Outside, the rain continues to pour.
“Rafe, wake up.” His arm tightens painfully at my waist, and he turns again, half dragging me with him. He’s hot to the touch. Almost as clammy as me. “Rafe!” I pat his cheek a few quick times. “Wake up. Come on…”
His eyes rove beneath his closed eyelids. I push him again, and his body suddenly goes still. Still and tense.
“Hey, it’s a dream,” I tell him. “It’s just a dream. You can wake up.”
For a long few seconds, I’m not sure where he is. If he’s here with me or lost in a torment of his own. He doesn’t move, doesn’t open his eyes. His chest rises quickly beneath me.
“It’s okay,” I say, even if it doesn’t feel that way. I’ve never seen anyone have nightmares like him. The way they consume him so completely.
He opens his eyes and looks at me. I run my hand over his warm skin, from his temple to his cheek. He releases a shaky breath and closes his eyes.
For a few seconds, we’re both quiet and still.
But then he rolls away from me and explodes out of bed. He walks toward the window of the chalet and pushes it open. Cool air rushes in, scented with rain. He braces his hands against it and looks out into the darkness. Just like he did back in Como, like he needs fresh air to soothe the hurt.
His arms are bunched tight against the windowsill.
“Rafe?”
He shakes his head a little. Like he’s warning me to stay away.
But every time I’ve needed him, every time I’ve felt on the brink of breaking apart, he’s been there. Even when it felt like I’d die from embarrassment, having him watch panic claw at me.
So I slip out of the bed and walk toward him.
“You’re awake,” I tell him. “You’re safe.”
Whatever response I expected, it wasn’t a laugh. The sound is haunted. “Yes,” he says. “I’msafe.At the end of the dream, I’m always fucking safe.”
My lips part. This has to be about the accident and losing his brother. His dreams must be of that night.
I put my hands on his back. He’s warm to the touch, even warmer than me, and I slowly wrap my arms around his waist. He feels like a skittish animal. Like he might break or bolt.
“Do you need me to tell you to breathe?” I ask. “It helps when you do it to me.”
He bows his head. “I can’t handle kindness right now, Wilde.”
“Why not?” My hands flatten against his bare chest. “Talk to me.”
“No. This is the one thing I can never talk about.”
I rest my cheek against his back. “Maybe you can’t talk to your friends about it. Or your family. But I’m not any of them. My opinion doesn’t matter.”
He scoffs. I feel it, through my hands, and with my face against his chest. As if what I said was ridiculous. But there’s truth to it. He and I exist outside of normal relationships. It’s a partnership and a business venture, a necessary evil and a growing attraction that I have no idea what to do with.
We’re everything and we’re nothing.
He breathes hard and deep.
“You don’t have to tell me everything. But maybe something?” I ask. “It can make it easier. Sometimes.”
Outside the window, the wind changes. Droplets of rain hit my hands.
“It’s close to here,” he says. “Where it happened. The dreams always get stronger when I’m back here.”
“At the chalet?”
