Nodding, I step back, one leg still propped up on the mattress and let my gaze travel down his nose. Over his lips. Farther to hisneck. Lower, to where his collarbones dip and flare out to pale shoulders.
My breath catches.
From his chest, a light dusting of hair with pink nipples, to his flat stomach.
His ribs are pronounced enough to count, and I swallow back the emotion that claws at my throat when the texture of his skin registers.
Tears I can’t stop cascade down my face.
There’s so fucking many.
White and pink lines, some straight and some jagged as fuck, cover nearly every inch of the skin he’s kept hidden.
“Please.”
I sniff, locked in on one of the marks that curves around his hip and how it gets wider the farther back it goes. It’s a dark pink. Thick.Raised.
Do they … are they all over his back, too?
A wave of something hot and fucking ugly rolls over me fast.
“Tristen,” he cries, sobs, his hands flexing at his sides and I swallow hard. Force a breath.
Quiet. Quietquietquiet.
Chest aching, my jaw clenched tight, I step close. “Tell me what to do, bubbles.”
Tear-filled eyes land on my chin, and I know without his answer what he needs, even if he’s not sure himself.
I don’t wait another second to grab his shoulders, yanking him to my chest and draping my arms around him.
The sob he tried to bury against me echoes off the bare walls, his claws anchoring into my sides.
It stings, but there’s no way I’m asking him to let me go.
“You’re gorgeous, baby. Fuckingbeautiful.”
He cries harder. Hangs on tighter.
“I got you, Emmett. I got you. Here—” I dip to grab the backs of his knees and lift, his thighs hooking around my waist. Holding onto his hips where I know my touch is familiar, I get us onto the bed, my back against the wall again. He clings to me, his arms so tight around my neck, he’s nearly choking me.
His grip is not the only thing that’s making it hard to breathe.
Sitting like this … his back is exposed.
Bile burns the back of my throat at the sight.
Did they fucking know?
I clench my jaw tight enough so that I hear my molars grind.
He shakes against me, his entire frame shuddering enough that his teeth clatter.
“S-s-sssso cold.”
“Okay, um—” I huff away the ugly swirling inside me as best I can and reach for the blanket.
I want to tell him to put his shirt back on, so he isn’t freezing and anxious.
