Not tonight.
Tonight is more than the attraction between us. It’s comfort and safety and warmth, and if this is what she wants, I’ll give it to her.
She talks me through the movie as I strip her down to her underwear, and then myself. I don’t know if she’s talking about the movie to distract herself or if it’s just something she does. Either way, I’m eating it up. I’m loving every second. Laughing. Touching her without expectation. Cleaning and re-bandaging the wound on her thigh.
And eventually holding her in the darkness.
The rise and fall of her chest against mine is a moment I’ll never get over. Her touch is as healing for me as she thinks mine is for her. Each time her hand strokes over my skin, I surrender another piece of myself.
And I know by the time the sun comes up, I’ll be nothing more than a vessel of meat and bones and blood. My soul is hovering somewhere between fiction and reality, ready to follow her into the afterlife instead of moving on with me.
I’ll never recover from having her like this.
It’s nearly two in the morning when my phone buzzes, and I realize I haven’t moved from the middle of the bed in a half hour. Bonnie is lying on my chest with her arm sprawled over my stomach, cheek on my breasts, legs entwined with mine.
KADE
Checking in since you’re not at the trailer. You good?
I sigh as I peer down at the fucking angel atop me, her wavy hair falling messily around her face. I pick up her fingers and kiss her knuckles, blinking back the tears suddenly pricking my eyes.
Yeah. All good.
See you in the morning.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
BONNIE
I’m notsure if it’s the dopamine from last night or just my brain desperately trying to save me from myself, but whatever it is, I’m clinging to the numbing joy spreading through me for as long as I can.
I’m dreading the moment I step into my cold, messy apartment and it no longer feels like the haven it once held for me. Still, I know even if any of my friends offer to stay with me tonight, I’ll say no as some poor attempt at proving to myself that I’m okay, that whoever my attacker was didn’t take away my safety.
Again.
We part ways with Andi, Mads, Reed, and Wren at the airport, each of them hugging me and saying the same things: call me if you need me, I’ll be there in a heartbeat, please don’t be alone.
Except Reed, who holds me a little longer and holds his pinky up to me after, our silent promise to always be there if the other one can’t find a way out.
He’s sat on the floor with me before and helped me choose between a drink and a blade.
“Hey, you have her?” Zeb says to Gemma when he wraps his arm over my shoulder.
Gemma snickers. “I have her,” she says, peering at me.
And I entirely believe her.
I don’t know what the hell has happened within the last few days, but when she looks at me, I feel everything in my bones… Happiness. Sorrow. Fear. Trepidation. Excitement. I’m desperate to call her mine.Entirely. I want every night to be like last night and more days like the ones before—the hikes, car rides, and chats. I hope every argument ends the way ours did the other day. I hope she calls me on my bullshit and tells me when I’m being a brat; when she knows I’m just trying to push her away because it’s the default I’m working on resetting.
Most importantly, I want to say yes when she asks me out again.
Even so, going back home means I have to take care of loose ends, and there’s one that I’m pretty pissed about.
I haven’t heard from my stalker since leaving for Radio Eleven. There’s been no update from her, no checking in on how I am—and considering news of the shooting made national television, she should have at least sent something.
I’m pretty ticked about it.
Zeb and I walk out of the airport together to the valet, Gemma and Kade trailing behind, and after a few minutes, a black SUV pulls up. I begin to open the back door to climb in after Zeb; however, Gemma stops me with a squeeze of my elbow.
