Total pages in book: 75
Estimated words: 76592 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 383(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76592 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 383(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
No charges. The law says I did the right thing. But the law doesn’t crawl into my chest at two a.m. and smooth the wrinkled place where the shot lives.
Zach lifts his head.
I breathe. In. Out.
Thirty-Five
Tabitha
Henry’s words echo after he falls asleep beside me.
You’re mine. Always were.
The cabin is quiet except for the low hum of the refrigerator. Henry sleeps hard, one arm flung over his forehead. Zach’s curled near his feet, twitching at some dream chase.
I rise and find my clothes by the table. I dress quickly and return to the master bedroom to pack up.
It’s afternoon already, and I have class tomorrow.
Every nerve in my body feels awake. Like the night—and just hours earlier—was both a healing and a wound.
Henry is still asleep, and his sleep has become fitful.
I sit next to him, nudging him lightly. “Hey.”
His eyes shoot open. “Damn.”
“What?”
“Just…everything. My mind was full of…everything. Everything about everything.”
I nod. “Same here. I’m thinking about everything. The attack. The seminar. My life. You.”
He exhales slowly. “I’m not good with the dreams.”
I almost laugh. “You’re good at other things.”
“Yeah? Name one.”
“You make me forget the world exists.”
He rubs his eyes and sighs. “That’s not always a good thing.”
“I know.” My throat tightens. “That’s what scares me.”
He tilts his head. “Say what you’re really thinking.”
I stand and move to the window, looking out into the sunny day. “I don’t want to be the one who gets left behind when everything catches up with you.”
He rises, wraps a blanket around his naked body. “I don’t plan on leaving.”
“No one ever does.”
He’s silent for a beat. I feel him behind me, close enough to warm my skin. “Tabitha.”
I look back. His expression is all edges and ache.
“When Ralph pulled that gun,” he says, voice shaking slightly, “I thought that was it. I thought I’d die with every wrong thing I ever did on a loop. I did what I had to do, and I have no regrets, but every day I wonder what if I had been only a second later with the gun? If—”
“But you weren’t,” I say. “You didn’t hesitate, and you saved Angie. Jason. Me. Now let me save you.”
“I’m not asking you to save me.” He steps closer. “I’m asking you to believe I’ll fight for myself. For you. For this.”
The word fight hits something deep in me. Some nerve I’ve been pretending didn’t exist. Because I’ve been fighting, too. Against fear. Against wanting too much. Against the voice that says I don’t get to have this and everything else.
He reaches for my hand. I let him take it.
For a moment, I let myself believe him.
The thunder rolls closer. The sound vibrates through the walls, low and hungry.
Henry glances at the window. “Storm’s coming back.”
“Yeah,” I say softly, knowing he’s not talking about the weather. “Feels like it.”
And for a heartbeat, we just stand there. We’re two people who’ve burned through every excuse and are holding on anyway.
He doesn’t let go of my hand. If anything, he tightens his grip.
“Tell me,” he says. “Not the polished version. Tell me about that night. What it did to you.”
“I told you.”
“No. Tell me how you felt. How you feel now.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Are you willing to do the same for me?”
“If that’s what you want.”
I sigh. I don’t like to revisit that memory. Remembering that night takes me to the darkest place. There’s a reason I’ve been so focused on the seminar beyond my career. Beyond my feelings for Henry.
It’s an escape from the dark place.
“I don’t want you to relive anything you don’t want to relive,” I tell him. “You shouldn’t ask that of me, either.”
“I’m only giving you the chance to talk about it if you want to. If you don’t want to, you don’t have to.”
“Good.”
But the thoughts spear through my head, swirling and whirling like tornadoes. Everything I’ve done since that night.
How in the shower, I scrub until my skin burns, until the water runs cold and my fingers ache. It’s not about getting clean. It’s about trying to wash out the memory of his breath near my ear, the smell of sweat and fear. Sometimes I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror afterward, and I don’t recognize the woman looking back. She’s smaller somehow. With less light.
Sleep is worse. My body remembers before my mind does, and my heart pounds, my chest locks, and I kick against something invisible. I wake up gasping, clawing at sheets that have never hurt me. The room is safe. The lock is on. But I can still feel him invading my space.
And when the world goes quiet, when everyone else moves on, I’m still here. I’m alive. Alive but cracked open.
I tell myself that surviving is enough. That someday, it will feel like victory. But right now, it just feels like standing on the edge of a scream I can’t quite let out.