“You didn’t find them?”
My lungs deflate as my heart stops beating. “No.”
Because as soon as Jude breached the doors, the wood splintering around us we were met on the other side with gunfire.
“I’m sorry, Oak. I’m so sorry.” She sounds heartbroken. I look down at her to find tears glistening in her eyes like diamonds.
“You have nothing to be sorry for,” I say gruffly. “You aren’t at fault for anything.”
She leans back to look at me, to really look at me, and when her eyes widen and her face falls I know she’s found what I let no one else see. “Please don’t tell me that you think it’s your fault.”
Not able to look at her I focus my eyes behind her on the cream painted wall. My body has gone incredibly stiff, my muscles feel as if they are about to snap at any second. Here is where my nightmares always begin. “After I signaled for us to go through the door we were ambushed.” God, my throat feels too fucking tight, like something is blocking my airway to breathe. My finger starts to rapidly twitch against her thigh but I can’t stop even if I tried. My body feels as if its out of my control. “No escape. No protection. No back up. There was only one way out, Grace. And the way out was death.”
“Oak.” My name is a broken whimper on her lips.
Yet still, I can’t bring myself to look at her. I can’t see the tears that I know are running free down her cheeks. I can’t see the empathy. It’s taking everything in me to simply hold her right now because these hands of mine don’t deserve to hold something as pure and good as her.
“It was a bloodbath, Grace. The kind you see in movies that you don’t think can be real.” I press back the tears and fight the large lump sitting at the base of my throat. “And their screams.” My voice breaks. I fucking break. A tear slips down my face. “Their screams were louder than the bullets raining down on us. I heard their screams for weeks, Grace. It was a constant ring inmy ear. And their faces. . .” A broken growl that sounds more like a sob rips from my throat. “They were terrified. So fucking terrified. Their eyes kept searching for a way out as they were bleeding out on the floor. They kept searching and searching until they finally landed on me. All their eyes landed on me. They wanted a way out, Grace. They wanted me to give them an answer. But I couldn’t. I fucking couldn’t do shit.” More tears fall down my face as I feel my heart being ripped to shreds.
I wanted to save them.
Miguel, Isaac, Roman, Jude and Darius.
I wanted to save all of those kids who were being held hostage.
I wanted us to make it out alive.
But we didn’t.
They didn’t survive.
The kids didn’t survive.
Only I did.
And I don’t know how to live with that.
I don’t know how to make sense of it.
“I was choking on my own blood,” I tell her grimly , my voice rough from my tears. “I couldn’t move. Could hardly breathe. My body was fighting for my life when all I wanted to do was fight for theirs.” I would have given anything to die with them. For them to not suffer such a cruel death alone. “I can remember their last breaths. It’s forever burned in my head. I saw the life leave their eyes. And. I. Couldn’t. Do. Anything.”
“Oak-”
“Don’t, Grace.” I stop her before she has the chance to redeem me in her eyes. I don’t deserve it. “I failed them. I shouldn’t have pushed for us to go ahead. I should’ve stuck to the mission and they would be alive. They would be here, Grace. But they’re not. And that’s on me. Their deaths are my fault.”
She grabs my face in her hands and forces me to look at her. I do but my eyes are as hard as glaciers. My jaw flexes from her touch.
Her eyes stare into mine with such strength and determination, with a fierceness I’ve never seen from her before. “It wasn’t your fault.”
I bite back the dark laugh that wants to break free. “Yes, it was.”
“No, it wasn’t,” she disagrees fiercely. “What happened was a tragedy but it was a tragedy you didn’t cause.”
My nostrils flare as I stare down at her. “Did you not hear what I just said?” I seethe.
“I heard every word, Oak. You’re not the person you are making yourself out to be.”
“And what’s that?”
