Chapter 41
PENELOPE
Irise through darkness like someone swimming up through deep water.
Slowly.
Heavily.
Reluctantly.
My body feels distant, far away from me, as if I am housed inside a shell I only half-recognise.
There’s no pain, not exactly. Just a stiffness, a dull ache under everything, like bruised earth after a storm.
My limbs are heavy, softened by whatever medication they gave me, as if I were forged from warm clay that hasn’t fully hardened yet.
I try to lift my fingers.
They twitch against something warm.
A hand.
Someone’s hand wrapped around mine.
I try again, pushing toward the surface of myself, and a breath escapes me, a thin, cracked whisper of air. My eyelids drag open with the stubborn weight of stone slabs.
Light spills in softly, dim and gold, like a candle cupped inside someone’s palm.
And then, him.
Billy sits beside the bed, angled toward me as if he has been trying to summon me awake with the sheer force of his presence.
His hair is damp, the usually upright springy coils of deep brown are weighted down by water, little drips hitting the shoulders of his clean shirt.
His warm brown skin is pale but whole. It makes my throat tighten because I know what they did to him, I watched it, and yet there is no evidence on the surface now.
Only the stiffness in his posture betrays him.
Only the way he holds himself a little too carefully.
His eyes snap open the instant mine do. His bright glacial blues finding my deep dark ones like the underworld demanded it.
And for one impossible, aching heartbeat, he looks like he’s forgotten how to breathe.
“Penelope,” he whispers, like he’s saying a prayer, or a word he never thought he’d be able to say again.
I try to speak but the air catches in my throat. He leans closer instantly, brushing his thumb over the back of my hand. The touch is so gentle I almost break apart.
“I’m here,” he murmurs, voice low, steadying. “You’re safe. You’re awake.”
Safe.
The word trembles inside me like a lie told kindly.
But before I can question it, before I can reach for him or the memories that lurk behind the last thing I remember, something moves in his arms.
Something small.
My eyes drag downward, and for the first time I see what he is holding.
A baby.
Our baby.
Wrapped in soft white cloth, tiny face hidden against my husband’s chest. My breath stops entirely. The world narrows. I can’t feel the stiffness anymore; I can’t feel anything but a tidal wave of raw, primal emotion that shakes me from the inside out.
Billy watches me with a fragile, breaking softness, as if my reaction is the only proof he needs that I’m truly awake.
“He’s healthy,” he says quietly, voice hoarse. “Strong. Perfect.”
My throat burns.
I open my mouth, but the emotion sticks there, choking me until tears spill from the corners of my eyes.
“A boy.” I manage, a smile cracking my dry lips. “He’s okay?” I question, the words barely sound.
His lips pull up into a smile. A real one. A soft one that looks like sunlight cracking through a shuttered window.
“He’s better than okay,” he whispers. “He’s been waiting for you.”
Billy shifts carefully, reverently, and brings the baby closer so I can see him better. The tiniest face peeks out, crushed-rose lips, soft cheeks flushed with life, a little furrow between his brows like he’s already judging the world he’s been born into.
He is beautiful.
Dangerously so.
Beautiful in a way that hurts.
“How…?” I try, swallowing, “How did- What happened?”
Billy glances down at our son before answering, as if protecting him from the memory of it.
“You went into labour suddenly. Too fast. The bleeding…” His voice cracks like old wood snapping. He clears it, but it doesn’t fully repair. “You lost a lot of blood. They had to do an emergency section to save you both.”
Emergency.
Blood.
Save.
The words land like heavy stones, each one sinking deeper into me. My hand instinctively moves toward my stomach, and I feel the bandage, thick, cool beneath the blankets.
There’s no pain.
Not yet.
Only an emptiness.
A trembling weightlessness.
Billy sees the fear forming across my face and leans in until his forehead nearly touches mine.
“They fixed everything,” he promises. “The doctors said the surgery went well. You were unconscious for hours. You had a transfusion but… you’re stable now. Strong.” His voice softens. “You’re safe.”
There it is again.
The lie.
Safe.
The word circles me like something unreal, something precious and fractured and temporary. Because I know where I am. I know what this place truly is.
“You… you carried me? Or-” I stop, the memory of him crawling toward me slicing through my mind like a blade.
He freezes, sorrow blackening the warmth in his eyes, “I tried,” he whispers. “I wasn’t fast enough. Gore reached you first.”
His older brother.
The lash in his hand.
The guilt in his eyes.
I swallow, my chest tightening with too many emotions layered over each other, fear, relief, grief, shame.
“You were hurt,” I say, my eyes dropping to his arms, his torso, searching for the damage I know should be there. “Your back…”
“They treated it,” he answers quickly. “Gone are the days when they let wounds fester for the sake of devotion.” A humourless smirk touches his mouth. “Fortunately.”
I don’t believe him.
Not fully.
Not even close.
He’s holding himself too still, too stiffly, too carefully. His shoulders look like they’re bearing invisible chains. But I let him lie to me because I understand why he’s doing it. He wants to be the strong one this time. He needs to be.
I look at the baby again, unable to hold myself back. My fingers brush the edge of his blanket. He stirs, stretching one impossibly tiny hand. His skin is warm. Softer than anything I’ve ever touched.
A sob breaks free from my chest.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, not even sure who I’m apologising to, my Pair, my son, myself. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen.”
Billy’s hand moves to my cheek, turning my face gently toward him.
“None of this is your fault.”
“It is,” I breathe. “I ran. I-”
“You survived.” His voice sharpens with a fierce, quiet intensity. “You protected him. You protected yourself. And I would take a thousand lashings if it meant you lived.” His eyes burn dark when he says it, a shadowed devotion that feels both holy and terrifying.
There is something dangerously poetic in the way he looks at me.
Like I am the battlefield he chooses to bleed for.
Like my survival is his only theology.
I feel myself trembling.
The darkness in him has always frightened me.
But the love he threads through it, the gentleness he reserves only for me, that is what truly unravels me.
He looks down at our son again, and the expression that crosses his face is almost indescribable. Soft. Reverent. Terrified. A man who would raze the world to protect something he can barely believe he deserves.
“Do you want to hold him?” he asks.
My chest caves inward with love and fear all tangled together.
“Yes,” I whisper, breathless. “Please.”
He moves slowly, carefully placing the tiny bundle into my arms. The weight of our son settles against me, warm and fragile and impossibly real.
I break.
Quietly, helplessly.
My tears fall into his blanket, each one warm against the fabric. He makes a tiny squeak of sound, a newborn protest, and my entire heart folds around him like wings.
Protection.
He is here, real, alive.
Mine.
Billy watches us, eyes filled with something so raw it feels like lightning trapped behind his irises.
“You did this,” he whispers. “You carried him. You kept him safe even when you couldn’t keep yourself safe. You saved him.”
“No,” I murmur, looking at the baby’s peaceful face. “We saved him.”
He leans closer, his voice dropping to a hush that curls around my spine.
“No, Penelope. You saved me.”
The words hit me like a physical touch.
There is darkness in him. Deep, ancient, wound-tight. But in this moment, I see the shape of his devotion with painful clarity. He would burn for me. Bleed for me. Break for me.
Kneel for me.
And he did.
I want to tell him that I don’t deserve it. I want to tell him I’m still afraid. I want to tell him I don’t know how to love someone who insists on sacrificing himself.
But before I can speak, he shifts, drawing a slow, unsteady breath.
His expression changes, something heavy settles into his eyes. Something I’ve never seen there before.
“Penelope,” he says quietly. I look up, my eyes coming to meet his, only when they do, they crash, collide, shatter. “There’s something I need to tell you.” He hesitates, the moment stretching taut and cold. “About why I was sent to find you in the group home all those years ago.”
And the world falls away from beneath me once more.