Chapter 40
“Are you nervous?”
Rex asks coming to stand beside me as I shake my hands out and practice deep breathing like Dr. Sherie instructed.
I snort a small sound and a little smile curves my lips as I look at him. He’s been something of a best friend to me all these months. Constantly there to catch me as I fall or pull me back from the brink of panic when my demons try to control me. He’s actually quite wonderful. Maybe in a different life I could have loved him like he lit my soul on fire, but I know such thoughts are pointless because only one man on this earth holds the gasoline.
“A bit,”
I respond on a sigh.
“Did you take your meds?”
Concern laces his voice and I roll my eyes.
“Of course not.”
“Har!”
He whisper shouts, chastising me as he always does.
“Calm down Rexy. I’ll take them later, for now I don’t need anything that’ll slow me down. I’ve waited so long for this opportunity and the last thing I can survive is this fucker slipping through my fingers again.”
“I understand,”
he says placing his hand over my chest, the gesture purely platonic. “At least tell me you took your heart rate regulation medicine”
His eyes plead with me to tell him that I did so, and I lie with a nod to placate him. If not he’d demand I return home and I couldn’t bare it.
Just then a feeling sparks in my body that tightens my muscles and speeds up said heart rate. An awareness I seem to still possess even after all this time. I always knew when Creek walked into a room, and in this case a field. A field outside of Marcus’s new compound, on the outskirts of Array City.
He was here. I knew it without having to look. I knew it before I heard an audible gasp. I knew it before it was confirmed as my name fell on a whisper from his unforgiving mouth. Rex told me he’d be here since their families were working together. That information had been the source of much anxiety and many sleepless nights. But what I knew more than anything was that that was completely irrelevant, and nothing mattered more than getting inside the compound, getting to B, and annihilating anyone who wasn’t a prisoner before I rip Marcus’s head from his shoulders with any force necessary.
I take another deep breath and prepare myself for the loathing and cruelty that was the love of my life before I begin twisting to face him.
Rex grasps my cheeks on both sides in his bigger hands before I could do so. “No. He doesn’t matter here. If it were up to me that asshole wouldn’t be here, he wouldn’t even be alive. Don’t look at him, don’t talk to him. Motherfucker doesn’t deserve to breathe the same air as you. He’s weak and you are Harlyn.”
His thumbs caress my cheek bones gently. “Remember that. I’m going back to the car to grab your med box. Stay right here, don’t move till I get back, okay?”
“Okay,”
I breathe.
His footsteps receded and I got back to my coping techniques that are vital on this dark night.
Last chance Har. Don’t fuck it up.
Looking up at the stars I close my eyes and talk to the only one I know that will always listen. “If it were up to me, I’d have spent the rest of my days doing your bidding. Whatever it took to ensure you were the greatest. I’m sorry that this will be the last thing I’ll ever do for you.”
The painful words were silent as I mouthed them. “I love you Cami. Until this day and always.”