Chapter 38 Jade
JADE
I'm still on the floor, my back against the wall, my wrists throbbing where the zip tie cut into my skin. Phoenix is kneeling in front of me, his hands covered in blood, his chest heaving, his eyes wild with something I've never seen before.
Behind him, Marcus's body lies in a spreading pool of red.
I should be horrified. I should be screaming, crying, falling apart. A man was just beaten to death in front of me.
But all I feel is relief and that I wish I could have done it myself.
It's over. Marcus can't hurt me anymore.
Phoenix's hands are shaking as he reaches for my face. He stops just before touching me, staring at his blood-soaked fingers like he's just realized what they've done.
He struggles to ask me if Marcus had raped me. He doesn’t say that word but I know that’s what he means. I reassure him that he stopped him just in time.
Something breaks in his expression. Relief and anguish and something darker, all warring for dominance. He pulls his hands back, clenching them into fists at his sides.
For a long moment, we just look at each other. Him kneeling in front of me, covered in blood. Me slumped against the wall, half-naked and trembling. A dead man cooling on the floor behind us. It should be horrifying. It should send me running.
Instead, I lean forward and press my lips to his.
The kiss is soft at first. Tentative. A question neither of us knows how to ask out loud. His breath catches, his whole body going still, like he's afraid to move. Afraid to break whatever fragile thing is happening between us.
Then something shifts.
My hands fist in his blood-soaked shirt and I pull him closer, harder, desperate for more.
The kiss turns urgent, almost violent—teeth and tongue and the metallic taste of Marcus's blood still on his skin.
I don't care. I need this. Need him. I need to feel something other than the horror that's trying to claw its way up my throat.
He groans against my mouth and his hands come up to grip my face, smearing red across my cheeks. He kisses me like he's drowning and I'm air. Like he almost lost me and now he'll never let go.
I want him.
Despite everything that just happened. Despite the body on the floor. Despite the blood. Despite all of it.
Maybe because of it.
He pulls back, breathing hard, his forehead pressed against mine.
"Jade." His voice is wrecked. "We shouldn't—you just went through—“
"I need you." My voice cracks. "Please. I need to feel you. I need to feel something that isn't him."
He searches my face, looking for doubt, for hesitation, for any sign that I don't mean it. He won't find one.
"Are you sure?"
"Yes." I pull at his shirt, desperate to get it off him, to get his skin against mine. "Please, Phoenix. Please."
Something shifts in his expression. The hesitation melts away, replaced by a fierce tenderness that makes my chest ache.
"Okay," he murmurs. "Okay. I've got you."
He lifts me off the floor like I weigh nothing, carrying me away from the blood and the body and the horror. He lays me down on the bed, his body covering mine.
I should feel trapped. After what just happened, I should panic at being pinned down.
But this is Phoenix. This is safety and home.
He's gentle in a way he's never been before. Every touch is careful, reverent, like he's afraid I'll break. He peels off my torn sweater and kisses the skin beneath, his lips tracing a path across my collarbone, my shoulders, the swell of my breasts.
"I'm so sorry," he whispers against my skin. "I'm so sorry I left you alone."
"It's not your fault."
"I should have been here."
"You're here now." I pull his face up to mine, forcing him to look at me. "You're here now. That's all that matters."
He kisses me again, slower this time, deeper. His hands slide down my body, pulling off the rest of my clothes, baring me to him completely. I reach for his shirt and he helps me tug it over his head, revealing the planes of his chest, the muscles of his stomach, the blood still drying on his skin.
We're both covered in Marcus's blood. It should disgust me. Instead, it feels like a baptism. Like we're being reborn together into something new.
Something darker.
When he finally enters me, I gasp. Not from pain, but from relief. From the feeling of being filled, completed, and claimed. He moves so slowly, his breath mingling with my breath.
"I've got you," he murmurs. "I've got you, Jade. You're safe. You're mine. No one's ever going to hurt you again."
The tears come without warning. They spill down my temples and into my hair, and I'm crying, really crying, while he moves inside me. But I don't want him to stop. Don't want him to pull away. I want him deeper.
"Don't stop," I choke out. "Please don't stop."
He doesn't stop. He keeps moving, keeps whispering my name, keeps holding me like I'm the most precious thing in the world. And when I finally shatter, it's with a sob that tears itself from somewhere deep inside me.
He follows me over the edge a moment later, groaning my name, his whole body shuddering against mine.
We stay tangled together for a long time afterward. Neither of us speaks. The fire crackles in the distance, and somewhere beyond, a dead man lies cooling on the floor.
Eventually, Phoenix presses a kiss to my forehead and pulls back.
"We need to go," he says quietly. "We can't stay here."
I glance toward the main room, toward the body I can't see from here but know is there. "What about—"
"I'll handle it. But not now. Not tonight." He cups my face in his hands. "Right now, I need to get you out of here. Get you somewhere safe."
"And then?"
"And then I'll come back and take care of it."
I want to ask how. Want to ask what "take care of it" means. But the truth is, I don't want to know. The less I know, the less I have to carry.
"Okay," I whisper.
He helps me up, his hands gentle despite everything they've done tonight.
We shower together in the small bathroom, washing away the blood and the sweat and the horror.
The water runs red, then pink, then clear.
He's careful with me—so careful—his fingers tender as he washes my hair, as he traces the bruises already forming on my skin.
Neither of us speaks. There's nothing to say.
He finds me some clean clothes, a sweater and sweatpants that swallow me whole, and dresses me like I'm something fragile. Maybe I am.
"Don't look," he says as he guides me toward the door. "Keep your eyes on me."
I do what he says. I keep my eyes locked on his face as we walk through the cabin, past Marcus's body. I don't look down. I don't look at the blood on the floor, the fire poker still lying where Phoenix dropped it.
I just hold his hand and let him lead me out into the cold night air.
The drive back to Malibu takes hours. I fall asleep somewhere along the way, my head against the window. When I wake up, the house is dark against the night sky, the ocean invisible beyond, only the sound of waves crashing somewhere below.
"We're here," Phoenix says softly.
He helps me inside, settles me on the sofa, wraps a blanket around my shoulders. I feel hollow and empty. Like someone has scooped out everything inside me and left only a shell.
"I need to go back," he says, crouching in front of me. "I need to... finish this."
"Now?"
"The longer I wait, the harder it gets." He takes my hands in his. "I'll be back tomorrow. Stay here and don’t answer the door or talk to anyone. Can you do that for me?"
I nod. My voice feels far away. "What are you going to do?"
He's quiet for a moment. Then: "What needs to be done."
He doesn't elaborate. I don't ask.
"I love you," he says. "You know that, right?"
It's the first time he's said it. The actual words.
"I know." I touch his face, this man who killed for me, who's about to drive back to a cabin in the mountains to dispose of a body. For me. "I love you, too."
A combination of gratitude and relief flickers in his eyes.
He kisses me softly. "I'll be back before dark. I promise."
Then he's gone.
I sit on the sofa and stare at the ocean through the windows. The waves crash against the shore, steady and relentless. It’s like nothing has changed.
I don't let myself think about what Phoenix is doing right now. Don't let myself picture him driving back up that mountain road, walking into that cabin, dealing with the body of the man he killed.
I just sit and wait.
I sleep a long time that night and well into the morning.
I spend the rest of the afternoon scrolling and watching stupid videos on my phone.
Phoenix comes back just as the sun is setting.
He looks exhausted. There are dark circles under his eyes, dirt under his fingernails, a haunted look on his face that he tries to hide when he sees me.
"It's done," he says.
I don't ask what "done" means. Don't ask where Marcus is now. Is he buried in the frozen woods, dumped in a ravine, or weighted down in a mountain lake? I don't want to know.
"No one is going to find him," Phoenix continues, his voice flat. "And no one is ever going to know what happened. Do you understand?"
I nod.
"This stays between us. Forever. I promise."
“I promise," I repeat.
He crosses the room and pulls me into his arms, holding me so tight I can barely breathe. He smells like pine and cold air and something else, something I don't want to identify.
"I'd burn the world down for you," he murmurs into my hair. "You know that, right?"
I do know.
That's what terrifies me.
And that's what makes me love him even more.