Chapter 39
Chapter
Thirty-Nine
Sage
The room alights back into focus, and without the rage and adrenaline driving my actions I'm left with only aches, pains and the sharp brightness of light burning my tired eyes.
"Nic? Nic!"
Victor's body slumps off me and I fall off the couch with him, crawling through his blood as I rush on my hands and knees for Nicholas. He's still curled over in the same position as he was when I last saw him. I turn him over to face me, huffing in relief when his alive eyes meet mine.
"Sage," he says, voice choking. His warm, comforting hand is clutching a wound on the left side of his chest and I cover my mouth to gasp. I pull his hand away and see blood pooling in the precise spot on the left of his chest.
It's not his heart, though. It's not his heart. It can't be his fucking heart. His heart is mine. It belongs to me. I get a say on when it stops beating.
"Nic, can you hear me?"
"I hear you, gorgeous," he says, but it comes out weak. And with a side of blood surrounding his mouth.
"You took a bullet for me," I say as tears fall down my face.
"Isn't that," he coughs and more blood makes its way out, but he smiles, "isn't that what a good bodyguard does?"
"No," I cry. He looks pale. Nic never looks pale.
Nic removes his hand from his wound and places it on my cheek. I don't care how much blood is on my face. I'll take it all. I sob as I sink into his hand.
Sure, the bullet wound is where his heart is, but it won't have hit his heart. There's no way. No. There'll be some kind of miracle. It'll have missed anything vital by merely a hair and he'll live. And we'll live. Happily ever after.
"Please help!" I yell so loudly, turning my eyes to the doorway expectantly. But there's no one there. I turn my panicked eyes back on Nic. I did everything I was supposed to. I chose my first love. I killed Victor. I - this isn't how it's supposed to end.
"Sage," Nic whispers, his eyes crinkling in pain.
"No," I whisper. I never got to bitch at him for the FBI thing. We would've resolved it.
Could've.
Can. Can. Can.
What's left of the door bursts open and I muffle a scream that turns into a sigh of relief when I see my family has finally made it to us. Everything will be okay.
"Help," I cry. "Freddie, he's-"
Freddie drops to our side as Anton freezes next to us.
I vaguely register that Isla is here too, watching from the doorway with her hand over her mouth. I see the moment her eyes finish searching the room and land on Victor.
"Nic, brother," Freddie says. "Let me see it."
Nic's hand slips from my cheek to give Freddie access on his other side, to his wound. I clutch his free hand in mine.
It's cold.
Freddie puts pressure on the wound, inspects it once, and then puts pressure on it again.
He looks at Nic, pain filling his eyes, then he shakes his head.
"What? What does that mean? Why are you shaking your head?"
Nicholas looks over to me, but it's slow. It's so slow. A painfully sedate turn of the head and croak in his throat.
"Nic, I love you. Nic, I love you so much. No. No, please," I shout. "Anton, help! Help please! I didn't yell at you about - I didn't get to say - I didn't mean it Nic, I promise. I didn't want to run. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry."
"Ssh," Nic says, but it's so soft it's almost a gargle.
"No, I'll do anything. I'll do anything, I swear it. What do you want? I'll do it. I'll do it. I'll do it."
Nic presses a finger to my lips, the heavy pools of blood sliding away with a drop of water. I frown. Wiping at my face as I find my tears nearly drenching the impact of his blood.
My heart cramps.
So much that it hurts. Everything hurts. Much more than a stab wound.
"I love you, Sage DeMarco," Nic says, the ghost of a smile on his lips.
"I'm sorry for lying to you. I never wanted to.
It's just... well, everything changed the moment I first saw you.
Whatever life has put me through and where it has led me...
I'd do it again, over and over again forever, because it meant I got to have you. Even if it was only for a moment."
I stroke his cheek and kiss him. Deep. Deeper than I could've thought as the sobs wreck my body. I bury my head in his shoulder and hold him tight, compressing him in my arms.
His gentle whisper meets my ear. "I don't see my life flashing before my eyes. All I see is you."
Beneath me, I feel him relax.
I hold him close to me, and when he dies, I feel it, both underneath my hands and inside my soul.
This time, I don't cry silently. I scream.