“But I kept going.”
I mean… that’s true. He could have stopped, but…
“You had no way of knowing if he’d get back up. He was going to kill me, or keep me… put me on display. You love me, right?”
That haunted expression turns back to me, and he nods. “More than anything, Loh.”
“Then trust me when I say I know a monster when I see it… and it isn’t you. You’regood.”
I’m shocked when tears pool in his eyes… even more shocked when he wraps me up in his arms and starts crying.
I want to stay here and hold him—I want to keep him in the shelter of my arms until the tears run dry and he realizes that what he did was out of survival, not malice.
I want a lot of things… but we don’t have time for that. Every second that passes, the blood is drying on the ground, and it’s going to be harder to get out. Every minute that goes by is another chance of someone wandering into Kyle Penton’s house and finding his body there. Every tear is another little sluice of blood down my side that’s going to make it harder for me to move a dead body.
We haveso muchto do. I pull my phone out to see what time it is, and my eyes widen at the string of texts on my screen.
Twenty-four unread messages. All from Oakley. All in escalating degrees ofwhere the fuck are youandis he okayandyou’re both probably dead.
It’s the last one that makes my heart sink, though.
It’s been an hour. If you don’t call me in the next ten minutes, I’m calling the cops.
Oh…shit.
I fumble Donovan’s phone from my pocket and hit the call button and shove it at him.
“What?” he says, his eyes wide and his expression still a little dazed. Oakley’s voice comes through the speaker, yelling something aboutif he’s hurt I’ll kill youandcalling the police now.
“Talk to your best friend before he gets us both arrested.”
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
DONOVAN
My palms sweatas I walk through the upper floors of the arena, heading for a boardroom I haven’t seen since I signed my contract at the beginning of the year.
It’s happening today.
Three months after everything went sideways and I almost lost my life along with everything that’s precious to me, I am finally here in this space. On my phone sits a text from Shiloh that I’ve read over and over again since I woke up to find our bed empty and the light on in the small spare room we converted into a studio for him.
I love you.
Don’t disturb me.
You’ll see when you get home.
We’re out of syrup.
I pull my phone out and read it again as I stand outside the closed door to the boardroom. Picking up the pieces of mybroken apartment was easy; finding a new place to live that ticked all our boxes was the real challenge. Eventually, we settled into a semi-detached property that’s almost halfway between the arena and the campus.
Shiloh likes to point out that he spends fifteen minutes more than I do on his way home, and I let that slide. I don’t remind him that picking up breakfast at Sal’s for us on my way back to where we live makes up for that extra time, because the one time I did, he commented that if I didn’t want to spend that extra time picking up my pancakes, I could always just come straight home after practice. He wasn’t wrong, but I don’t think I’m wrong either.
“You ready for this, Donny?” a very familiar voice says from behind me. Krystal walks over to me and offers a grin, her eyes sparkling and her blonde hair tossed back in some kind of messy bun.
I offer a nod and a smile to the one person who’s become my biggest confidant here in this team. It’s because of her taking over my social media entirely and managing any sort of blowback from the comment section of my posts that I made it through the days and weeks after I killed a man with my own hands.
She’s a fucking angel, and I don’t know how to repay her for all that she’s done. Shiloh suggested a fruit bouquet. Maybe that’s the way to go, but after this is over, I’m sure I’ll owe her far more than some cut-up melons and strawberries on sticks.
