Something snaps inside me.
I lunge and slam my hand over her mouth, cutting off the next scream. My other arm bands around her waist and drags her back hard against me. She fights like she’s on fire, kicking and twisting, eyes wild.
“Enough,” I hiss into her ear.
I’m squeezing too tight. I feel it in the way her body bucks, in the wheeze of air against my palm. My fingers dig into her ribs, hard enough that she’ll be bruised. For one dangerous second, I don’t care. I want her to stop screaming, to stop acting like I’m the monster who left us there instead of the one who dragged her away.
She jerks under my hold, her heel catching my shin. Pain spikes up my leg. My grip tightens reflexively, her spine arching under my arm. Her muffled cry goes sharp and choked.
Easy.
The word flashes through my head like a warning light. I force my hand to loosen, to slide from crushing to just covering. I ease my arm a fraction, enough that her lungs can actually fill.
Her struggles start to weaken, movements going jerky and uncoordinated as her body burns through what little oxygen she has. When her knees finally buckle, I shift my hold and lower her back to her knees, keeping a firm grip on her until she’s steady.
I peel my hand away from her mouth, but keep my arm locked around her middle, holding her back against my chest. She drags in ragged gulps of air, a sob breaking free with each inhale.
“Please…” she gasps, the word brushing my palm.
I catch her chin between thumb and forefinger and tilt her face up, forcing her to look at me. Tears shine on her cheeks. Her lashes are wet spikes, her mouth swollen from the gag and my hand. She looks wrecked. Beautiful. Mine.
“You promised you’d be quiet” I whisper, brushing my thumb over her trembling lower lip. “And right now, you’re failing spectacularly at that.”
She chokes on a sob. I feel the warmth of her tears on my fingers, the heat of her panting breath. It takes everything in me not to crush my mouth to hers and swallow those cries. But I force myself to hold back, to stay in control.
“Think,” I murmur, keeping my voice low and close to her ear. “How many nights did we sit out here and scream for someone to come?”
I jerk my chin toward the window, toward the ghost of the house in the trees.
“How many times did you pound on those walls? How many times did I?” Memories roll through me in quick, ugly flashes—my fists going numb on a locked bedroom door, her voice hoarse, the way the yelling downstairs just got louder to drown us out. “No one ever came then. No one will now. You know that.”
Her eyes squeeze shut. A shudder ripples through her. She does know.
“Nick,” she breathes, and the sound of my name in her voice is pure anguish. Her eyes flutter open, shining with a hurt that pierces straight through me.
My anger eases on a slow exhale. I slide my hand from her chin to her cheek, catching a fresh tear before it falls, and this time I don’t resist. I bring my thumb to my mouth and taste the salt. Fear. Exhaustion. The past. It burns down my throat like something holy.
“Shh,” I hush her gently. “Don’t cry. You’re here. With me. We made it out of that place.” I gesture around the cabin. “We’re where we always dreamed about being.”
Her face twists. “I never wanted to be here,” she rasps. “I hated this place.”
I frown, my hand hovering uselessly in the air where her face was a moment ago. “No, you didn’t,” I say, a sharp edge creeping into my voice. Does she think I don’t remember? That I’m making this up?
“That’s not true.” The words come out flat.
I start to pace, slow circles on the warped boards, needing movement before I do something I can’t take back. Every creak under my boots sounds loud in the tight room. I can feel her eyes tracking me, even through the tears.
“We used to sit on those steps,” I say, staring at the wall but seeing winter-bleached grass and chipped concrete. “House at our backs, this place in front of us.”
The memory rises, unspooling clear as the night outside.
Snow dusts the steps, turning the bare patch of yard between the house and the treeline gray. Our breath ghosts in front of our faces. She’s beside me, bony shoulder almost touching mine, arms wrapped around herself in that too-thin hoodie with the broken zipper. The wind cuts through everything. The cabin is a dark shape through the trees, porch sagging, chimney crooked.
“It looks empty,” I say, my teeth chattering. I’m pretty sure my toes are blue.
She doesn’t answer. Her face is turned toward the cabin, eyes narrowed like she’s trying to see through the walls. Like she can imagine a fire in the hearth, blankets that don’t smell like mildew, a lock that works from the inside.
“Do you think anyone lives there?” I ask.
