Chapter Twenty Eight
Dax
The first thing I feel is weight.
Not the weight of sandbags or body armour or the desert pressing down on my lungs. This is softer. Warmer. Human.
Her.
Cassandra.
She’s draped across me like she couldn’t hold herself up any longer, her arm hooked over my chest, her head pressed into the hollow of my shoulder. Her breath flutters against my skin—uneven, exhausted, but real.
For a second, I think I’m dreaming again. Another hallucination built out of fever and morphine, another cruel trick my brain plays when it wants to keep me chained to her even while I’m dying.
But then I hear it.
The machines.
Beep.
Hiss.
Beep.
And the pain—fuck, the pain. It’s not sharp anymore. It’s not fire tearing me open. It’s a dull, dragging weight in my ribs, a constant reminder that something tried to kill me and didn’t quite finish the job.
I blink. The ceiling swims into view—canvas, dim light, shadows moving slow outside the flap. The smell of antiseptic still clogs my throat, but underneath it, faint and fragile, is her. Soap. Sweat. The salt of tears she didn’t want me to see.
My lips part, dry and cracked. My throat is sandpaper. The words scrape out anyway.
“Butterfly.”
Her body jerks against me. She stirs, a soft sound slipping from her throat, and when her head lifts—when her face tilts up to mine—those eyes cut straight through the haze.
Red-rimmed. Wet. Alive.
She looks at me like I’m something she’s been holding together with her bare hands. Like she’s been keeping me alive through sheer fucking will.
And maybe she has.
“Dax,” she breathes, and it’s not anger, not accusation. It’s relief so heavy it makes my chest ache worse than the shrapnel.
I try to lift my hand. It takes everything. Muscles scream, tendons pull, but I manage to curl my fingers into hers where they’re still clutched at my chest.
She doesn’t let go.
Not this time and for the first time since the blast, I believe maybe—just maybe—I’m still here.
Alive.
Because she didn’t stop holding on.
My throat’s a desert.
Dry, cracked, every word dragging blood up with it.
I want to talk.
Need to but the second I open my mouth, all that comes out is a sound. A rasp. Ugly. Broken.
Cass’s eyes widen, and she’s already shifting, already reaching for the plastic cup on the stand, already sliding a straw between my lips like she’s been waiting for this.
“Slow,” she whispers. “Just a sip. Don’t choke.”
The water tastes like metal. Warm plastic. But it slides down anyway, cooling the raw edges of my throat, loosening something enough that I can force out a word.
“Cass—”
She flinches like I just cut her open.
Her fingers tighten on mine. “I’m here.”
My chest stutters. I swallow again, grit grinding down my throat, and push harder. “Didn’t—” My voice breaks. I squeeze my eyes shut, force the air in, force it out, fight past the way my ribs feel like they’re being sawed from the inside. “Didn’t mean—”
Her tears spill fresh. She shakes her head, hair falling loose around her face. “Don’t. Don’t you dare. You don’t get to apologise for almost dying.”
“I left you,” I rasp. The words scrape like shrapnel. “Didn’t—say goodbye—”
Her hand covers my mouth so fast it shocks me. Gentle, trembling, but firm enough to stop me. Her tears drip onto my skin, hot and desperate.
“Shut up, Dax.” Her voice cracks. “Shut the fuck up. You’re alive. That’s all that matters.”
Alive.
The machines hum their rhythm.
Beep.
Hiss.
Beep.
And I realise—I don’t have the breath to fight her. Not now. Not when every word feels like I’m dragging myself back through that crater.
So I let her win.
For once, I let her.
I turn my head just enough to press my lips into her palm, the only apology I can give without killing myself trying to say it.
Her sob breaks, but she doesn’t pull away.
She just holds me there, her hand against my mouth, her body curled into mine, as if she can anchor me with nothing more than her tears and her stubborn fucking heart.
And for the first time since the blast, I don’t argue.
Because maybe she’s right.
Maybe being alive is enough.
For now.
The words rattle against my teeth, begging to get out, but my throat won’t hold them. Every sound tears fire through my chest, every syllable tastes like blood and smoke.
Cass doesn’t move her hand. Doesn’t give me the chance to destroy myself just to tell her what she already knows. Her palm is soft, trembling, warm against my mouth, and I breathe her in instead of speaking.
Her shoulders shake. Her whole body leans closer, until her hair brushes my cheek and I can feel her heartbeat hammering like it’s the one keeping me alive.
“You don’t get to do that again,” she whispers, fierce and broken all at once. “You don’t get to throw yourself into hell and make me wonder if you’ll ever come back.”
My chest seizes. I want to tell her I didn’t have a choice. I want to tell her I’d do it again if it meant she stayed breathing. But the machines hiss beside me, and her tears drip faster, and I know—if I say it, she’ll shatter.
So I don’t.
I just press harder against her palm, as if I can tattoo my mouth into her skin.
Her lips brush my temple, soft and shaking. “You’re not leaving me. Not again. I don’t care how stubborn you are, how much you hate yourself—I’m not letting you go.”
My ribs scream when I try to breathe deeper, but I drag the air in anyway. I need her words filling me. I need her hands holding me here.
Butterfly.
The word pulses at the back of my throat. It aches to be said. But if I try, I’ll drown on it.
So I let my eyes say it instead. I open them just enough, heavy lids fighting, and I look at her. Really look. Red eyes, wet lashes, cheeks raw with salt. The girl who saved me, the girl I broke, the girl still here anyway.
Her gaze meets mine, and she sucks in a breath like I just pulled her out of the wreckage instead of the other way around.
“I’ve got you,” she whispers. Her forehead presses to mine. Her fingers slide down, lacing with mine tight enough to hurt. “I’ve always got you.”
My throat locks. My chest jerks. A sound crawls out, raw and ruined.
Not a word. Not yet.
But close.
Close enough she freezes, waiting, her breath caught between hope and fear.
I swallow the pain. I taste her tears on my lips. And I fight.
“B—butterfly.”
The syllables shred me open, but they land. Barely a whisper, cracked in half, but hers.
Her sob breaks into a laugh, wild and wrecked, and she kisses my knuckles like it’s the only thing keeping her upright.
And I think—maybe it is.
The taste of her skin is still on my lips when I manage the word, when I manage her—butterfly—and it tears my throat open like I’ve swallowed glass.
Her laugh cracks, jagged, wet, wild with relief. She presses my hand to her mouth like she’s afraid I’ll disappear if she lets go. Her tears drip hot against my skin, sinking into me, anchoring me.
And then she breaks.
“I love you.”
The words rip out of her like she’s been holding them in for years, like they’ve been clawing her lungs bloody to get free. She shakes her head, presses her forehead to mine, sobbing as if each syllable might undo her. “I love you, Dax. God, I love you so much it hurts.”
My chest heaves, jagged, uneven. The monitor ticks my shame out loud, every weak blip a reminder I can’t say it back without tearing myself to pieces. But she doesn’t stop. She doesn’t let me.
“You think you broke me,” she whispers, trembling against me, her words a confession and a wound.
“But you didn’t. You are me. Every day without you has been a fucking war I couldn’t win.
Every breath was glass. Every second you were gone—I hated you.
I hated myself. But I never stopped. I never fucking stopped. ”
Her voice cracks. She clutches my hand tighter, like the bones might snap. “So don’t you dare—don’t you dare think you can leave me again. I don’t care if you think you’re poison. I don’t care if you think you’ll ruin me. You already did. And I’m still here.”
The air scorches my throat. I want to tell her I don’t deserve it. I want to tell her she’s wrong. But the words won’t come.
All I can do is lie here, raw, ruined, her confession pouring into me like it’s the only thing keeping my heart moving.
Her lips brush mine, soft, trembling, not a kiss—just a vow. “You’re mine, Dax. Always. Even when you’re too fucking stubborn to say it back.”
My eyes sting. My chest jerks again, violent, breaking against the monitor’s steady hum and the only word I can manage, the only word my throat will bleed out for her, is the one that’s always been hers.
“Butterfly.”
She sobs again, louder this time, but she’s smiling through it. Smiling like she’s bleeding, smiling like she just won a war neither of us believed we could.