“Home,” I whispered, wishing I could get out a full sentence without pain.
“I know,” she agreed, brushing a loose strand of hair back off my forehead. “He’ll come home. I’ve learned with Eli that sometimes you just have to let him work it out. In the meantime, you rest. He’ll be okay. I promise.”
Miranda’s absolute certainty eased my worry just enough that I closed my eyes and drifted back into sleep, hoping that Eli would work out his penance sooner rather than later. I didn’t need him to feel responsible. I just needed him to come home.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
ELI
“That’s it. We’re packing it in.”
I swung around to look at Maddox, my head throbbing with a pulse so deep it felt like it echoed down my spine. My mouth watered as my stomach rolled. I had to swallow back the nausea before I could say “No.”
That was all I could get out. I couldn’t fucking think through the drumbeats in my skull.
Just that one word was enough to catch the air in my lungs, and I coughed, cranking up the pain in my head another notch until I doubled over, thinking for just a second it was possible I was going to throw up, cough out my lungs, and pass out all at the same time.
“Man, seriously? I can’t believe you’re fighting me on this,” Maddox said. “You’re done. This was a fucked-up, stupid idea in the first place. At least Sylvie is in bed where she belongs. The doctor didn’t want you to leave the hospital. We had to swear we’d bring you straight home, strap you to the bed, and not let you leave. And instead, we’ve spent the last, what, ten hours driving around, following every goddamn lead no matter how thin, and we’ve gotnothing. Eli, dude is vapor, okay? Whatever’s fucking your head up, this is not the way to deal with it.”
I heard him. I did. I just didn’t want to acknowledge that he was right. This was a stupid, fucked-up idea. I was in shit shape. Probably shouldn’t have left the hospital. I definitely shouldn’t have left Sylvie’s side. But the idea that the bomber was still out there—still coming for Sylvie?—
Every time I thought of packing it in, I saw her face, blood streaking from her temple. Her eyes closed.
It had been so close. So fucking close.
I heard her voice.I love you, Eli.
Fucking hell. I hadn’t let it land in the moment, because I couldn’t concentrate on anything but disarming the bomb strapped to her goddamn chest. We’d had no time. I’d barely heard her; I was so focused. I hadn’t taken the time to say it back. But now I couldn’t stop hearing her.
I love you, Eli.
And she’d almost died because I was a fucking idiot. Because I didn’t tell her the truth about Silas. Because I thought I could put everybody in their little boxes. Keep myself safe. From what? Loss? More death? Hadn’t life taught me that nothing could protect me from that?
I forced myself upright and drew in a slow breath, praying it wouldn’t aggravate my lungs into another cough.
“Fine,” I said. “We’ll go back. I’ll get some sleep.”
I didn’t fight Maddox for the driver’s seat, alarmed at how grateful I was just to sit and close my eyes for a minute. I needed a bottle of headache meds and twelve hours of sleep. The headache pills I could handle. The sleep… I had to get back to Sylvie. I trusted Miranda and Wren, but being away from Sylvie was like a piece of myself was missing.
I needed her. Wanted her.
The SUV rolled to a stop, and I opened my eyes to see us parked at the curb in front of the building we called the barracks.
“Why are we here?” I hadn’t been back to the barracks since I grabbed my stuff to move into the safe house with Sylvie.
“You’re off duty, man,” Maddox said, sounding resigned but prepared for a fight.
“Then I’ll go back to the safe house and sleep there,” I said.
“No.” He shifted to face me, his jaw hard. “You’re off duty. You need sleep.”
“I need to see her,” I said, forcing the words out, hating that while they sounded like a statement, they felt like a plea. I wasn’t going to beg. But maybe I was. “Maddox, I?—”
He gave a sharp shake of his head and rubbed his palm over his shaved scalp. “Eli. Go inside. Get a shower and some sleep. Check in when you wake up, and we’ll talk. If Sylvie sees you right now,” he added before I could interrupt, “you’ll give her a fucking heart attack. You look like absolute dogshit. You need rest. A shower. You need to get your head on straight. When you do, we’ll talk about coming back.”
“You don’t get to make that call,” I said, knowing he was right and not caring. I needed to see her. My head throbbed, and I gritted my teeth.
I needed to kill the fucking asshole who’d almost taken Sylvie from me.
