“I keep thinking I should feel relieved. But mostly I just feel hollow.”
“That’s shock, it’ll pass.”
“And then what?”
“Then we deal with the rest.”
I huffed out something that wasn’t a laugh. “You make it sound easy.”
“It’s not easy. But it’s doable. Especially if you let people help you.”
I studied him. The man who tracked me across fields. The man whose voice pulled me out of fear like a rope. The man who held me with both arms when my legs refused to work.
“Thank you,” I whispered.
He shook his head. “You don’t thank someone for doing what they’d do again without hesitation.”
My eyes stung. The room swayed slightly.
“I don’t know how to be normal after this.”
“You don’t have to be normal.” His voice softened again. “You just have to be here.”
The house creaked. The wind tapped against the window. Dani murmured into her phone down the hall.
I breathed in slowly, the movement shaky but real as Wyatt watched me. Not like I was fragile or broken. Like I was alive.
Thirty-Seven
Tessa
It was quiet, but not the peaceful kind. The kind that felt like it might snap if I breathed too deeply or moved too fast. Every muscle stiff and sore, my throat dry, my head thick and heavy. For a moment, I didn’t know where I was. The ceiling looked wrong. The light slanting through the window didn’t match my internal map of the house.
Then I felt it. Weight. Warmth. The faint drag of someone else’s breath against my skin.
Wyatt was asleep on the floor beside the couch, long legs folded awkwardly, shoulders braced against the cushions like he’d sat down for a second and his body finally quit on him. His hat lay on the coffee table within reach.
His head was tipped back against the couch, turned just enough that his temple pressed into my bent knees.
Like he needed a point of contact with me before he let himself sleep.
I didn’t move at first. I couldn’t. The sight of him there made something inside me go soft and sharp all at once, like relief had teeth. He looked wrecked in the honest way men only did when they stopped pretending. Dirt streaked his jaw.There was a scrape on one knuckle, already swelling. His lashes cast faint shadows under his eyes. His mouth was slightly open as he breathed, slow and even, like his body finally decided it was safe enough to let go.
I could feel the heat of him through the blanket and the thin wall of air between us, even though he wasn’t touching me anywhere but my knees.
Dani was sprawled on the far cushion of the couch, curled tight, pink hair a bright mess against the throw pillow. Her hand was still on my thigh, fingers slack now, like she anchored herself there in the night and refused to move. On the other side of me, Maddy was curled into my back, knees tucked close, her arm looped around my waist with unconscious possessiveness. Her breathing was deep and steady, the kind kids managed when their bodies finally decided the world could wait.
Three people. All asleep. All close.
My chest hurt.
I stared at the wall and let my body catch up to the fact that I was here. That I was home. That the air smelled like old wood and dust and coffee instead. Like Uncle Ray had been through the room before I woke up.
My fingers curled into the blanket. My hands were still trembling, faintly, like my nervous system hadn’t gotten the memo that the immediate danger passed. My heart thudded heavier than it needed to, each beat a reminder that I was still here, whether I felt ready for that or not.
Wyatt shifted in his sleep. The movement was small, almost nothing, but I felt it through my knees. His brow furrowed for a second, like he was chasing something in the dark. His hand tightened on my ankle, then loosened again.
My stomach rolled. Not with fear this time. With something worse. I swallowed, throat dry, and tried not to replay the night in fragments. The cabin. Colin’s voice. The way timetwisted into something meaningless. The way I held myself together by sheer spite.
