35. Brontë
Anyone Who Knows What Love Is (Will Understand) - Irma Thomas
“ W e are confident that we will have the suspect in custody within the next twenty-four hours,” says Detective Sloan Laurent to the Channel Nine News reporter. Her expression is stoic but sharp as she speaks with confidence, peering into the camera.
“And you believe that the suspect is still within the city limits?” asks the reporter.
“That’s correct. We have no reason to believe that Jael Hendrix has managed to leave Easton. We will work diligently to locate her and any accomplices.”
“Can you confirm she does have someone working with her? An anonymous source submitted footage of her with a large man at the subway?—”
“I can neither confirm nor deny that piece of information at this time,” interrupts Detective Laurent. “It is an ongoing, active police investigation, and at the moment, we are doing everything within our power to locate the suspect and anyone assisting her. We will find her.”
I tap the ‘x’ on the video to close it out. The screen darkens to black again, though Laurent’s words echo around the room.
We’ve taken refuge in an abandoned warehouse only a few blocks down from Imani’s townhouse. The old building creaks around us, shrouded in dark shadows and cobwebs. The space reeks of dust and mold after what’s probably years of neglect.
From the distance somewhere, helicopter blades whir, their searchlights sweeping over every crevice the city has to offer. The beam flashes against the broken window of the room we’re in and I shrink further into the darkness, avoiding its spotlight.
Jael’s perched on a stack of dusty boxes in the corner, her knees drawn up to her chest. The blank look on her face would seem detached to most, but I know better—she’s experiencing one of her freeze ups, where she’s so overwhelmed, she can’t function.
Her dark eyes are wide and unfocused, staring off into the shadows. She gives no reaction as I walk her phone over and hand it back to her—or try to, she doesn’t reach out to take it. She’s gone completely still, too numbed to move.
There’s a lot that could be said in a moment like this. Many things we need to iron out in order to move forward.
Archer Hurst might be an insufferable, smug prick, but he was right about one thing—we need to be smart and proactive about what’s happening.
The longer we drag our feet, the closer Detective Laurent and the rest of the Easton PD get to tracking us down. He, Ryu and Imani are already gone and they’re not even the subject of a city-wide police manhunt.
We are.
Jael is.
The words get stuck in my throat. I breathe through the frustration tightening in my chest and crouch in front of her.
My gaze roams over her, taking in every broken piece. Her torn and dirtied clothes. The dried blood that clings to her chin and cheek and anywhere else where it splattered. Her full lips are downturned slightly, her afro curls cloudy and dense as they frame her face.
The spark that had once radiated from her has been extinguished. It’s been snuffed out, leaving a shell of herself in front of me.
I pull her toward me, my arms slipping around her waist so I can hold her close. I bury my face in her hair and inhale the scent of smoke from the fire. It’s what we both smell like, but on her the scent becomes addictive.
It reminds me I have her in my arms after years of lurking in the shadows.
Tension seeps out of her. She softens against me as I draw back and frame her face in my massive hands. She feels fragile, even if she’s been strong, activating my most protective instincts.
No matter what lies ahead of us, I’ll be by her side. I’ll defend her until my broken, disfigured body has nothing left.
I wipe a tear away with my thumb and let my gaze speak for me. It says the things I struggle to verbalize otherwise.
She understands, sniffling. “I just… I wanted to find her. I wanted to fix everything. All the broken things from our past. But now…” She lets out a trembling breath that turns into a sob. “I’ve made everything worse. So much worse.”
“No.”
She blinks, her glossy eyes flicking toward mine.
I can think of no other way to communicate the devotion I want her to feel than doing something I’ve never done before. My hands leave her face to reach up toward mine, peeling away the minotaur mask I’ve hidden behind for so long.
I tear it off and cast it aside where it thumps against the cold, cracked floorboards. Where it will remain from this point on.
My scarred face hers to peer at, I meet her gaze so she can see the man beneath the mask. The man who’s willing to go down in a blaze of fire and bloodshed with her.
She spends a second studying me. Her brown orbs track the jagged scars and raised flesh in silence with the same fascination she’s always held when looking at my hideous face.
But there’s no disgust to be found—no judgment anywhere.
“Bront?,” she murmurs softly.
I cup her face again and silence any words she has to say with a kiss. My lips on hers, we kiss deeply and slowly, like we have all the time in the world. As helicopters scour the city and squad cars fill the streets, we’re hidden away in an abandoned warehouse making our own time.
We lose ourselves to the immediate hunger that comes on strong. After weeks apart, we’ve gone too long without each other.
Jael needs me as my lips press to hers and she releases a keening whimper. She twines her fingers in my shirt and tugs as if urging me to come closer.
Overtake her in all the ways I’ve done in the past.
My carnal instincts answer her pleas. I kiss her harder and force the zipper down on her jeans. I drag them down her hips as she parts her lips and pushes her slick tongue into my mouth.
We’re suddenly whipped up into a frenzy, wrenching clothes away, knocking into the pile of boxes on our way to the wall. They crash to the floor with a heavy thud, some of them spilling open. I bring her back up against the wall and she notches her legs at my waist as I slide into her wet heat in a single stroke.
The reunion feels so fucking good, we moan against each other’s lips. She clings to me, trembling from the intensity of my cock buried inside her. Pulsing warmth surrounds me. Heat that’s soft and wet and makes me lose my mind.
It turns me into the beast, the monster I am deep down.
I growl as I draw my hips back and then slam into her, forcing my way inside, spreading her slick walls that much more open so she can take me. She’s so tight, so fucking snug around me, that her entire body seizes up with my every thrust.
Jael cries as I fuck her, tears of pain, of pleasure, of relief pouring out of her.
She needs this.
I pound into her, feeding off her, giving her what her pussy milks out of me.
We reconnect like this, two shadows hidden away in the dark. Two creatures no one else understands, but it doesn’t matter because we have each other.
My cock slips deep into her spasming pussy and I’ve never felt more alive as her shiny brown eyes find mine and we ride the intense wave together. We hold each other’s gaze as our climax arrives in a burst of mind-numbing, body-racking pleasure.
I come inside her, framing her face in the palm of my hands, as I place a kiss on her soft lips.
When we pull apart, she releases a little sigh that tells me she feels what I do. But, for once, I need to speak for both of us.
“We can make it out of this.”
Her brows knit. “Bront?…”
“We can escape. You might not get to be with your sister,” I admit in my deep, hoarse voice. “But you’ll always have me. I’ll always be by your side. We can make it out together.”
Her breath catches, a few more tears slipping down her cheeks, but this time, it’s not from mourning. It’s not sorrowful but hopeful. She nods, the hint of a smile tugging at the corner of her lips.
“Okay. Let’s do it. Let’s escape together.”
I kiss her again, harder this time, as the sound of helicopters grows louder, their searchlights sweeping across the warehouse window. But I don’t care. Nothing matters except the vow we’ve made.
Grabbing her hand once we’re dressed, I pull her with me toward the door. We’re going to make it out of the city and start over somewhere new, or we’re going to die trying.