Chapter 40
CHAPTER FORTY
MATTHEW
Acouple of weeks had passed since the infamous sleepover, and we hadn’t had a chance to catch up all together since then. Oren and Thorne were busy collecting information, using Oren’s past to retrieve accounts even Liam didn’t know about.
Simon and Liam chimed in over the phone, and I couldn’t blame them. They’d spent so much time apart, and their recovery was necessary. None of us blamed them for keeping a bit more distance, but they both made efforts to check in for updates.
But Lev and I?
We frequented the Graves’ house often, partially so I could hang out with Thorne and he could hang out with Oren. We’d all grown closer, and the first time we’d hung out, just the four of us, I sobbed.
I didn’t realize how much it meant to me for them to not only accept Lev, but to accept me without any judgment. I’d caused so much pain in their lives, but neither of them looked at me with even an ounce of ire. They truly loved me, and I knew that’s what I’d been missing for so long.
I’d tried to do life on my own, shoving everyone away, but I understood now it was a trauma response meant to protect me. But that supposed protection hurt me until I ended up in that bunker alone with scattered pills and empty liquor bottles.
Something I refused to ever do again because I had loving friends and a boyfriend—a boyfriend who loved me endlessly.
Lev was the best thing to ever happen to me, and I’m pretty sure I gained new wrinkles from all the smiling I did around him.
He filled my life with such radiance, and I couldn’t explain it, not even to Thorne.
There was something so drastically perfect about him that I couldn’t help but fall further in love.
Love.
When had I ever used that term… but for him? For Lev?
That was the truest statement possible. What we had was love, and I wanted to tell him that in person. He was everything I wanted, needed, and I couldn’t wait to see his face when I told him.
And well, I might have made Oren bake a batch of his favorite cookies to give him with my sentiment. The box sat in the passenger seat along with the flowers I’d picked from the local florist.
Was this too much?
Possibly… but it felt right, and I refused to keep myself from a life I wanted—a life with him.
Gripping the steering wheel, my thumb tapped against the leather as I waited for the light to turn green. Still about twenty minutes away, I huffed in frustration. The traffic was fucking ridiculous, and I missed him.
Clicking through the screen on the center dash, his name popped up, Little Fox, and I smiled. God, I was fucking smitten as I pressed the call icon.
With the light turning, I pressed on the gas as I shifted gears. Nothing was quite as sexy as a manual transmission, and it earned perks with my sweetheart too.
All it took was one ring before the ringing ended. Grinning, I spoke before he could. “Hey, sweetheart.”
“Well, hello, my beautiful raven. What’s your ETA?”
Driving around an elderly woman on her fucking deathbed, I sighed. “About twenty minutes. Traffic is fucking awful, and I just want to be there already.”
“Just as I want you here—” A muffled shout sounded from the other end, cutting Lev off from what he was saying. Pausing, he listened before he responded, not to me, but to whoever had spoken. “What the fuck do you mean you accepted a package—”
The line crackled before the call ceased. “Lev?” I blurted, as if the phone hadn’t already been hung up.
Weaving around another car, I clicked the call button again. Trying not to think the worst, I inhaled, my breaths shuddering with each passing second, the ringing didn’t end.
When it reached voicemail, I panicked, cursing out loud as my foot rammed the gas pedal down. Too many people wanted him dead, and he wasn’t unfamiliar with unsolicited gifts. He didn’t recognize the mail he received, and that commotion?
It sounded bad. Maybe… maybe I was overreacting and nothing happened, but dread seeped further.
Curling my hand around the wheel, I shifted once more, darting between cars as if I were being chased. There wasn’t time to waste, and every minute I lingered was another minute something… something could be happening to him.
Rooted so deeply in worry that I didn’t notice the turn I needed to take, I had to haul my wheel right to make it. Nearly hitting a sedan, their horn blasted at me, but I was too occupied with the building in front of me.
Half of it was crumbling, and parts were on fire as smoke billowed into the cloudless sky. I didn’t even remember parking the car or getting out, let alone when I started running toward the burning compound.
Shoes slapping against the ground, they echoed loudly in my ears, keeping in tempo with the blaring of my heartbeat.
No. No, no, no, no, no…
It was Lev’s office… his office that’d taken the brunt of the attack. It… It had to have been a bomb, the destruction too familiar to me to be anything else.
Oh, God, was he… was he…
My eyes watered from the ash as I rushed toward the rubble, not even caring if I burned. I needed to find him.
Coughing, I jumped over a fallen beam, heading in the direction I knew his office used to be. “Lev!” I screamed, inhaling lungfuls of tainted smoke. “Little… Little Fox!”
There was no answer as lights flickered from the half that wasn’t ruined, power sparking with various surges. It didn’t help that the fire was growing, flames catching onto any surface it could devour.
“Fuck,” I wheezed, resting my mouth and nose in the crook of my arm.
Blinking away the soot, I continued forward, ignoring the increasing heat with each footfall. Where were the fucking firefighters? Where were the fucking officers?
The destruction would’ve easily been heard, and God, I just needed him.
“Levander! Sweetheart, please!” I cried, scanning for anything that indicated his position.
I was right where his office used to be, and I could barely make out that cherrywine desk, now splintered across the ground like fucked-up foliage. Stepping over the threshold, a gut-wrenching scream greeted me, undoubtedly belonging to the man I was searching for.
Buried under a mixture of drywall and wood, his horrid shouts spurred me into action. Collapsing to my knees, I tore at the debris, not even caring if the pieces cut into my palms.
“I-I’m here, Lev!” Another cough agitated my voice. “I’m here!”
Biting back my emotions, his continued cries of anguish tore what little semblance of sanity I had left. A guttural wail left me as I tossed pieces away, some blazing with residual heat.
Screaming as it burned my palms, I flung them behind me, grabbing one after another despite the heat.
“M-Matt…” The usual strength was absent from his articulation, and a deep-seated fear replaced it, mixed with insurmountable anguish.
“Lev, hold on!” Voice breaking, the wreckage finally cleared, and what I witnessed made me want to vomit.
Lev… my precious… my precious everything was covered in splotches of red on his right side. His skin was melted along the upper portion of his arm, trailing upward to his neck. Clothes frayed, it exposed his right hip bone, and the blisters there were brutal.
The smell of burnt flesh reached me next, and I couldn’t help the tears that spilled onto my cheeks. “Oh… Oh, god… Lev… We… I need to get… get you to a hospital.”
And that was only the start of his injuries, various cuts seeping crimson, and I couldn’t even tell if anything was broken. Every inhale was shallow, worsening with each breath as I gazed at those dimming olive green irises.
What if his spine snapped? What if the burns are too severe? What if he is bleeding internally? What if… What if he bleeds to death? What if he dies?
“M-Matt…” he whimpered, his chest shuddering with the sign of slowed breathing. Lids fluttering, he struggled to keep his attention focused on me. “I-I wasn’t … strong enough for…”
Eyes slowly closing, his words faded.
“Lev?” Bringing my palm to his cheek, I brushed some of the soot away. “Hey, sweetheart, I’m right here. I made it.”
At his lack of response, everything stopped. The burn in my lungs, the pounding of my heart, the crackle of the fire—everything.
“No,” I breathed, glancing down at his unmoving figure. “No, no, no, no… No!”
Patting the side of his face, his head lolled to the side. The motion was so unnatural that my hand darted away, fingers trembling as the color… that vibrancy he carried began to vanish.
He wasn’t… He wasn’t breathing.
An inhumane sound escaped my lips as my wails heightened, stealing oxygen with every shuddered inhale.
Pressing the heel of my palm into his chest, my fingers interlaced on top as I started compressions, that military training driving my ability to function. I ignored the cracks that resounded from his ribs as I kept a steady pace, ignoring the burning as I inhaled ash.
Leaning down, I breathed into him twice, pausing between mouthfuls of air to see if his chest rose. When it didn’t, a sob tore through me. “God, please. I love you, Lev. You can’t… You can’t fucking leave me. You c-can’t. You can’t!”
Placing my hands to start again, my arm was pulled back gently as my gaze lifted to a firefighter. “It’s okay. We’re here to help.”
“He… He’s not… He’s not…”
Arms wrapped around my shoulders, and with one solid yank, I was pulled back from Lev. Thrashing, my nails dug into gloves, but it did nothing as a voice rattled my ears.
“Hey, we’ve got to get out from the fire so the paramedics can look at him. If you’re stuck here, we can’t help.”
Slackening slightly, I kept my eyes glued to his frame as the firefighter pulled him from the wreckage. His arms dangled, head flopping against the man’s chest as I sobbed again.
He couldn’t be dead. He couldn’t leave me. Not… not after I’d finally found him. He was everything I needed and more. He saved me, and I wanted to spend every moment with him. I fucking loved him, and the universe wanted to steal that from me already?
Brightness swathed my vision as I blinked it away. Unfamiliar hands pressed against my shoulder, but I paid them no attention as the firefighter placed Lev on a sterile stretcher.
“H-Him,” I wheezed, the smoke impacting my breathing more than I realized. “Help… h-help him…”
“We will.” Another replied as they heaved Lev’s lifeless frame from the ground.
The path back outside was a blur, my mind struggling to comprehend everything that happened, and solely fixed on the image of Lev dying in my arms. Somehow landing in front of another medic, they sat me on the back of an ambulance opposite the one the firefighters quickly worked to put Lev inside.
Realizing what was happening, I pushed off the door, sliding from the ambulance floor as my soles hit the ground. A rough cough spilled from me at the motion, but I didn’t stop walking. “N-No… I go with h-him.”
“Sir! You need oxygen!”
“In… there, with him.”
Wheezing, I keeled over, plastering my hands on my knees before pushing myself upright. I’d rather fucking die than be separated from him when he needed me. They… were taking him away, and he wasn’t… I needed to know if he was okay. I needed to know that they were doing everything to help him.
She rested a hand on my shoulder. “Sir, we need to give them room to work. If you’re in that ambulance, they won’t be able to cater to that man as much as they need to.”
“I-I won’t bother them. Just… please. He… He means everything,” I cried, faltering slightly as a weight settled on my chest.
The double doors shut, concealing Lev from me as that siren blared to life. It rolled backward, and my voice was barely audible above its chiming. “Please… please.”
Her brows pulled together, a wave of sorrow coating her expression. Expecting her to deny my request again, the raise of her hand caught me off guard. The ambulance stopped, one of the back doors swinging open, and the chaos inside brought forth another wave of panic.
“What, Barlow?”
“Is there room to take him with you?”
“Yes, but we need to move now.”
Glancing over at me, she offered a hand, steadying my balance as she led me to Lev. Her attention shifted to the man who helped me into the ambulance. “He needs oxygen.”
“On it. We’ll see you at the hospital.”
“Copy that.”
Slipping into a chair, a mask was pulled over my nose as I breathed in a high concentration of air. Unable to keep my eyes off Lev, I took in the substance as the medics worked to bring him back to life.
He was everything.
My home.
My love.
My life.
And if… if the word rid me of his presence, I would take it with me. I’d kill every single fucking one of them who harmed my little fox and turn that sorrow into unbridled rage—a rage to rival the heavens.
Because if the love of my life died, so would I, and the earth would crack and bleed with me.