Therefore, and acting completely on instinct, I unclicked my seatbelt, crossed to him, and sat on his lap. He stiffened, his razor eyes cutting to mine, laced with a fevered fury and severe warning. I ignored them.

Instead I encircled him with my arms, threading my fingers and nails into the hair at the nape of his neck, and whispered in his ear, “I love you, Martin. I love you.”

He grew rigid for a split second, but then he embraced me. Really, he crushed me to him with his powerful arms and his forehead fell to my shoulder. We sat like that for several minutes—me gently scratching the back of his head and placing soft kisses everywhere I could, given my limited range of motion, and him holding onto me like a life raft. I silently rejoiced when I perceived the inflexibility wane, ease, relax, and his breathing grow normal, less measured.

He broke the silence with a growled, “I hate him.”

“I can see why.” I wanted to add that hating his father was counterproductive, as it gave his father all the power. But I didn’t. I figured we’d have plenty of time in the future for me to help Martin deal with his poorly controlled rage where his father was concerned.

“He sent Patrice.” He said this against my neck, his voice a broken whisper.

“On Wednesday morning? When I was in your room?”

“No. When I was fourteen. He sent her…to me.”

My eyes narrowed with confusion and I stared at the side of his head. “I don’t understand. What do you mean he sent her to you?”

I felt Martin gather a deep breath before he lifted his face from where it had been sheltered in my neck. He avoided my eyes, opting instead to stare at the cabin’s ceiling and rest the back of his head against the headrest.

“After my mother died, I moved in with my father. I’d never…I’d never spent time with him before, but I’d always thought of him as a way to escape my mother’s manipulations. During the first year he ignored me. Then something changed when I was fourteen. Everything was a test, all of our interactions were mind-games and I was always failing, and he always let me know how much of a disappointment I was. I wanted to prove myself to him. I thought I could earn his respect.”

Martin’s eyes darted to mine and he gave me a wan smile shaded with bitterness as he continued. “I was so fucking stupid, naïve. I thought no one could be worse than my mother, and I’d worshiped my father. But I was wrong.”

I studied him, thought about what it must have been like for him as a shy, beautiful boy to be at the whim of a fame-seeking mother, then thrust upon his unfeeling, manipulative father. I’d been allowed to hide in closets. He had not. My heart broke for him.

As well, his earlier statement, about his father sending Patrice to him nagged at me, filled my stomach with dread.

I prompted gently, “What did you mean, your father sent Patrice to you when you were fourteen?”

He heaved a sigh. “When I was fourteen she climbed into my bed. She was naked. I was asleep. She put my hands on her body and kissed me, touched me…” He said this like the words were sour and swallowed. “I woke up and realized what was happening, so I pushed her out of the bed and my room. The next morning I went to my father and told him what happened—this was before they were married, so I figured he’d leave her. Instead he laughed at me. He told me he’d sent her, that it was a test, and that I’d finally passed a test.”

“Test? What kind of test?”

Martin held my gaze as he explained, his tone hollow. “He had to marry her, she has something incriminating on him, but I’m not sure what. But he wanted to keep his money out of her reach, so it was a loyalty test. I think he liked the irony of using her to ensure her undoing. Shortly after that he transferred all his property into my name using a trust.”

“What about his bank accounts? Surely she can just raid those in a divorce?”

He shook his head, adding impassively, “No. In their state of residence, draft accounts existing prior to marriage, even new deposits, aren’t community property, nor are retirement, stock options, and savings. That’s why the houses—the ones he owned and the new ones he’s purchased—are in my name. They’re in a trust until I turn twenty-one.”

“So…next year?”

“No. Four months.”

I stared at him, nonplussed. I’m sure my eyebrows were drawn together in a severe frown of equal parts anger and disbelief. I shook my head at this elaborate scheming, the disgusting test of loyalty that had obviously humiliated and scarred Martin, and felt the acidity of furious indignation rise in my throat, building a concrete structure in my chest.

But before I could vocalize my horrified amazement, Martin added in a voice so quiet I could barely make out his words, “Then he told her. He told Patrice she could use me if she wanted.”

“He what?!” I blurted. Actually, it was more like a shriek.

“She didn’t—she tried, but she didn’t get a chance. I wasn’t at the house much after that.”

I was so angry. My eyes were burning and fury choked my throat. Therefore, without meaning to, I expelled my acrid thoughts. “What a goddamn, motherfucking sonofabitch.”

He laughed a little, obviously surprised, and his answering smile was small and sad. “I don’t know. I never met my grandmother.”

I huffed a laugh, but my features twisted with sadness and anger, and I wanted to make everything better for him. Yet I felt completely helpless. I noted he was avoiding my eyes again; as well, his earlier rage had dissipated and seemed to be replaced with a simmering and fierce determination.

I moved my hands to frame his face and feathered a soft kiss over his lips. “I wish I could drop a house on your father,” I whispered.

His mouth tugged to the side, so I kissed the side of his mouth.

“No...I’ll make sure he gets what he deserves.”

I lifted an eyebrow at this statement and leaned back just far enough so I could look in Martin’s eyes. “What he deserves is your apathy.”

His eyes flashed and I felt his fingers flex on my body as he contradicted through clenched teeth. “No. What he deserves is to be ruined and humiliated.”

My gaze moved over Martin’s features and I saw passion there. It was dark passion, potent and fathomless. I was certain he was absolutely intent on being the instrument of his father’s destruction.

It hadn’t occurred to me until that moment that he might not want to work through the issues with his father. Rather, it appeared his zealous loathing for his father might currently be the driving force in his life.

“Martin—” I started, but stopped, unsure how to proceed but needing to say something. I swallowed as I searched his eyes for some thread of sanity and reason where Denver Sandeke was concerned. I found none. “Martin, maybe take a step back from this. I understand your father is a horrible man who has done horrible things, but what can be done? He’s very powerful.”

“He’s not untouchable,” he was quick to point out, his eyes growing a darker shade of blue as he added, “and I have a plan…”

“But why waste your energy on him? Why not forget him, cut him out of your life like the cancer he is, and move forward with your—”

He shook his head while I spoke, his jaw tight with steely determination, and interrupted me. “No. Fuck no!”

I flinched and his grip tightened on my body as he continued with a harsh whisper, “Nothing else matters other than making him suffer. I’m going to be the one to destroy him. Seeing him humiliated is all I’ve thought about and planned for since I was fourteen. If I achieve nothing else in life, if I do nothing else…” He ended there, his eyes losing focus as his thoughts turned inward to a dark place I couldn’t follow.

My disquiet spread, trepidation ballooning with the dawning comprehension that Martin had allowed this passion—this hatred for his father—to define him.

And most of all, more than the tragic and twisted tales of his childhood, this realization broke my heart.

CHAPTER 12

Factors Affecting Solubility

The plane landed and I was in a mood. An introspective, anxious, overthinking-the-situation mood.

Whereas Martin’s mood had lightened considerably.

When we stepped off the plane and piled into the limo, my mood did not improve. Eric and Martin discussed what to do about Ben’s abdication from the team. Sam tossed me searching looks. I stared out the window.

When we arrived at the dorm and the boys carried our luggage into the building, my mood did not improve, not even when Martin pulled me into an abandoned study room on the first floor and motioned for Sam and Eric to go on ahead. Not even when he backed me up against the door, crowded my space, his eyes dark and hot with intent.

Not until he said, “I told you because I trust you, Kaitlyn. I don’t want anything—least of all my fucked-up past—coming between us.”

I held his gaze and felt some of the tension ease from my shoulders, leaving me feeling merely melancholy. “Thank you for trusting me. I’m just…I’m just so sorry you had to go through that. I know trusting can’t be easy for you.”

“You make it easy.” His eyes lit as he caught my wrists, and used his body to press me against the door. Martin’s voice dropped an octave as he added, “Being with you, listening to you play music, calling you on your bullshit…”