was completed. They were waiting on a package to be delivered before either one would come to an agreement on a dollar amount. This part of the business I understood.

I hated the fact that Eden couldn’t leave with me. Laying in that hotel room, I looked up at the ceiling and thought of her. I wanted her to sleep in this bed with me. I have never wanted to just hold a girl before and feel her breath on my chest but that is what I wanted with her. Something about her eyes and the way she looked at me stirred a strong desire in me to protect her. It killed me that she was in that cold empty warehouse at night with no one to protect her from Lex or his disgusting guards.

On the second day I went to see her she actually smiled when she saw me coming to her with food again. I have never seen anything as beautiful as her smile. I swore I would take care of her forever, if she could just survive this.
We didn’t speak to each other as I looked her over quickly for any injuries. I saw more bruises on her legs but I didn’t ask her what happened. I wouldn’t be able to control my anger if I heard they hurt her during the night. It was probably best she didn’t tell me. I know Lex would have had me killed if I tried anything and that would leave Eden completely alone.

Byron had told me about her mother. Marisa was a seller for one of New York’s biggest cocaine dealers, Lexter Lewis. He made a fortune off her and a number of other high priced call girls that also sold to their rich, international customers that came into the city. Marisa was beautiful. I was only nineteen at the time but this woman, in her mid thirties had the most seductive lips, exotic eyes and hips that begged to be grabbed. I knew my uncle had her a few times. He liked to brag about how he was her favorite and she demanded to see him every time he came to New York. I laughed, even I knew she no doubt said that to all of them.

When Eden rested her head on my lap I couldn’t resist touching her. I ran my fingers through her silky hair and pictured her a few years older. If she made it out of this alive she was going to look like her mother. I didn’t know then just how right I was.

She is her mother's daughter, absolutely stunning. Her eyes sparkled in the sun which her mothers didn't but otherwise they were the same. She had her hips, her lips and even though she wasn't trained in the seduction of men she knew how to smile in a come hither way. She knew how to walk with a tilt at her waist that made her ass wiggle. The woman drove me wild and I can't resist her charms. I won't let another man have her ever again. I want to ruin her for all other men. I want to be the one she thinks of when she needs a release. I want to be the one she calls for in the night, just past midnight, to touch her and make her scream.

I shake the memories from my head. I can’t think about the days that followed without feeling my anger return. My rage at what they did to her during the night still boils in my veins. My anger isn’t only at them but at myself. I didn’t save her and it eats away at me every time I look into her eyes. She’ll hate me as much as she’ll hate them when she remembers.

"Good morning beautiful girl, how did you sleep?" I ask her as she rolls over and looks up at me with a grin.

"Are you watching me sleep?" she asks, her hand resting on my bare abs.

"Yes," I tell her honestly. I need to be honest with her, at least about everything I can be. The other lies will come clean later, much later.

“
You are perfect,” she moans, then moves closer to me. My heart races, I love this girl.

“
Eden, I am merely basking in your perfect morning glow,” I tell her with a grin, kissing her forehead, breathing in her scent. Even after a full nights sleep she smells delicious. I run my fingers through her hair and kiss her full lips. She doesn’t kiss me back and I’m worried. I pull back and look into her eyes. She smiles but looks like she’s blushing.