Harlen is leaning over his knees, his palms chasing rain from his face.
“What the fuck do I do with that?” I repeat, taking another swig.
“Gimme that.” Harlen reaches out, snatching the bottle from me, taking it to his mouth.
I drill my palms back through my soaked hair, massaging my fingers into my scalp. “What happens if I do this, if I let myself be in her life, and she finds something good inside, something she trusts, and I fuck her up again? What if I find myself in another hole? But one…one that’s just way too fucking deep and dark to get out of?”
“I’ll drag your ass out,” Harlen says, his cadence telling me it’s not up for discussion. “I won’t let you hurt her, man.”
Silence hangs a beat, wraps itself around us at the same time lightning zig-zags across the sky.
“But what if I do?”
My question is weak, a whisper beneath my breath, but Harlen’s reply is harder, like stone.
“Not gonna happen.”
I sniff, hang my head. “That’s a lot of belief you got in me,” I tell him.
I feel his hand wrap around my shoulder, his fingers squeeze. I glance back at him.
He blinks, then rasps, “We all gotta believe in something, right?”
I palm my face. “What does that even mean?”
Harlen looks away.
So do I.
We exhale at the same time.
I stare ahead at the thick film of water, rain drumming down like bullets against my shoulders.
“What does that even mean?” I repeat.
When there’s a lull in the rain, Harlen turns his eyes on me.
“Motherfucker, it means I’m choosing to believe inyou.”
The whistle of a bullet has me shooting up in bed.
My eyes are frantic, and fear is a thudding clump in my chest.
I press my hand to my heart, willing the battered organ to settle and feeling the clamminess of my nightmare at the surface of my skin.
My ears latch onto a grinding sound, and it takes me a moment to catch my bearings, realizing exactly where I am, who’s room I’m in, before the events of yesterday come clambering in.
The murder.
The suicide.
The reporters.
The return of him.
All the blood.
Chase Keller.
