“Kira, breathe,” he orders. “It’s okay. I’m not going to let anything happen to you. Just breathe.”
But how can I do that when the walls are leaning in? I grab onto his shirt, desperate for something sturdy, and my gaze drops to my fingers and the death grip they’re wielding. I’msuddenly hot, my skin dampening. Is it the damn fireplace? Is it cooking me alive? Is this what it will feel like when James makes Jax burn my body after killing me? Surely, I wouldn’t feel it. I’d be dead, right?Dead. Me and my sister.
A strangled whine seeps out between gasps, and I get an intake of salty tears on my tongue.
“Look at me,” Jax demands.
My head lifts in jerky increments, vision bouncing, his face coming into focus in pieces. I see the hard line of his jaw, the deep furrow between his brows, the set of his mouth.
“Breathe,” he says once he has a lock on my gaze. “In,” he says slowly, pulling air into his chest like he’s demonstrating, “now out.” He exhales deliberately.
I try to copy him, but the air feels thick and uncooperative.
“Try again,” he urges. “In…” He places one of his hands over mine, flattening it against his chest. “Out…”
But I struggle again, and my vision starts to darken around the edges.
With a tick of his jaw, his free hand finds the back of my neck. He pulls me forward until our foreheads touch.
“Breathe for me, buttercup,” he whispers. “Feel my heart. It’s yours. Every beat is yours. It would have to stop before I ever let anything happen to you.”
His words shift something inside of me, loosening my chest. The edges of my vision pull back, just enough for his eyes to come into focus again. So close and steady, holding me in place.
I match his next inhale, shaky but fuller than the last, and his chest rises beneath my palm. His scent, like smoke and leather, pushes through the chaos in my head, giving me something to cling to. I inhale deeply, tucking it inside me.
“That’s it,” he murmurs, his hand on my neck stroking once. “You’re doing so good, my pretty little accomplice.”
My breaths stutter, uneven at the mention ofaccomplice, but they start falling in time with his. In. Out. In. Out. Each one pushes little space between me and the panic. The walls don’t feel as close now. My grip on his shirt loosens, my fingers sliding down until they’re just hooked there. I’m afraid letting go will undo the fragile calm creeping in.
“You’re safe,” Jax says quietly. “Right here. Just you and me.”
My shoulders slump without my permission, the fight bleeding out of them. My head tips forward until it finds the curve of his neck. The heat of his skin is grounding and not the smothering blaze I’d imagined.
For a moment, we just stay there, our breathing in sync, the flames of the fireplace filling the silence. When he finally speaks, it’s a comforting rumble against my cheek.
“Spitting image of atoughgirl,” he chuckles.
“Ugh,” I grumble. “You’re not going to let me live that down, are you?”
Chapter Forty-Four
Kira
The bed is much more comfy than I had anticipated, but that could have something to do with Jax taking up most of it.
I managed to change into a pair of sleep shorts that Nix picked out for me and wash my face, while, in the meantime, Jax was apparently turning down the room. He shed his jacket and lowered the fire, and when I came out of the closet, I found him laid out on top of the down comforter, still in his jeans, with his arms crossed behind his head.
I didn’t argue it and crawled in. Because if I’m being honest, I didn’t want to be alone in this house. But now that I’m beside him, my cheek against my hands and my knees tucked against my chest, I feel bad. He can’t be comfortable like this.
“You don’t have to stay,” I whisper in the amber-flecked darkness, taking in the hardened slope of him, mesmerized by the way he looks like golden stone.
He pops open one eye. “I’m right where I want to be.”
I cluck. “But aren’t you… uncomfortable?”
“Uncomfortable?” He chuffs, closing his eyes. “This beats a hospital chair.”
I shift, feeling worse at the reminder that he did in fact stay with me every night in the hospital. How? How could he sit withme every night in the hospital, pay for the procedure, and then turn around and do the awful things he does? I don’t understand how he can be so gentle and so ruthless. Is he truly in the shades of gray like Caleb said?
