“I’ll be careful,” I assure her before quickly washing off the blood and then turn to grab her shampoo. I squirt it into my hand. I haven’t thrown any of her stuff away. I just couldn’t get rid of her presence. I wanted the reminder that she was all mine. Even if it was for such a short time. When I left this world, I wanted to make sure all our stuff was in the same place she had it.
“Sit on the bench.” She slowly sits down and turns the best she can to give me her back. Lathering it in my hands, I begin to shampoo her hair.
EVERETT
We both remain silent in the shower. My mind is racing as quickly as my pulse, but I don’t know what to say or how to act.
I’m afraid things have changed. What were they talking about when I walked in there? What does he know that I don’t?
Getting out of the shower, I allow him to dry me off. He’s treating me as if I’m incapable of taking care of myself. Maybe I am. Will he chain me up in the basement after this? That way he always knows where I’m at and I can’t put myself in danger?
I’d let him. If it meant I’d never see him like he was in the motel again.
We enter his bedroom, and he pulls back the covers, gesturing for me to crawl in. I drop the towel and slide into the cool sheets.
He climbs in beside me. I’m not sure what day it is, much less what time it is. The curtains to his balcony are open and it’s dark out.
Lying side by side, the silence eats at me, and I know he wants to turn on the TV.
He drapes his arm across my chest, and I flinch. “I’m sorry,” comes his voice.
“I’m fine,” I assure him. I’m not some delicate flower, and being shot doesn’t change that. I want him to know that I’m still the same woman he wanted to marry.
I sit up, ignoring the sting in my chest and shove the covers away as I straddle him.
“Angel,” he warns, and his hands go to my hips. I have a moment of panic that he’s going to shove me away. Deny me.
His fear is abandonment and mine is for him to stop loving me. I never knew it could be like this. I’ve become dependent on him and can’t imagine a life without him.
“I didn’t know you thought I was dead,” I say softly. My nails gently run up and down his chest. I know how it sounded. My goodbye call to him. But that was in case I didn’t walk out of there. I would have never wanted to put him through that unless I really was dead.
“But you were willing to die for me,” he counters.
I bite my bottom lip nervously. “You would do the same for me.”
“As your husband, that’s my job.”
“No. Your job as my husband is to love me unconditionally.”
I feel him shift, and then the light on his nightstand turns on. He places his hands on my face and frowns. “You think I don’t love you anymore?” I open my mouth, but he continues. “I…” He looks away for a second before he glances back at me. “I was a wreck without you, Eve.” I swallow the knot that lodges in my throat, remembering the call I overheard with Saint and Adam. How Kash had killed their prisoners and left. “I was so mad at you…” He closes his eyes. “For leaving me.” He looks up at me, and my chest tightens thinking of him in that motel all alone. “You may not have died, but you willingly walked into an ambush knowing damn well that you might not walk out.”
“Kashton—”
“And that fucking voicemail,” he adds with a growl.
So, he heard that. “Kash?—”
“I begged you not to do it.” He interrupts me again. “To give me time to save you.”
“That’s what they wanted. They were going to kill you.”
“Why?” he questions, his brows drawing together in confusion. “What did they want from me that you thought you could give them?”
I frown at his question. He makes it sound like he already knows. “I…I don’t know,” I say honestly. “There was a text…and I knew it was either you or me.”
“It’s always me,” he grinds out. “In any situation like that. It’s me.”
“Is that why you were going to kill yourself?” I ask.
