Surprising me, Falk leads me not to my bare prison but turns instead toward the blue room. He squeezes my forearm as I pass him, an overwhelming comfort, his gaze steady.
Clara freezes at the top of a pushup, her hair tied into its familiar pile on top of her head, giant, stained sweatpants pooling from her legs to the ground, the waistband rolled so many times it’s practically a belt around the undershirt she’s wearing with it. The door clicks shut behind me, the snick of the lock horrifically familiar.
Clara pushes herself to her feet, the long lines of her muscles clear as she tucks a curl back up into the mass at thetop of her head. “Hey,” she says, wary enough that I have to wonder what I look like to her right now.
I swallow, not yet able to move, frozen with the anticipation of her touch.
She skirts around the bed, glancing around the room with a twist of her lips. But I’m not able to look at whatever she doesn’t like about her surroundings. I’m too taken by the way she moves, the efficiency of every step, the lack of subterfuge or coercion in her body language.
A woman built for trust and truth, turned into a liar and thief by life.
By me and mine.
By a mother who wanted perfection over honesty, and a father too weak to stand up for her. By an ex who needed a shield to protect him from the righteous fury of the world. And by our need for creative solutions to dark problems, her beautiful face so easily used as a tool to get us what we want.
But here, now, with me, I get the real her. The complete one. Forthright and strong enough to have taken the blows she’s been dealt and turn them into hope.
Her palms bracket my jaw, and still, I can’t move or speak. “Trips?” she whispers.
My hands shake as they find the small of her waist, the warmth of her welcome after the cold that’s seeped into my bones. But it’s not enough, the thin fabric of her undershirt crumpling in my fists. “Clara,” I croak.
Those delicate fingers trace the sides of my neck, and I shiver, tugging her closer, just a step, until the warmth of her tickles my front. Her hands rest on my chest, and I breathe into her, the slight pressure there forcing my eyes closed as Ifocus on it. Another breath, and her head joins her hands, the weight of it leaving goosebumps across my over-sensitized skin.
I want more. I need it. But still, my voice is hard to find, a frustrating mix of hoarse and underutilized. “Touch me,” I manage, the crack in my voice a gunshot in the quiet of the blue room.
Her nod rubs my shirt against my sternum, then her fingers slip under the seam, tracing over my ribs, brushing the hair beneath my belly button before dancing up, slowly, carefully, like she’s afraid of spooking me.
I’m not going anywhere. Never again. I’ve run from her since the beginning. Even when I ranwithher, I ran from her. But I can’t. Not again. Not anymore. It’d be like trying to run from a piece of myself. Impossible, farcical, and excruciating. So I force myself to move toward her, tugging her shirt free from her sweats, and over her head, my eyes closed, still focused on every point where our skin touches.
Trailing my fingertips from her wrists to her shoulders, down her sides, up the indent of her spine, her fingers unbuttoning the dress shirt I’d been given this morning, dragging it over my shoulders, my undershirt soon falling to the floor with a barely audible whoosh.Every touch from her burns in the best way possible, taking the rotten, broken bits of me and turning them into fuel for her fight. Fuel she’ll use to fight forus.
“Look at me,” she whispers, her palms flat against my pecs, the back of her neck so goddamn fragile in my hands.
I force my eyes open, the late afternoon light fading quickly as winter approaches. But it’s like my eyes were made just tosee her, the curl of her dark eyelashes, the question written in the corners of her eyes and lips, the slight bump on the bridge of her nose that adds dimension to her face.
She glances over her shoulder, asking about the camera, about how vulnerable I’m willing to be when I know we’re being watched. “I don’t care,” I whisper.
“Then what do you need?” she asks, her voice as quiet as my own.
“You. Just you.”
Her hand twists in her sweats just for a moment, before she takes me by the hand and leads me to the bed, tugging me over with a tumble a second before I kick off my shoes. Hers fly off the other side, and then she’s lying over my chest, her arms squeezing me tight, something too monumental to be called a hug passing between us. “I need you, too,” she whispers, her voice muffled by my skin.
I keep my arms low, my palms hot against her skin, not wanting to cage her in. Not right now. “I miss them,” I say. “I didn’t think I would, not like this, but I do. Is Jansen?”
“He’s alive, in hiding.”
My breath catches, the revelation light and heavy on my soul. Alive. Hiding. Broken. Saved. He came for her. They’re always there for her in a way I haven’t been. In a way I want to be.
“I’m sorry. So sorry, Clara. I’ve been so worried about the bad stuff for so long that I didn’t leave space for the good stuff to happen.”
She squeezes me tighter, first one drip then a second against my skin, her tears hidden. “I didn’t understand howbad the bad could be. Not until now, until I lived it. I thought you didn’t care. But you did care, didn’t you?”
“More than I wanted to at the beginning, and later, more than I could keep hidden from you.”
She tilts her head, her chin digging into my chest as she looks up at me. “I get it now.”
“I wish you didn’t.”
