Chapter 38
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Kira
Ieye the twelve designer bags lined up in the walk-in closet and then scrub at my face.
This is insane.
The closet is bigger than our living room was.
I can’t believe I’m staying in the house of the guy who burnt down my house, and I’m actually contemplating wearing the clothes he bought for me.
No doubt they are nice… and clean. I am still wearing the leggings Nix brought me for my check-out at Memorial, the ones with the rip in the seam on my inner thigh.
I wonder when she grabbed them. Did she know what Jax was going to do and make sure to pick something before he could burn it all?
In a haste, I dig into one of the bags and pull out a receipt. I want to know just when everyone started lying to me. But sure enough, the receipt is dated three days ago, and the truth curdles something inside of me. I crumple the paper in my hand and plop onto the obscenely plush ottoman.
I don’t know how to get out of this. I don’t know how to make Nix see reason.
How can she be on his side? I get that he says there was going to be a warrant issued to search our house, but burning it down?
No one does that! No one sane, at least. He literally took away everything we had to our name in this world, and I’m just supposed to be…
what, thankful? And Nix is just… okay with it?
My eyes well up at the mess of my life. I really thought we were going to make it.
Nix is so close to graduation, almost in college.
Neither of us got knocked up, neither of us ended up in the system or homeless.
I held it all down, kept us fed, kept the lights on.
As useless as my high school diploma is, I got it, and I made sure she got hers.
We were so close. She would have started to live a normal life, get the college experience with proper housing and three square meals.
She would have healed from the trauma of our lives—something I don’t think I’ll ever get.
But it was finally going to be okay. Because she would have gotten a job, a good one.
I would have spared her from the sleazy bar life.
But now, how could she ever recover from this?
Killing someone? Burning their body? It’s clear she’s not in her right mind—if her just skipping on as if everything is fine in the wake of our house being reduced to ash is any indicator.
I’ve failed her. I’ve failed us.
We are literally under the roof of the most insufferable man that I’ve ever met, and she won’t listen. She thinks I’m being unreasonable, asking me why I would want to stay in a back room when we could be here.
And yeah, it would be rough in the back of Bell’s, but we aren’t safe here. Jax is savage. He doesn’t stop to consider consequences. He does whatever he sees fit without any remorse. That makes him dangerous.
The bedroom door opens, and I bolt up, quickly swiping the tears from my face. I practically leap into the room, hoping Nix has finally come to her senses. But when I realize Jax is the one shutting the door behind him—and flipping the lock—I freeze.
The urge to run into his arms jars me.
What the fuck?
I literally was just thinking about how cutthroat he is.
But now that he’s in front of me—simple black shirt hugging his biceps so perfectly that it brings out the ink on his skin—my chest softens in relief.
I want to run to him, bury my face against him, and let his arms wrap around me—something in me telling me he’ll fix this.
He’ll kill whoever burned down my house.
But that’s not right.
Because he’s the one who did it.
Rage sears me from the inside out. How could he? How could he do this to me? Make me feel like I could trust him and lean on him, and then mar me so badly?
I don’t know who I hate more—him or me.
Because I was so, so stupid, and still am, wanting his hand to wipe away my tears when it’s the same hand that caused them. God, I’m just as fucked up in the head as Nix.
“What do you want?” I snap, keeping a death grip on the door frame to the closet, my fingers aching from the pressure.
“Did you find the clothes?” There’s a hesitance in the way he steps into the room, like he’s treading lightly. It’s unnervingly unlike him. “If you don’t like any of it, I can give you my card. You can go shopping, get what you want. You and Nix.”
I narrow my eyes despite the offer and softness. “We don’t want anything from you.”
He hangs his head and sighs, the sound more painful than exasperated. “Forever or just right now?”
“What?” I find myself releasing my grip on the frame, agitated that he’s not responding to my venom.
“Because I need to know what I’m in for.” He looks up at me from under hooded eyes. “If you’re going to hate me forever, I need to prepare myself.”
I blink, not used to this side of him. It makes my skin prickle. I don’t like it.
“Are you insane?” I guffaw, trying to push us back into hostility. “Yes, I’m going to hate you forever. You burned down my house!”
“And I don’t regret it,” he says, standing straighter.
There it is. The audacity. That’s better.
“And I would do it again,” he continues. “Despite the fucking guilt that’s eating me alive right now, I would do it again because it was the only way to keep you safe.”
“Oh, yeah, I’m so safe now.” I shake my head, feeling more on level ground.
“I’m homeless, Jax.” I hate the way I add his name, hate that I like saying it.
“Me and my sister,” I tack on so that it’s not only me he’s wounded, so that it’s not so personal.
We don’t need to get personal. It was clearly a mistake to let my shields down. It’s better if they stay up.
“I would never let you be homeless. You or Nix.” He has the gall to look offended.
“I find that hard to believe, considering you burned—”
“I burned down your house. Fuck, yes, I know.” He runs a hand through his hair. “But forever? That’s a long time to hate someone who was trying to protect you.”
I squirm in my skin. God, why does he sound so repentant? And why is his gaze so pained? And why is my traitorous heart reacting to it? I don’t want him to be sorry. I want him to be an arrogant prick so I can hate him and keep myself safe.
“Why do you even care?” I grind out, hating the tremble in my voice. “You… you kill people for a living. You’re a…a sociopath! And an arsonist!” I grasp at straws, on the cusp of stupid tears.
“Why do I care?” He laughs, sharp and broken.
“Jesus fucking Christ, Kira. Do you have any idea what you’ve done to me?
I can’t think clearly. I can’t fucking breathe around the guilt of burning your house down, and trust me, I would love to be the sociopath,” he winces, “that you apparently think I am, if it would end this torture. But I’m not.
I’m a weak, pathetic version of myself when it comes to you.
And I have no doubt my brother is just as dumbstruck by your sister as well, seeing as how he was so desperate to help her.
Your Noland blood sears away logic. I should have killed you that first night to—”
“And you’re still threatening to kill me,” I latch onto the only part of his words that don’t make me want to run into his arms and forgive him.
His eyes flash. “I’m trying to make you understand that I knew what you were going to do to me, and I still couldn’t do it, that you rattle my brain so thoroughly that I keep making mistakes. Starting with bringing you here.”
“Oh, thank God.” I sag theatrically, if only to hide the pathetic hurt I shouldn’t feel. “Kick us out so I never have to see your psychotic face again.”
“You haven’t seen psychotic yet,” he growls under his breath before pinning me with a stare.
“Wherever you go, I’ll be there. You think if you get a new place, I won’t be parked outside every night?
You think if you faint again, it won’t be me who catches you, that it won’t be my arms that carry you?
I dare you to try and walk home at two a.m. without spotting me ten paces behind.
” He steps closer. “You will never get rid of me, Kira. No matter how much you hate me.”
I try desperately to hold my ground, but the things he’s saying, the closer he gets, the harder it is to stay angry.
He smells like him—like leather and smoke and warmth—and the way he towers over me, so strong and solid and unyielding.
He’s everything I want to fall into, everything I want to latch onto.
“You will see my face every day,” he continues, prowling closer until I swear I can feel the thump of his heart in the air, “because I can’t not see your face.”
I swallow despite myself. There’s such earnest in his dark eyes, such fire and fury and resonance as he takes in my features. Embarrassment burns my cheeks because I know that my expression lacks the anger I want it to have. But I don’t dare move, afraid that if I do, I’ll fall right into him.
“I’ll buy you a new house,” he says, voice suddenly softer as if he knows I’m wilting. “I know it can’t replace what you’ve lost, but I would never let you be homeless. Just… stay here,” he cups my cheek, “for a little bit longer.”
I close my eyes against the touch, as if the heat will dissipate if I don’t see the person behind it.
Because I can’t bring myself to pull away.
A mixture of self-loathing and comfort tears my heart in two.
I’m helpless to fight off the soft place of rest he’s giving me.
I’m so tired, so very, very tired. He said I make him a weak, pathetic version of himself, but he does the same to me.
“Jax.” Tears well behind my eyelids.
“Don’t fight it,” he murmurs, his tone tender but resolute. “It’s easier if you don’t fight it.”