Chapter Eighteen
~ Floyd ~
Ransom tried to get up, but the movement failed him. I reached out, and he let me help, which told me more about his headspace than any words would’ve. I hauled him to standing, and for a second we just stood shoulder to shoulder, facing the ruined wall.
He broke first. “I should’ve known it was coming. I always do. Can’t let anything nice stay around me for long.”
I bristled at that. “He attacked you because of me, too. Because of this,” I said, gesturing at the space between us. “Maybe he wanted to send a message.”
Ransom’s lip curled. “Yeah, message received. Go back to the closet or we’ll burn you out.”
“Not going to happen,” I said. My voice cracked, and I felt the heat rising in my face, but I didn’t care if he saw. “Not in my fucking county.”
He tried to laugh, but it was broken glass. “I’d like to see you enforce that.”
I put a hand on his shoulder, squeezed hard enough that it bordered on painful. “I will,” I said. “I’ll find him. And when I do, I’ll make sure he never touches anything of yours again.”
He looked at me, the sarcasm gone. For a second, the mask dropped and I saw the real damage—the fear, the self-loathing, the part of him that still believed he deserved this.
I wanted to say a thousand things: that he was wrong, that I’d protect him, that nobody was going to chase us out of this place ever again.
But I’d never been good at words, not when it counted.
So I just stood with him, while he took one last look at the ruins of his life.
He said, quiet, “I don’t want to start over. I just want to go home.”
The word stuck in my chest. I wanted to promise him a home, but all I could offer was the shell of one.
“Let’s get out of here,” I said, and this time, when I put my arm around him, he leaned in.
As we walked out, I looked back once at the wall. The color wasn’t right, and the scars were still there, but I knew how this kind of thing worked. You could cover the wounds all you wanted. It never really hid what happened underneath.
I made a promise, there in the blue glow of a ruined shop, that whoever did this was going to pay. Not because I was the sheriff. Not because I owed the town. But because I belonged to the man next to me, and I protected what was mine.
With everything I had left.
* * * *
The house had never felt this full. I don’t mean full of people—hell, it was just us—but full of something denser.
Denser than grief. Denser than pain. It was like the air itself didn’t know what to do with two men stubborn enough to let the world burn down around them and still crawl home together.
The first thing I did was get him inside, past the half-finished porch and the pile of packages my ex-wife had left on the stoop. Ransom made a noise about the state of the entryway, but I shushed him and dragged him straight through to the kitchen.
“You hungry?” I asked, even though I knew the answer.
He stared at the floor, brow creased. “Not really.”
“Bullshit,” I said, already rooting through the fridge. “You haven’t eaten since the hospital.”
He didn’t argue. Just stood in the archway, arms folded so tight he looked like he might splinter.
His eyes were fixed on the far corner, where the dog bed sat empty, the old beagle having gone to my sister’s after the first night Ransom stayed over.
I’d meant to get another dog, but now the idea seemed too risky. Like I might curse it.
I managed to microwave leftovers without further incident—meatloaf, mashed potatoes, the kind of food that sticks in your gut and tells you to keep going.
I watched him eat. The first few bites, he just chewed, slow, mechanical.
But after a while he started to speed up, jaw moving with a little more purpose.
The flush of his cheeks came back, the scar on his left eyebrow standing out against the pink.
He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Don’t get used to this, Sheriff. Once my shop’s back up, you’re not getting any more free meals.”
I snorted, the motion nearly doubling me over. The ribs were a constant low burn, but I was good at compartmentalizing. “If I wanted to date a chef, I’d have gone for Rosie.”
“Rosie’s taken,” he said, and that was true enough.
He finished eating, then washed the plate and set it to dry, which is when I knew he was stalling.
I said, “You can shower first, if you want.”
He hesitated, then nodded. I listened as he climbed the stairs. The man moved like a predator, all economy and intent, but now there was a drag to his steps, a drag that made me want to go up after him, hold him at the top of the landing and tell him it was all going to be okay.
Instead, I went to the living room and turned on the fire, the old gas unit whooshing to life and painting the walls with a flicker of orange.
I sat on the edge of the couch, breathing careful, waiting for the sound of the water to stop.
I expected it to be quick—he wasn’t a man who lingered over creature comforts—but the minutes stretched. Ten, fifteen, almost twenty.
When he came down, he wore one of my old flannels, rolled up at the sleeves, and sweatpants that were two inches too short. He looked ridiculous, and also more at home than I’d ever seen him.
He didn’t sit. Just stood behind the couch, staring at the fire.
After a while, I asked, “You want to talk about it?”
“No.” He circled the coffee table twice, as if warming up to the idea. Then, “I lost everything today.”
I wanted to argue, but I knew the rules. You don’t fix it, you don’t contradict it, you just let him say it.
He kept going. “Every fucking design I ever made. My first tattoo machine. The bike parts. My books. All of it, gone.”
“It’s not gone,” I said. “It’s just broken.”
He made a sound—half laugh, half sob—and kicked the edge of the table, not hard but enough to make the whiskey glasses rattle. Then, suddenly, he was on his knees in front of the couch, hands gripping the edge so tight his knuckles went bone-white.
“I don’t know if I can do it again,” he said.
I leaned forward, careful of the pain, and rested my hand on his head. The hair was still damp from the shower, and the tips stuck up in a way that made him look younger, softer.
“You don’t have to,” I said. “Not tonight.”
He bent forward until his head touched my knee.
He shook once, then again, and finally the dam broke.
He started to cry. Not the dignified kind, not the kind you wipe away and never speak of, but the ugly, shuddering sobs of a man who’s lost the one thing that kept him upright.
His shoulders shook, the sound muffled by denim, and I let it happen, let him lean into me as hard as he needed.
I stroked his hair, ignoring the shrieks of pain from my ribs, and tried not to think about what I’d do if he didn’t stop. I’d never been good at comfort, but right now I would have set myself on fire if it helped.
After a while, he stilled. The sound faded to ragged breaths, then silence.
He looked up, eyes swollen and red. “Sorry,” he said, voice raw. “Didn’t mean to lose it.”
“Fuck that,” I said. “You get to lose it as much as you want.”
He tried to smile, failed, then just slumped forward, head on my lap, hands curled around my thighs. I thought about saying something more, something hopeful, but the best I could do was rest my hand on his back, palm flat over his spine, and let him feel the weight of me.
We stayed that way for a long time.
Eventually, I shifted, pulling him up onto the couch. He came willingly, and I wrapped my arms around him, holding him close, feeling every line of muscle and scar. His breathing slowed, but every few minutes I could feel a fresh tremor run through him, like aftershocks from the main event.
I pressed my face into the top of his head. “You’re home, Ransom. You’re safe.”
He didn’t answer, but I felt the way he clung to me, the way his hands tightened around my waist.
The fire cracked and spit, painting shadows on the far wall.
After a while, I felt him relax. Just a little. I knew it wouldn’t last, not with what we had ahead, but it was enough for tonight.
I closed my eyes, let the pain fade to background noise, and thought about the day Knox had shown up at the station with a black eye and a broken nose and refused to press charges. “Some fights,” he said, “aren’t about who wins. They’re just about who’s still standing at the end.”
Ransom was still standing. So was I.
We’d figure the rest out later.
For now, I held him, and didn’t let go.
After the shop destruction and the hospital and the world watching us like we were a fucking reality show, the house went dead quiet at night.
I could hear the clock in the hallway, ticking off the seconds, the slow build of wind as it curled around the eaves, but mostly what I heard was his breathing.
Ransom didn’t snore. Never had. But when he finally slept, really slept, his chest made this low, contented noise—almost a purr, if I was the kind of sap who’d use that word.
I lay on my side, arm draped over his stomach, tracing the lines of ink with a fingertip.
He didn’t react, not even when I ran the edge of my nail along the place where the wolf tattoo vanished under the hem of his t-shirt.
Maybe he was too tired, or maybe he just didn’t think he was worth waking up for.
He always slept on his back, like he was daring the universe to hit him again. The light from the hallway made a faint halo around his head, highlighting the red in his bear and the long, reckless spike of hair that never lay flat, no matter what he did.
I couldn’t sleep. Didn’t even bother trying. The pain in my ribs was manageable now, but my mind wouldn’t stop. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw the wall in his shop, the shadow where the graffiti had been, the wild look in his eyes when he realized what had been lost.
I didn’t realize I was crying until he turned toward me, eyes open, and reached up to brush a thumb under my eye.
“You’re not supposed to be the soft one,” he said. His voice was rough with sleep, but there was a smile in it.
“Too late,” I replied, trying to laugh. “Guess we’re both defective.”
He rolled onto his side to face me. The blankets tangled around his hips, the pale blue glow from outside painting his tattoos in shades of navy and gray. He looked at me for a long time, like he was memorizing every detail.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. “Really.”
I thought about lying, but there was no point. Not anymore.
“I’m scared,” I said, voice barely a whisper.
He frowned, not in anger, but confusion. “Of what?”
“That I can’t protect you,” I said. “That this… us… is a target. That I’ll fuck it up and lose you anyway.”
He didn’t say anything for a long time. Just reached over and ran his fingers through my hair, slow and careful.
“You know what scares me?” he asked.
I shook my head.
“That you’ll decide it’s not worth it. That you’ll go back to being alone. That I’ll wake up one day and you’ll be gone, and the world will just keep moving like nothing happened.”
I swallowed hard, the words stuck in my throat. “Not going to happen.”
He smiled, and it was the real one—the rare kind, all crooked teeth and stubborn hope. “Good. Because if you leave, I’ll have to burn the town down. And that’s a lot of paperwork.”
I let out a breath I didn’t know I’d been holding. “You’re an idiot.”
“Takes one to know one, Sheriff.”
He leaned in, pressed his lips to mine, just for a second. Gentle, like he was afraid I might shatter. I pulled him closer, ignoring the flare in my ribs, and held on tight.
After a while, I felt him relax, his breathing slow and steady. He tucked his head under my chin and wrapped an arm around my waist, pulling me in until there was no space left.
I stared at the ceiling, watching the shadows flicker.
I thought about tomorrow. About going to the station and pulling every resource I had. About finding the bastard who’d done this, and making sure he never hurt Ransom—or anyone else—again. But mostly, I thought about the way he looked right now: safe, peaceful, alive.
I’d been a cop for twenty years. I’d seen people die over less than a grudge, over less than a rumor, over nothing at all. I’d learned that you can’t save everyone. But you can try.
I’d try for him.
I lay there, listening to his heart beating under my hand, and made a silent promise: whatever it took, whoever it pissed off, I’d protect him. Not because it was my job, but because it was my choice.
He was mine, and I was his.
And in the dark, that was all I needed.