Page 86 of Until You

“Almost dying isn’t weak. Surviving seems quite the opposite actually.”

“Aren’t we the glass half full kind of girl.”

“We are.” I pat the spot on the bed beside me.

He stares at my hand, then at me, before crawling up the bed. He grabs a pillow, places it on my lap, and rests his head there. My hands go to his head automatically, my fingers threading through his hair as he loses himself to his thought.

He’s trusting me. He just let me see the vulnerable side of him, and he’s still choosing to trust me.

How can he think that’s weak? Opening up to someone after they’ve seen you at your lowest is the definition of strength in my book.

“Justin, my best friend and partner of eight years, and I went on a call. It was an apartment complex like a million others we’d been to. We were checking out a complaint that one of their neighbors had tried to lure their ten-year-old daughter into his apartment.” He blows out a long, steadying breath. “The guy opened the door and invited us in like he had nothing to hide. After a few minutes of us asking questions, a baby cried in one of the bedrooms.”

I lean over and press a kiss to his temple. A little show of support as he opens up to me.

“He went to check on his baby? The baby? Hell if we knew at the time. But he was taking too fucking long, and we started to realize there wasn’t a single baby thing in the place. No baby monitor. No bottles near the sink. No toys or blankets. Nothing.”

“Oh God,” I murmur, imagining how he might have felt when the realization hit.

“Something was hinky, and we both knew it. Justin lifted his chin toward the closed bedroom door the guy had disappeared behind. We positioned ourselves to breach it—Justin with his hand on the knob and me with my gun raised for cover. And just as he was about to make entry, the fucking baby cried again. I pulled my finger off the trigger for a second—because there was a baby in there—and then all hell broke loose.” He rolls onto his back and looks up at me from where his head is in my lap.

The pain etched in the lines of his face breaks my heart. I’m afraid to hear what happened next. “I can’t even imagine,” I murmur and feel lame in doing so, but I want him to know—as he does me—that I hear him. That I’m listening.

“I remember bits and pieces of what happened after that. The boom of gunfire. The door splintering. Justin’s body jerking as each bullet hit him. Emptying my clip in return as I dove for cover . . . then realizing I’d been hit myself.” He moves his hand to cover the jagged scar on his lower abdomen. “Justin’s ragged breathing. The smell of the gunpowder. My own pain as I faded in and out. Christ, all I could think about was that I couldn’t leave the girls. That I hadn’t told them I loved them that morning.” He scrubs a hand over his face and closes his eyes for a few moments, I’m assuming to collect himself.

I can’t imagine how agonizing it had to have been for him. Trapped, terrified and bleeding out, listening to his friend dying, and worrying about his girls. My heart hurts for him and the memories that clearly haunt him.

“How did you eventually get out of there?” I ask.

“SWAT breached at some point. By then, I was pretty much out of it.” He moves his hand up to where his tattoo covers another bullet wound. “I was shot in the crossfire during that . . . but don’t remember much of that really.”

“Jesus, Crew. What happened to Justin? He made it, right? And the baby? The guy?”

“The baby wasn’t his. Hell, the kid wasn’t even in his apartment—just a neighbor’s we could hear through his open window. He used it as a means to arm himself.” He shrugs. “As for the guy? He didn’t make it. I hit him a couple of times, but SWAT finished him off.”

“And Justin?” I ask softly, feeling callous that I don’t react to the loss of the man’s life, but at the same time, look at who he hurt.

Crew shifts suddenly onto his side so all I can see is his profile now. I get the feeling he doesn’t want me meeting his eyes and looking too closely for some reason.

“He made it.” I can barely hear him when he speaks. “A T10 spinal injury. Paralyzed from the waist down.”

I suck in a breath when I hear the words. When I realize Crew’s not only dealing with his own injuries and their aftermath, but also dealing with confronting the longstanding ones to his partner. His best friend.

Uncertain what to say, I settle on the one thing I can’t stop thinking about. “You’re a hero, Crew. You saved his life. If you hadn’t returned fire then—”

“No. You don’t get it.” His tone is a mixture of frustration and anger as his body tenses before emitting a measured exhale, almost as if he’s trying to control his reaction. “I’m no fucking hero, Tenny. Far from it. My hesitation cost Justin the use of his legs. Cost him the chance at a normal life. At the possibility of kids. I mean . . .”

And there it is. It isn’t the damage the bullets caused as it tore through his body or the nightmares that haunt him that weigh the heaviest on him. It’s the unfounded guilt that his split-second hesitation is what sentenced Justin to life in a wheelchair. That he is responsible.

“Crew.” I lean forward and press a kiss to the top of his head, closing my eyes with my lips there and just breathing him in.

“Every time I talk to the goddamn therapist, I end up back here. In a bed, covered in sweat, reliving every fucking moment of it,” he says softly. Anger would be easier to take, but the quiet resignation in his voice is gut-wrenching. “You’d think if she’s going to stir all that shit up, I’d at least get something out of it. I’d at least be cleared to go back . . . maybe then . . . maybe then it would just help push it all away, and I can forget about it.”

And therein lies his somber mood earlier tonight. I’d at least be cleared to go back . . .

I lean back against the pillows again and highly doubt he’ll ever forget about it. How could he?

“Does Justin have the same nightmares?”