The words are on a loop, all I can offer her as I keep trying to get her to stop fighting me. I look to the door when some light pierces the darkness and see Dimitri frozen there. He looks from Hope to me, and back to Hope.
She stops screaming, her eyes fluttering, then she shoves me hard with both hands, beating against my chest even though I refuse to let her go.
She manages to wedge her legs between us and hisses at me.
“Why didn’t you kill him?”
“Hope?” I ask.
“Why did you let him near me?” she spits, continuing to shove at me, threatening to claw right through my shirt as the same questions roll off her tongue, somewhere between a desperate plea and an accusation.
Jaxon bursts into the room, then lifts her from my hold. She thrashes and fights, but he holds her wrists above her head and pulls her body flush against his. He wraps his arm around her waist, then pushes her back until she’s pinned to the desk.
She grumbles against his chest, keeps trying to fight, then just… stops. I stand slowly and see her head against his chest. Jaxon’s obviously whispering something in her ear. She shudders, keeps crying, but lets her eyes close.
My eyes flick to Dimitri, who looks annoyed, but he’s pointedly refusing to look at me. He’s focused on Hope.
“Good girl,” Jaxon says, rubbing the nape of her neck. His eyes are focused on me. “I’ve got you. Just listen…” He’s quiet for amoment and Hope seems to relax a little more. “That’s it… good girl.”
Four
KNOX
“Are we going to talk about that?” I ask as we clean up in the shower after practice.
We’re the only guys left. Everyone else decided to go out for beers. Of course, while we were scrimmaging, none of them said a fucking word about Hope. No one mentioned her reaction.
“It’s her first day out of the house,” Jaxon replies simply.
“That was more than a panic attack,” Dimitri mumbles.
“And what did you do to help her, huh? Stand there? Man the door?” I snap as I turn off the water and grab my towel.
Dimitri rips open the curtain shielding me and glowers at me. “And what did you do other than make it worse?”
Jaxon’s already pulling on his jeans. “Not the time.”
He walks out just like that. I glower at Dimitri. “What’s your deal? You’ve been pissy since yesterday.”
“Let’s see, our girl is struggling, can barely eat without being reminded, and you carried her out of the fucking house this morning,” he accuses.
“You’re the one who said we’re being too nice,” I bark back before grabbing my clothes. “So that’s not the fucking issue. What is it? Pissed at the situation? We all are. Youfroze.”
“My issue doesn’t matter. Not when she—”
“It does matter!” I yell. “Because we’re in this together. The three of us and her. How the fuck are we supposed to take care of her if you can’t even walk into the room where she’s panicking?”
“Don’t push on this,” he warns, voice dark and eyes even darker.
“Or what? You’ll glare at me like you did Ben?” I sneer. “Or you’ll tackle me just like you did him? Dirty? Almost hurting him?”
“Ben has apologized plenty of times and you fucking haven’t!” Dimitri sneers.
“For what?! Not finishing things with Coach? For not being there when she needed me? For what, Dimitri?! We’re not leaving this fucking room until you—”
“You know exactly why I’m pissed. My reaction doesn’t have a damn thing to do with it either. At least I didn’t touch someone having a panic attack that was caused by being touched,” he sneers, shouldering past me and changing his clothes.
I don’t know where to start with that. I don’t know how to deal with Hope’s freak-outs. Is that why Jaxon keeps taking the night shift with her even though he looks like a zombie? Am I missing something that she’s told them and not me?
