Chapter 52 Dex - Present
fifty-two
Dex - Present
SAFE AND LOVED.
I didn’t know the man at my feet. He’d lost weight, his cheeks were hollow, his skin pale.
His hair was dull and greasy. He was smiling up at me, but beyond the smile, beyond the tears that filled his eyes, my honey-eyed inferno was missing.
There was no life in him. No spark. This wasn’t my rabbit.
A year had taken a lot from both of us. It had started with what had almost been the end of my life, and it ended now, with the shell of his. Because I might have been the one who nearly died, but Jonah was the ghost.
“I missed you,” he said, dull eyes glassy and blurred with fresh tears.
Pain laced with rage coursed through me. I reached for him, my fingers threading through his hair, tightening, pulling his head back so he couldn’t look away from me if he tried. Because how dare he? How dare he say that to me when he was the one who left?
Despite the burn he must have felt in his scalp, Jonah didn’t react. He still smiled and didn’t try to pull away.
“I thought I killed you.” He sniffed, but it did little to help with his current state, tears and snot weeping like open wounds. “I didn’t know what to do. I thought I could outrun it. But I couldn’t. Wherever I went, you followed me.” His smile faded. “You are here, aren’t you?”
The days, the weeks, the months I’d spent without him had built something huge and ugly inside of me. But now that he was here, now that I was looking at him again, touching him again, all I wanted was to hold him for the rest of our lives.
My grip in his hair loosened, my hand smoothing over the strands. My fingertips trailed over his cheek. He turned into my palm, soaking up the warmth from it like he was starved of it.
“I’m here,” I told him.
“You’re real?” he asked, as if he still didn’t believe me.
“I’m real.”
Before I’d sent Harper to Jonah, there had been so many emotions at war within me.
Betrayal because he had left me. Rage because he promised he never would.
Grief because I had lost him. Mostly, though, there was a deep ache in my chest. A void deeper than anyone else had ever left behind. I longed for him with every breath.
Harper had updated me on the state Jonah was in when he left him. Jonah was alive, but he wasn’t living. He existed in a constant state of survival, stuck between the life he’d destroyed and the way forward. Unable to find it for himself.
Seeing it for myself was different. I wanted to hold onto the rage, to the hurt, but how could I? He had hurt himself far more than he’d ever hurt me.
He had run because it was his instinct to run, and I’d chased him for the same reason. But it was more than instinct. It was purpose. Through it all, we were still each other’s purpose.
I could have caught him months ago, but he hadn’t been ready.
I hadn’t been ready. His words that day hurt me more than any stab wound.
I couldn’t show up, have him see I was alive, then turn and run from me again anyway.
I’d survived it once. I couldn’t do it again.
I needed him to give up, and he needed me there to pick him up when he did.
It’s why when I’d seen him slowing down I’d sent Harper to him.
Because I needed to see him without giving him the chance to reject me.
I’d sent Harper to change out the tracker so I wouldn’t lose him if Jonah wanted to keep going, but I’d also asked him to test Jonah.
To befriend him. To see if he was still loyal to me.
To get a glimpse into the man I’d get back no matter what.
But also so that I’d know how long to wait.
So I’d know when it was safe for me to give my heart to him again.
Harper didn’t have the chance to report back until after Jonah had discovered who he really was. As soon as he’d told me everything, I was there.
Now that I had him, I had to find him again. I had to bring him back to himself. He was in pieces at my feet, and he needed me to put them back together. I would. I always would.
He sobbed. Arms wrapped around my legs. Tears soaked into my jeans.
There was so much we needed to talk about, but it wasn’t the time for that. Now it was time to pick up his pieces and carry them home. “I’m here, baby.”
He sobbed harder. Loud, guttural sobs from some place deep inside him. I attempted to take a step back, but he only clung to me tighter.
“I’m not going anywhere,” I assured him, but he still didn’t want to let go.
Letting my cane drop to the ground, I pulled at his arms until I eased his hold enough to sit down. Without prompting, he was on me again, crawling into my lap. His arms wrapped around me, his wet face buried into my neck.
My hand smoothed over his back, and through the fabric I could feel the ridges of his spine.
Heat rose inside me. His tears beckoned my own.
Jonah’s pain called out to me, and mine to him.
Both demanded to be seen, to be soothed, to be released.
It wasn’t needed anymore. Because we finally had each other again.
“I’m sorry,” he cried into my skin. “I’m so sorry.”
I knew he was. Knew he had been all this time, but he was scared, and he hadn’t known what else to do. My tears fell… for him, for myself, for the time we’d lost together and the mistakes we’d both made.
“Sorry,” he repeated over and over, his voice hitching with his sobs. I held him tighter.
We cried until the pain eased. Until it was freed. Leaving us empty and ready to fill its place with comfort. Only comfort from now on.
“Will you come with me?” I whispered, long after we’d fallen silent.
Jonah nodded, finally ready to allow a sliver of space between us again. He stood and reached for my cane before I had the chance to. New tears welled in his eyes as he stared at it.
“Hey.” I smoothed them away with my thumb. “I’m okay.”
A wet sniff as he nodded.
In silence, we collected his things from his car and took them to my truck. In silence, we drove to the closest town, and I paid for a room. In silence, we entered it, shed our clothing, and showered together.
Jonah cried again as I washed him, my fingertips learning the ways his body had changed.
Then he washed me and cried even harder, his fingers lingering over the jagged scar on my forearm, on my thigh, at my side, on my back.
They trailed higher, so gentle as they parted the short curls of my hair, seeking the scar he feared the most. The one that hurt him far more than me.
I let him take his time to meet it properly so he could let go of the fear.
“I’m so sorry,” he sobbed.
“I know, Rabbit.” The truth.
“It was an accident.”
“I know.”
I turned slowly to face him, and his body stiffened as our eyes met again. He still wasn’t in them, his fire extinguished. I needed to bring it back.
After shutting off the water, I reached for a towel, drying him and then myself before taking his hand and leading him back to the bed. Short distances without the cane were manageable, if uncomfortable, but with Jonah’s hand in mine it was the best I had felt all year.
We slipped under the covers, his body against mine for the first time in so long. Another wound healed.
“Where have you been?” he asked me, voice tired.
My fingers tucked a long strand of damp hair behind his ear. It wasn’t an easy story for me to tell, and it wouldn’t be easy for him to hear. But there had been enough secrets between us. Enough distance. Jonah deserved answers.
“After you left.” My throat caught on the word, and I cleared it, composing myself before I continued.
“And Roy found me, he called Bryce. Bryce called Bull, and Bull did the rest. He was a doctor once, and he saved me. I was asleep for a long time, Rabbit. And then I wasn’t.
When I woke up, I couldn’t move much. Talking was difficult for a while, and I had to learn how to walk again. ”
Tears flowed freely, a damp circle forming under his face on the pillow.
“I fought a lot with Bull. I was determined to get to you, and he wouldn’t let me leave before I was healed.
But I knew where you were, and I watched you as you went.
I was always coming for you. It just took longer than I expected.
And when I was ready, you were still running from me.
I thought maybe you needed to. So I stayed close by, and I waited for you to stop. ”
This time I didn’t fight the heat as it pulled from inside me again. There was a wound that still needed to be soothed. “No. I wasn’t ready to see you. I couldn’t watch you run away from me again. You have stopped now, haven’t you, Rabbit?”
Jonah sobbed, arms around me, then legs. “I’ve stopped. I’ll never leave you again. I didn’t mean it when I said that. I never wanted to leave you. I was just so scared. I did so many bad things, and I didn’t know how to deal with it. It was all too much too fast.”
“You’re not bad, baby. You know that, right? No matter what you did, you could never be bad. You protected me. You did the best you could.”
He trembled in my arms, his face wet on my skin again. “W-what happened… to the bodies?”
I held him tighter. “Bull dealt with it all. They’re gone. No one will find them. No one will come for you. You’re safe. We’re safe.”
“And… the fire?” He whispered the last word, as if he wasn’t sure if he should bring it up. As if I still didn’t know.
“Police deemed it an accident.”
“That’s… not what I meant.”
“Look at me.” I forced him back, just enough to look into his eyes again. “You killed a murderer. An abuser. A monster. One that kicked us out of our home. One that—” My voice caught but I pushed through. “One that hurt me so many times. I love you for what you did for me.”
I meant every word. Jonah had killed for me.
Had protected me far more than anyone else ever had.
I’d kill for him too if anyone ever threatened him.
It didn’t matter if they were supposed to be family.
Nothing mattered except him. I’d burn the world down to keep him safe, just as he would do the same for me.
“Say it again,” he whispered.
“I love you.”
“Again.”
“I fucking love you. I love you more than I thought it was possible to love someone. I love you in ways I can’t ever put into words.
I love your fire. I love your temper. I love when you’re needy and clingy and entirely unreasonable.
I love your body, and I love your mind. I love every moment when you’re with me.
You’re fucking mine, Jonah Hargreaves. And I love you. ”
His pupils dilated, and I saw it, his spark. It was small, but it was there.
“Show me. Let me feel it. Love me, Devil. Show me I’m yours. Love me and let me feel it. Let me taste the love on your lips, let me drink it from your skin and feel the heat of it burning inside me. Burn me with it.”