The pounding in his head receded. The rage in his gut subsided. Peace slipped over him. A new hunger rose, something sharp and terrible in its intensity, tapping into a well of passion so deep he was nearly destroyed by it. He’d had his share of women and had treated sex so casually. Now, suddenly, there was nothing casual about the way he felt toward Mariko. Nothing casual about his kisses, or the way he held her.

He poured what he felt into her, hoping she understood the truth of his feelings – that he even had them was a miracle. It was all Mariko. He’d been alone so long, fighting to keep everyone around him safe, believing he had no chance at anything more than just existence, and then she was there. Out of nowhere. The one he knew would be the center of his world.

But he had to tell her the truth about her past. He had no choice. Reluctantly he lifted his head, his thumb brushing a caress over her lips. Her gaze clung to his, a little shocked, dazed and definitely aroused. He hated to see that leave her, knowing she would never be able to look at him in the same way.

“I have to tell you the rest, Mariko. I don’t want to, but you have to know. Your family would never have deserted you. They would have been proud of you. You’re a Tanaka, of the legendary Tanaka shadow riders and every bit as good as the best they ever had.”

She shook her head, but he knew the denial was more automatic than anything else. She was confused, but not utterly rejecting his account.

“You were that little girl in the closet. Nao pulled your little brother out first, threw him and began stomping on him, over and over. You came flying out just as I rushed in. You hit him hard with a perfect flying kick, right in the groin. When you came down you slipped in Akiko’s blood nearly at Nao’s feet. Do you remember?”

Tears were running down her face and he used his thumb to brush them away, bending to kiss her temples and then her eyes as if that could make it all better. As if that would somehow ease the terrible tragedy of losing her family to murder.

“You were so brave. Kenta was there and he attacked me. He had a sword. I should have kept Hachiro’s sword, but I couldn’t take all the blood, and I never wanted to hold a sword again.” He had since then. He’d trained year after year, but it had turned his stomach. He touched the long scar on his face. “He did this to me while I was trying to get in a position to keep Nao away from you and still get the sword from Kenta.”

Mariko nodded several times, her fingers trembling as she pressed them against her lips. “My nightmares,” she whispered softly. “I saw these things in a nightmare.”

“Because you lived through them,” he assured. “Not nightmares, reality, so imprinted on your brain you can never rid yourself of the sights, sounds and smells.” It was like that for him the moment he closed his eyes. He could smell the blood. Hear Akiko’s screams. The cries of the little boy, and the sound of his bones breaking as Nao stomped on him over and over.

Ricco couldn’t get to Nao and the little boy or girl because he was fighting for his life, trying to get past Kenta, who wielded his sword with the beginnings of expertise. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Nao smirk, deliver another kick to the girl and then go back to the boy.

“Nao bragged that Kenta would kill me, but not before I witnessed what Nao planned to do to your brother and you.”

She nodded, her entire body shuddering. “He said they would blame you, a devil from another country. I remember that. I remember him saying that.” She looked at him with stricken eyes. “It’s true then. I couldn’t stop him from hurting Ryuu. He kept stomping on him over and over until he broke so many bones that Ryuu grew up twisted.” She put a slender hand to her throat, as if she needed to defend herself and that was all she had.

“You tried, Mariko. At three years old, with only one year of training, you tried. I could hear the bones breaking, and then you went after Nao a second time. Kenta turned his head to laugh. He was covered in blood, and as he stepped, his body turned toward you and Nao. His hand slipped on the hilt of the sword. I took advantage and went inside, hitting the sword aside. He’d gotten me in the face already and there was so much blood I had a difficult time seeing.”

The pain had been agony, but he set it aside, hearing the cries of the toddler on the floor, so broken, a maddened teenager attacking the boy so viciously. “It was you, Mariko, who saved the day. If you hadn’t found the strength and courage to go after Nao a second time, I wouldn’t have managed to kill Kenta.”

“I jumped on his back,” Mariko whispered. “Kicking and hitting him, pulling his hair. I think I even bit him.”

Ricco nodded. “I slammed the edge of my hand into Kenta’s throat with every bit of strength and adrenaline I had.” All the fear. All the rage. All the knowledge that he was a shadow rider and this was what he was born to do. He might have been late, but Nao would not have his last two victims.

“I had a pen I’d picked up off the floor and I jammed it into Kenta’s eye. A horrible rattling noise emerged from his throat, as if the sound was being squeezed out.” He shook his head. “It was a horrible sound. I picked up his sword and hit Kenta in the head and then turned toward Nao. He had you in his lap.”

Mariko touched her throat. “He had a knife.”

Ricco had to keep going, to get it all out so she would know the details in her dream were real. “In one move, still spinning, I cut through flesh and bone with Kenta’s sword. I wasn’t trying to cripple him for life. Only to keep him from killing you and your brother.”

Nao screamed, the sound high-pitched, mixing with Ryuu’s cries until Ricco couldn’t tell them apart. He still remembered those desperate sounds every single night. Sometimes they were so loud he sat in his bed, hands over his ears, trying to drown them out. Behind him, Kenta had crumpled in slow motion, his eyes rolling back in his head so only white showed. In front of him, Nao collapsed, falling into Akiko’s blood, his arms thrashing as his legs lay useless. Those images were locked in his brain as well, the artist in him seeing the blood as red ribbons, as crimson rivers, as dark wine pooling below the bodies.

“I ran to Ryuu,” she whispered. “His body was so crushed and twisted I just held and rocked him. I remember blood getting onto my clothes and hair.”

He nodded. Tears were running down her face, just as they had when she was that little white-haired girl. “Ryuu and Nao were still alive.” In shock he called the number to bring the council members to the horrific scene. Then his nightmare had really begun. He supposed hers had as well, and she’d been so much younger. He had his family; she had no one.

“Osamu Saito raised us. Ryuu and me. She hated me with every breath she drew and it got worse every year.”

Ricco had felt sick with grief and anger over what the council members had done to him. Forcing him to stay in Tokyo, enduring their threats of telling others he’d murdered an entire family if he didn’t cooperate. Afraid they would carry out their threats of killing his family if he told anyone what had happened. He’d felt so alone even in the midst of family who loved him.