She shakes her head, but I feel her breath skip and falter. “No. Sometimes it’s worse… But with you, it’s at least honest. With him…” She trails off, and I know which him she means. I don’t say anything. Just hold her, just keep holding, as if my arms might convince her I’ll never hurt her again.
“We’ll figure it out.” I put my mouth against her hair. “You’re not alone, okay?”
She doesn’t answer but she lets out a breath, slowly.
I hold her like that until my legs go pins-and-needles and my spine hates me. I don’t let go. I’ll never let her go. Not again.
After a while, her breathing smooths out, and for the first time in days, I feel her really fall asleep.
I stroke her cheek, careful not to wake her, and I wish I could tell her all the things I never said. That even broken things are worth loving. Maybe especially broken things.
I can’t sleep but I pretend, counting her breaths, the skipped beats in her pulse. I keep watch, the way I always do.
She starts to twitch in her sleep. Little kicks, her jaw grinding, lips curled back from her teeth. I know the rhythm by now—three deep breaths, then the first whimper, then her fists ball up and she thrashes so hard she nearly knocks her head into my chin. I tighten my grip, using my body to lock her down before she can hurt herself.
She jerks so violently she almost slips my grasp, and then her voice rips out—it’s not a scream, not at first, but a choked, feral sound. She’s trying to speak but the words don’t line up, just garbled syllables mashed together. I stroke her hair, cradle her skull with my palm, whisper her name again and again.
She claws at my hand, nails biting into my wrist. “Stop,” she sobs, “stop it, stop touching, please don’t, please no, no no—” and I realize it isn’t me she’s talking to.
It’s him.
“Hope, you’re safe. He’s not here, it’s just me. It’s Jax.”
She’s fighting me so hard I can barely hold her. She thrashes, gets a foot on the mattress, and nearly knees me in the balls. I pin her down with my weight, but I keep my voice as soft as I can. “He’s gone, Hope. He’s fucking gone. He’ll never touch you again. I promise. I swear it.”
“Don’t,” she chokes out. “Don’t touch me, don’t—” Her breath is ragged, her eyes wide, but she’s not here. I grip her wrists, not to pin her but just to keep her from hurting herself, and I stretch my body behind hers so she can feel how much bigger I am, how easy it is for me to hold her, and maybe that’s fucked up, maybe that’s exactly what she’s scared of, but the first time I tried to let her go, she almost broke her own hand against the wall.
She shakes her head, loose hair sticking to the sweat on her forehead. “Stop, stop, please—” Her voice cracks and the next thing out of her mouth is a scream, a real, unfiltered shriek, and it shreds me from the inside.
I think about waking the others, but I don’t want them to see her like this. I don’t want her to have witnesses when she finally breaks down.
She keeps screaming, wild and empty, until her voice goes hoarse and the fight leaves her. Her body sags against me, ruined and limp, and I press my lips to her temple, tasting salt and shampoo and whatever chemicals make up fear.
I crawl up the headboard, rest my back against it, and pull her into my lap, rocking her the way my own mother did after a bad dream, back when there was still someone around to care.
Hope’s eyes are still open but she doesn’t see me, not yet. She’s somewhere else, somewhere darker, colder, a place I’d burn to the ground if I could.
“Hope,” I say, and I do the only thing I know will reach her. I press my lips against her hairline, right above her temple, and I say, “Good girl.”
She shatters. The tension goes out of her, every muscle slack. Her arms droop, her head tips back against my shoulder. I hear her breath, raw and high and wet, then she starts to sob, ugly and wordless.
I keep rocking her, like it will keep the horror out of her mind.
I whisper her name in her ear, over and over again, until my voice is a rasp. She clutches my arm and buries her face there, and I let her. I’ll let her bite through the skin if she has to.
After a long while, she calms. The shakes get smaller. Her breathing finds its way back to normal, or as close as she ever gets. We don’t talk. I just hold her and wait for her to pull herself back into her skin.
When she does, she lifts her head and looks at me, and even in the dark I can see the fierce light in her eyes.
“I hate him,” she whispers.
“Me too, sweetheart, me too.”
More than she even knows.
Three
HOPE
