I had just come to the hospital to tell my uncle that we were having dinner at the mansion that night and to give him his lunch since he hadn't had any. I did not expect to find the most beautiful, most adorable little thing sitting in a hospital bed. The bruises were unsettling, and they angered me. But she was so beautiful.

She had blonde hair, kiwi-coloured, big, green eyes and the most beautiful body I'd ever seen despite how skinny she was. But she was looking at me like a frightened puppy, she was truly horrified.

She almost fell off the bed when I stood up from the chair that Rico had left me in. So I lunged forward. Pulling her right into my arms. It felt like that's where she belonged and that's where she stayed for the next several hours.

It had been a while since she'd finally eaten the fruits and she wasn't moving. I didn't know if she had fallen asleep or if she had just fallen completely silent and motionless. I shifted slightly and looked at her to find her awake. But the shaking had stopped, the sobbing had stopped. She seemed to be deep in thought now.

That's when Uncle Rico came back to the room. She immediately hid her face in my shirt and held onto it tightly. She clutched my shirt tightly, too scared of Rico to be comfortable in his presence. I felt good about it though, it showed me that even though she wasn't exactly comfortable with me, she was more comfortable with me than anyone else.

"How's it going in here?" He asked.

"We had some fruit." I said, stroking her hair softly.

I had texted everyone to tell them I wouldn't be able to make it to dinner. Rico was going though.

"Alright. Visiting hours are almost over, and you're going to have to leave, Vidal." He said to me.

I felt my shirt being clutched more tightly and now her nails were digging into my abdomen.

"I don't think that's going to be ok with her." I said gently, stroking her hair and hoping it would somehow calm her.

"Vidal... you shouldn't have even come in. How did you find me in here?" Rico asked me.

"I was coming to bring you food, and I saw that weird nurse that won't leave me alone. She told me you were here and when I asked if I could come see you, she said yes." I told him.

"This better not get me in trouble. I'll see what I can come up with." He sighed.

I smiled and nodded.

"But I think having her actually in bed and not attached to you might help the case. So work on that." He said to me, turning to leave.

I raked my fingers through her hair, not even caring if I needed to let her go. It wasn't going to happen. I was comfortable like this, even if I had lost all feeling in my legs an hour ago.

She eventually removed her head from my shirt and rested it against my chest. I continued stroking her hair and I felt content. My legs would be fine, I'm sure. My bladder however, was another story.

I realized I still didn't know her name. I needed to figure it out. I texted Uncle Rico to ask him and he said he wasn't sure. The file was on the table beside her bed and he wasn't able to reach it because she was freaking out a little. I looked to the side and I saw the file he was talking about.

I picked it up and I looked at the name at the top.

Kiara.

It was cute.

"Your name is Kiara." I whispered softly, making her sit up abruptly and look up at me in shock.

"Sorry. I didn't mean to scare you. I just found your file." I said to her.

She looked at the papers in my hands and she frowned at them.

"Do you not want me to read it?" I asked her.

She looked up at me with her big green eyes.

"I don't want to invade your privacy. But like... I've agreed to stay with you and I don't know what's going on, but I want to make sure nothing bad happens to you and I can't really do much if I don't know your story." I said to her.

She looked between me and the papers tears began to fall from her eyes. She just placed her head back down on my chest and looked away from the papers. She looked so sad, so hurt. She had clearly been through hell.

I knew I probably wasn't allowed to look at this file. Which was confirmed seconds later by a text from Rico telling me not to read the file in all capital letters. But I was just going to read it anyway since I felt like I'd gotten a silent permission from Kiara to do so.

I felt nauseous as soon as I read the file.

Slave trade?!

Sex slave?

Severe physical torture and emotional abuse!

Sixteen years!

"Oh, Kiara." I said, holding her close to me.

She started crying. I didn't know if she thought of me as someone she could trust yet, but she was clearly crying openly about what I'd just read.

"Kiara. I didn't know that was what happened to you." I told her.

Every reservation had flown out the window. I just wanted this adorable, beautiful, strong woman to be ok. She seemed to trust me most right now and if that meant that I'd be responsible for her for the rest of my life, I was happy with it.

I always worried about being too rough. Never being able to be gentle for the woman I devoted my life to. But now I knew I could be. I had just needed to find the right one and I felt like I had. I was just drawn to her the second I saw her. She was by far the prettiest woman I'd ever seen in my lifetime. I knew all she needed was my attention and care. I wanted to give that to her.

She wouldn't want me because I had money. She probably didn't even know much about money at all. She'd spent sixteen years in an illegal slave trade facility where they trained her to be a sex slave and she had regular torture sessions. The girl just needed love and honestly, that's what I longed for as well.

No wonder she kept flinching and crying and shaking. She had been acting incredibly odd, but it wasn't that odd anymore now that I knew her backstory. I was devastated. I felt a lump form in my throat as I thought about what she'd been through.

She had been through so much and yet here she was, alive, with a glimmer of hope in her eyes amidst all the fear. She still hadn't given up completely. She was one of the strongest people I'd met.

I felt a connection to her. God knows why, I just couldn't let them take her to another facility where she'd be treated like a burden. She needed someone to treat her like a person. Like the special someone that she was. That's the only way she'd get better.

I wanted to be that person for her. To take care of her. The feeling I got when she ate those fruits out of my hand was incredible. I felt so happy that she'd eaten something. She was clearly hungry, eating them piece after piece and barely giving herself time to chew. I wanted her to become mine to feed and take care of. I wanted her to be mine to love. Heaven knows I already felt a strong affection towards her.

"You know you're safe now. Even though it doesn't feel like it yet, you are safe. I'm not going to let anything happen to you. You're out of that horrible place, and no one is going to lay a finger on you." I said to her. "I can imagine you don't know what's going on. It says here that you were found in a room and you passed out the second the officers entered."

The poor little thing was shaking and crying now and clutching my shirt tightly.

"I know you may not trust me, but you were found by officers and brought here to the hospital so your injuries could heal and so you could be taken care of. I don't know where they're going to try to put you, but I won't let you go anywhere weird. If you want, you can come with me." I told her, pulling her closer to my chest. She rested her head on me, hiding it in the crook of my neck as she cried.

"Sh... it's ok. I promise." I said, stroking her hair.

She pulled the blankets up higher and hid from the world inside of them. She was clearly very scared and sad. I just wanted to do anything to make that sadness go away.

"Does your bunny have a name?" I asked her, trying to distract her from the grief. It was a long shot, I knew it wasn't likely to work, but hopefully it would ease the sadness just a little bit.

She looked down at her bunny, hiccupping and sniffling as she looked at it.

"Alright. I'm going to assume he has no name. When you're ready, you can tell me." I said to her.

She seemed like she was having an internal battle with herself. I truly had no way of knowing if she trusted me. If she believed what I was saying. For all I know she could think that I was just like the people that tortured her, she could be expecting me to hit her at any moment.

My heart hurt thinking she thought of me as a scary person. I knew I was rough and much, much bigger than she was. The muscles probably scared her, but hopefully one day I could make her see them as a shield she could hide behind. My muscles could be a reminder to her that she was safe and protected.

It would take time for her to trust me and get over this pain. But I knew one thing for sure, she was special. I wasn't letting her go. I wouldn't let her get hurt. I would protect her no matter what.