Chapter 38 Jonah - Past
thirty-eight
Jonah - Past
NOT SAFE.
Dex was gone.
I returned from the diner, and he was just gone. Roy said he was picking up some parts for the shop, but that was a lie. He was lying to me. Dex had lied to me. His bike wasn’t here. I might not know shit about cars, but I know you can’t pick up parts on a fucking motorcycle.
“Where is he really?” I asked, intending to sound as stern as possible, but my voice didn’t listen. Emotion, raw and vulnerable and disgusting, laced my words.
“Told you.”
“I don’t believe you.”
He grunted in response, arms crossed over his chest as he watched me from the desk.
“Who is he with?”
Silence.
“What did he say he was going to do?”
Roy’s eyes flicked from mine to the coffee in my hand and back.
“Did he at least say when he’d be back?”
“Jesus, kid.” Roy grabbed a handful of tissues from the desk and marched over to me, prying the cup from my vise-like grip. Only then did I register the wetness on my trembling fingers.
I let him take the cup. My breath was coming in short and fast. I tried to steady it.
When he attempted to take my hand, I yanked it back, snatching the tissues from him instead to wipe up the spilled coffee.
My skin was pink underneath from the hot liquid, but I hardly felt it.
All I felt was the heat inside me, scalding, boiling, burning me from the inside out.
I didn’t know how to let it out without Dex.
I paced, watching the empty lot outside the shop window. Waiting. Listening. Roy went back to the desk, but I still felt the weight of his eyes on me. I hated it. It made my skin feel too tight, too itchy. If he were as concerned as he was pretending to be, he would just tell me where Dex was.
Rather than writhe under his relentless supervision, I pushed the door open and stepped into the cool air, taking my panic with me out into the lot, and yeah, maybe I’d scare off the customers, but who the fuck cared? Dex was gone.
I pulled my phone from my pocket and called him until the line rang out, and then I called him again. Stupid fucking bastard lied to me about that too.
Heat bubbled over inside me, rising up my throat. It made my jaw tighten and my vision blur. I ran my fingers through my hair, tugged at it, tugged harder. The pain across my scalp forced some of the heat to recede. I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t fucking breathe.
My back thumped against the brick of the shop’s outer wall, the leather probably getting scraped up as I slid down the rough surface until my ass hit the cold ground. I still yanked at handfuls of hair over my scalp.
What could I do? What if he was hurt? What if he was in trouble?
I couldn’t go to him. I didn’t know where he was. Even if I did, how would I get there? My vision blurred further, and even though I tugged at my hair until the strands came free, it wasn’t enough anymore.
“Hey,” a voice spoke to me softly, like he was trying not to spook a feral animal. Roy had followed me outside. I didn’t want him near me. Didn’t want him to look at me. I wanted only one person, and he wasn’t here. He wasn’t here.
Every breath burned as I inhaled, unable to hold it in for a moment before I was chasing the next one, and the next. Too much. Not enough. Dex.
A warm hand rested on my shoulder, and I pulled away as if struck by it. “No,” I choked out around a sob. Was I crying?
“Shit,” Roy grumbled, hovering over me without touching me again, clearly uncertain what to do, and I didn’t have answers for him.
“Dex,” I choked out again.
“He’ll be here, kid. Any minute now he’ll be here, and he’ll be okay.” Roy’s words were supposed to soothe, but they didn’t. He didn’t know. He was a liar. He’d already lied, and he was doing it again.
Dex.
I wanted to scream, but I couldn’t get enough air into my lungs. Was I suffocating? Was I going to die because I couldn’t remember how to fucking breathe? The sound of my own ragged breathing drowned out everything else.
Knowing Roy was there, watching me, made it worse.
But I couldn’t tell him to fuck off like I desperately wanted to.
I couldn’t tell him anything. My words were caught in my chest, tangled like a ball of string I couldn’t find the end to.
Building, building, building. Heavy. Itchy. Hot. Too much. Dex.
I needed Dex. Needed him more than air. Needed him more than I’d ever needed another person.
Even Adaline. I hadn’t felt like this for a long time, not since I was a child.
Not since I had her to help me. She always knew how to help me.
She was the only one who tried. Until Dex. But she was gone now. And so was he.
I blamed them both. I only felt like this because they let me feel.
They made me think it was safe. Without them I’d learned to feel only rage, because I knew how to deal with that, how to use it.
My rage felt like a weapon, like a protection.
I wasn’t protected now. My rage was out of reach, and I wasn’t safe.
Not safe. Not safe. Not safe.
The only reason I didn’t throw up was that my mouth and throat had dried up, air passing in and out too rapidly to be useful. Until my head spun. Until my vision was blurring and my limbs were stiff and trembling. Twitching like a dying spider as it curled in on itself. Vulnerable. Weak. Pathetic.
Not safe.
Then I was being touched again, cradled by warmth, the scent of smoke and leather and safety as familiar arms wrapped around me. “Shhhh… I’m here. I’ve got you, Rabbit.”
Dex.
I sobbed. Heat flowed freely down my face as I let him surround me.
“I’ve got you,” he said calmly, always so calm. I breathed deeper, my body only accepting air when it tasted like him. The burning fire receding to embers in my core, his presence water over the flames. Drowning me. Saving me. “I’m right here.”
He was here. He was here with me, and he was safe.
My limbs unlocked, melted into him, falling and trusting him to catch me. He did. His hands smoothed over my hair, his touch soothing the hurt I’d inflicted.
I must have been a mess, but I didn’t care, and he didn’t seem to either as he held me tighter, letting me bury my damp face in the warmth of his neck. He was here. He’d come back.
I clung to him like I’d die without him, and honestly maybe I would.
It had felt like I was going to. But he was with me now, his pulse warm and beating beneath my lips.
I let it soothe me, like sunlight above the surface of deep water, guiding me up, guiding me back.
Only when my pulse matched his could I bring myself to pull away again.
“You left me,” I told him, whatever fire remained seeping into the words.
“I did. I’m so sorry, baby. I shouldn’t have done that.”
There was more I wanted to say, wanted to know. But now my head was heavy and spinning, and I felt so tired.
“Can you stand?” he asked, and I nodded softly, still giving him my scowl because I was too tired to give him anything else.
Dex pulled me to my feet, and I wiped the back of my hand across my face, trying to erase the evidence of the disgusting feelings that remained on my skin.
Roy wasn’t here anymore. He must have left when Dex had come back. He probably thought I was completely fucking ridiculous, and maybe he was right. I hated when anyone looked at me at all, and I’d let him see far too much.
“Come on.” Dex’s fingers laced between mine as he pulled me inside.
Thankfully, Roy was nowhere in sight as Dex made his way through the office and into the garage, and I let him pull me along with him until we reached an old Jeep in the back corner.
Dex opened the driver’s door and gestured inside.
I rolled my eyes, and the action only reminded me of how heavy they felt as I got in and he closed the door, walking round to the other side to get in beside me.
“Do you like it?” he asked me, looking hopeful.
“What?”
“The car.”
I shrugged one shoulder. “It’s fine. Why? Whose car is this?”
“It’s yours.”
I thought I was done crying, but as his words sunk in I felt that icky heat pooling behind them again. “You… you got me a car?”
He nodded. “It was supposed to be a surprise when it was finished. I still have to do a few more things, but then it’s all yours. You’ll have a way for us to get around, and you won’t ever be stuck in place.”
It was all too much, all of it too big to fit inside me, but I didn’t know where else to put it. So instead of speaking, I rested my hands on the wheel, sniffing as I nodded firmly, once, letting the tears fall again, feeling safe enough not to stop them when it was just the two of us.
“Come here, baby,” he said, his voice soothing and warm like nothing else I’d ever known. I wanted to be angry at him, wanted to hold on to my rage over the fact that he’d left me, that he’d lied. I couldn’t. Even now, when I was so broken because of him, I still wanted him.
My hands left the wheel and I went to him, climbing over the center console, my limbs and shoes knocking things awkwardly as I scrambled over it and into his lap.
Warm. Safe. His arms circled me, cradling me to him as if I were smaller than I was.
Lips pressed a soft kiss onto my hair, and then I was crying again.
We didn’t speak. I wasn’t sure if I’d even be able to. But this was enough. I let myself fall apart this time because I knew he was there to hold me together.
By the time I was done, what felt like hours later, I felt empty and exhausted. My eyes were too heavy to keep open, but still he held me close to him, waiting for me to be ready to just be again.
“Roy thinks I’m a freak,” I told him, my voice quiet and hoarse.
“He doesn’t think you’re a freak, baby,” Dex replied, his voice just as quiet. “He’s probably just worried. But you’re not a freak.”
I turned into him further, unsure if I believed his words. But it didn’t matter, not really. Not what Roy thought of me, or anyone else. The only person who mattered was here with me now, and he saw me. He knew me. He loved me. It’s all I needed.
“Will you be okay if I go back to work soon?”
Despite just thinking that I didn’t care what Roy thought, I decided I still didn’t want to see him again so soon. “Can I stay here?”
“Of course. This is yours now, baby. You can stay here as long as you want.”
“And you won’t leave again?”
“I won’t, I promise. I’ll stay in the garage where you can see me, and if you need me, I’ll come back and be here with you again.”
“You lied already.”
Dex inhaled deeply, trying to find the right words to say because he knew I was right. He couldn’t deny it, and if he even tried, I wouldn’t be able to handle it.
“I did,” he answered eventually. “I did, and I’m so sorry. I thought I was protecting you by keeping you out of it. But that was a mistake, and I know that now. And I’m so very sorry, Rabbit.”
I didn’t want his apology to soothe me, but he always had a way of influencing my emotions more than I wanted him to. Like parts of me obeyed him as if they belonged to him instead of myself. Like he possessed me.
“Fine,” I grumbled. “But if it happens again… I won’t forgive you.”
“It won’t happen again,” Dex told me, and against my better judgment, I trusted him.
The rest of the day passed uneventfully. When Dex was sure I was okay, he got back to work, bringing me a fresh coffee that apparently Roy had gone to get. I sipped as I hid out in the car—my car, that he was fixing just for me.
When it was time for lunch, he asked me if I wanted to go to the diner with him or just have him go pick something up for me.
While I did trust that he wouldn’t take off without me again, I still didn’t want him going anywhere I couldn’t be with him, so I had to leave the safety of the vehicle I’d locked myself away in.
I avoided Roy as much as possible, and he didn’t seem to mind that.
When the shop closed for the day and Roy left, I felt brave enough to leave the car again, only to hover around Dex as he continued the repairs on it.
I didn’t know shit about engines, but Dex still explained to me what he was doing, still tried to keep me involved even though I’d much rather watch him work than do it myself.
By the time he was done, it was late, and I was so tired.
Dex brought the Jeep out from its corner, and after I assured him I was perfectly capable of driving it—Richard having paid for my driving lessons when he still thought he’d eventually get something out of me—I drove home, following Dex on his bike.
We stumbled through the door, up the stairs, and into each other’s arms as we fell into bed.
I was hard and so was he, but it wasn’t about being sexual.
It was the connection, the intimacy. I needed to feel him on me—in me—so that we could be as close as possible.
So that my mind and my body were filled with nothing but him.
Only with him could I stop myself from spiraling when all I wanted to do was run and hide from the world.