“I’m sorry,” he snapped. “I can’t.”
Her silence gutted him.
His mind drew upon the wreckage left in the wake of every catastrophe he’d ever survived, throwing him back to a time and place he never wanted to visit again.
Hands pawing. Skin tearing. Breath cinching. Tears welling. Teeth biting. Copper filling his mouth as he held it all in, pretended it wasn’t happening, tried to breathe through it, tried to die. Weight. Crushing weight. Sweat. The stench of rot. Gold veneers and laughing cherubs. Blood-red bedding to hide the stains.
“Fuck!” he snapped, storming to the bar.
Crystal clinked as he uncorked a decanter with a shaky hand. He half expected to stand on tippy toes and stretch to reach the glasses. In that moment, he was not Jack Thorne. He was trapped in little Jackie’s mind, stripped of options and trapped under the crushing weight of a giant.
The rattle of liquid filling an unsteady glass broke the silence. He swallowed three fingers of Mad Hatter in two gulps, but the anesthetic was slow to take effect. So he poured more.
Her sniffle stopped time and his heart split open in ways he couldn’t handle. Not now.
“You should go.”
Her breath hitched. He couldn’t bear to face her, didn’t want to see how she looked at him. “Jack…”
His eyes pressed shut. His fucking name on her lips was a spell. “If you want, I can arrange a car. You’ll be compensated for your time?—”
“Fuck you.” Bedding rustled and she was on the move in a flash of red satin. The bathroom door slammed and he flinched.
He set down his empty glass with a hard click and turned. The room was destroyed. He should have never brought her back here.
Moving to the fireplace, he lifted the empty leather file box and began picking up the scraps of paper. He’d burn them with the others. As long as he had a plan, he could stay calm. He just had to keep moving and?—
“Fuck!” He flipped the table, sending the silver tray of food soaring across the floor.
Flinging the useless box at the wall, he seethed. His hands balled into fists, splitting his broken knuckles open again.
“I can’t do this.” He buttoned his shirt, tucking in the tails in such a rush, a dash of blood marked the crisp white.
He moved to the dressing room and ripped a jacket off a hanger. Clothing used to be his armor, but now it felt more like a tourniquet.
He faced the mirror and stilled when a little boy looked back at him. Dark bruises showed under his big eyes as he stared up at Jack wearing far too much exhaustion for a child. His clothes were moth-eaten and his arms too skinny. He shivered as if trapped in an endless winter.
Jack’s throat tightened until his vision blurred, forcing him to abruptly look away.
He dialed the code into the safe and retrieved his gun, checking the magazine out of habit. Then he stilled.
His mind went to Daisy. What was she doing in there? Was she angry? Crying?
He reached to rub a hand over his face and stilled again. Her scent was all over him.
He shoved the gun back in the safe and slammed it shut.
Moving slow and keeping his steps light, he approached the bathroom door. Pressing his head to the cool wood, he closed his eyes and listened to her soft sniffles.
He was a monster for making her cry.
His palm pressed to the door. “Daisy?”
Another sniffle. “Go away.”
He twisted the knob and pushed his way inside. She sat on the lip of the tub, wrapped like a goddess in the bedsheet. “I’m sorry.”
“I heard you the first time.” She wiped her eyes, but more tears fell, each one a small, brutal death he suffered in full.
