Chapter 33
Chapter Thirty-Three
Emily
Jared’s soft groan pulls me from a half-sleep. I blink in the dim light of my living room, disoriented by the stiffness in my neck.
The clock on the mantel reads a little after five in the morning. I must have dozed off in the armchair after tending to Jared’s wounds. The sting of the antiseptic wipes I used earlier hangs in the air, mingling with the copper tang of blood I scrubbed from my hands, but can’t wash from my nose.
Jared lies on my couch, one arm flung above his head, the other curled across his taped ribs.
By the time I’d placed the last bandage, Jared struggled to breathe without wincing. The walk to his room might as well have been a mile, so I left him where he was, the couch turned makeshift recovery bed.
The blanket I draped over him has slipped down to his waist, exposing the white bandages wrapping his torso. In the soft glow of the single lamp, bruises bloom across his body in shades of purple and blue, and his split lip has crusted over with dried blood.
Mixie lies curled in a tight ball of black fur on his stomach, and her purr fills the quiet room with a soothing rhythm, as if she’s trying to heal him through vibration alone.
Horror fills me as I take in the damage those men did to him. All because he went out searching for me while I was with Auren.
The guilt sits heavy, constricting my lungs until each breath hurts. I could have lost him tonight to violence because of a misunderstanding and my own inability to make a clean break from the past.
I rise from the chair, wincing as my stiff muscles protest. The floorboard creaks beneath my foot as I approach the couch. Mixie cracks open one eye before settling back to her important work of warming Jared’s bruised body.
As I reach down to adjust his blanket, my fingertips brush his shoulder, and his eyelids flutter. For a moment, I freeze, holding my breath as I wait to see if he’ll slip back into sleep.
Instead, his lashes lift, and he stares around, unfocused at first before awareness sinks in as he settles on me.
He takes in my red-rimmed eyes, the untouched coffee mug on the side table, and the rumpled clothes I haven’t changed since the hospital, and tension slowly fills his body, the air coiling taut between us.
“I saw you leave with Auren,” he says, the soft words holding an accusation. “At the hospital. You were helping him into your truck.”
I sink onto the edge of the coffee table and clasp my hands between my knees. “I took him to an Omega protective house in Pinecrest.”
Jared’s jaw flexes, the bruise darkening as his muscles tighten. “You left me here alone. You didn’t even call to let me know what was going on.”
“It wasn’t... I wasn’t thinking clearly.” I rub my palms against my thighs. “He tried to manipulate me into bringing him here, but I couldn’t— I wouldn’t do that.”
“Were you coming back?” The question slips out rough and uneven, as it catches in his throat.
My heart stutters. “What?”
“To me,” he clarifies, struggling to sit up.
Mixie chirps her displeasure as he displaces her, hopping to the floor with an indignant flick of her tail.
“After you dropped him off,” he continues. “Were you coming back, or were you going to stay there? With him?”
I blink, confusion washing over me. “Of course, I was coming back. This is my home.”
“Home,” Jared repeats, the word flat. “Sure.”
He shifts, wincing as his ribs protest the movement. “Why didn’t you call me, Em? I waited for hours.”
Everything since I left here earlier is a blur. Did so much time really pass?
“There were forms to sign. The police had questions. And the Omega house needed paperwork, too.” I press my palms together, tension gathering in every muscle. “I couldn’t step away long enough to make a call.”
“You could have texted,” Jared insists. “A single word to let me know you were okay. That you were coming back.”
My fingers twist in my lap. “I didn’t think you’d doubt me.”
“Didn’t you?” His eyes find mine, unnervingly direct. “After you walked out on me in the middle of...?”
Heat climbs up my neck. “You could have called me, too. Why did you come to the hospital?”
“I was worried about you.” A muscle in his jaw jumps as he swallows. “I knew he was going to fuck with your mind. I didn’t want you facing him alone.”
The silence stretches between us, filled only with the click of Mixie’s claws across the hardwood as she retreats to her food bowl in the kitchen.
“Why didn’t you wait for me here?” I ask, feeling smaller than I want to be.
“Because I didn’t know if there would be room for me when you returned.” He turns his head away, his broken profile outlined by the lamplight. “If he convinced you to take him back—”
“I wouldn’t have.”
“How are you so sure?” Jared argues, voice rising before he winces and lifts a hand to his ribs. “You went to him the second he called, Em. No hesitation. No questions asked. What was I supposed to think?”
My anger flares, quick and defensive. “That I’m a decent person who doesn’t abandon someone in the hospital, regardless of our history.”
“You left me without a second thought,” he accuses.
“I didn’t leave you.” The protest comes out too loud. “I left because someone was hurt, and I couldn’t pretend that wasn’t my responsibility.”
“He’s not your responsibility. He kicked you out of the pack. He has a new pack to take care of him. You left me without a single word of explanation. As if I didn’t matter.”
“You told me not to go,” I counter feebly.
“And then I asked you to let me come with you,” I correct.
We stare at each other, the argument circling, and both of us too tired to find a way out.
“I wouldn’t have brought him here,” I say finally. “This is...”
I struggle to name what this space has become. Not just my house anymore. Not quite ours.
“This is where we’re building something,” I say at last. “I wouldn’t let him poison that.”
Jared’s gaze softens, though doubt lingers. “I want to believe you.”
“Then believe me,” I echo his words from the workshop. “Even if it’s just for right now. Even if it’s just in this room.”
His breath catches with recognition of our promise last night, before the call from the hospital pulled me away.
I lean forward, needing him to understand. “You left. You walked out into a storm while I was trying to end a nightmare.”
He sags, the fight draining out of him. “I didn’t leave you. I just didn’t think I was someone worthy of you coming back to.”
The confession hangs between us, stripping away the pretense. This isn’t about Auren or the hospital or the men who attacked Jared. This is about the fear of being replaceable, of not being enough, of building something only to have it crumble.
The same fear that’s kept me walled off from connection since Auren pushed me out of my own pack.
I take Jared’s hand, careful to avoid the bruises on his knuckles. His fingers curl around mine, warm and solid.
“I came back,” I whisper. “I came back, and you were gone.”
His thumb traces circles on my palm. “I went out to find you.”
“I’m sorry I cut you out. I shouldn’t have walked away and not taken the time to update you about what was happening.
” My thumb rubs over his knuckles. “And I shouldn’t have told you this wasn’t your place.
I only meant to make sure Auren was alive and end it for good, but that doesn’t excuse shutting you down.
You had no way to know what I was thinking. You deserved better from me.”
“And I should have trusted that you’d come back,” he acknowledges.
I smile. “We’re not very good at this, are we?”
“No.” A smile tugs at the corner of his mouth, pulling at his split lip. “But we’re trying.”
Mixie returns, tail high as she surveys us before leaping back onto the couch and settling beside Jared’s hip.
The anger drains from my body, leaving nothing but bone-deep exhaustion in its wake. Jared studies me with patient eyes that see too much, his bruises a stark reminder of everything that I could have lost tonight.
Without speaking, I slip from the coffee table to kneel beside the couch, the area rug rough beneath my knees. “Let me check your ribs.”
I click open the plastic medical kit I left on the side table, revealing gauze, more antiseptic wipes, and tape organized in neat compartments.
Jared studies me for a moment, considering. The silence between us shifts, charged with a mix of caution and unspoken want far more complicated than the earlier tension.
He nods, the small movement causing him to wince. His hands move to the blanket, pushing it down to expose the white bandages wrapped around his torso.
The intimacy of this moment strikes me, and I draw a steadying breath and lean forward, my fingers trembling as I find the edge of the tape holding the bandage in place. This isn’t the heated rush we shared in the workshop, but a quieter moment built on trust and vulnerability.
“This might hurt,” I warn, peeling back the first strip of tape.
Jared sucks in a sharp breath but remains still as I work.
The bruising beneath the bandage has darkened since I first wrapped his ribs, spreading like watercolors across his skin. Purple bleeds into blue into green at the edges.
“No new swelling.” My fingers ghost over the discoloration, heat pulsing up from the damaged tissue. “That’s good.”
I work to re-wrap his ribs with clean bandages, my hands moving with practiced efficiency, as my mind wanders through the wreckage of the day. My heart had almost stopped when I spotted Jared injured in Leif’s car through the rain.
I never want to feel like that again.
“I’m sorry,” I say, smoothing the last piece of tape into place. “I keep trying to fix things before they break, and I end up breaking them instead.”
My hands continue their nervous motion, gathering wrappers and arranging supplies back into the kit. The plastic containers click together in the quiet room.
Jared catches my wrist, stilling my fidgeting, and his fingers circle the bone in a calming motion. “Then stop fixing. Just stay.”
The words sink into me, past the defenses I’ve built, past the walls that kept Auren out when I finally realized what he was doing to me. Jared’s touch doesn’t diminish me, it offers support. He never demands, only invites.
I press my forehead against his arm, the skin warm beneath my brow. The smell of rain clings to him, mixed with the antiseptic I used to clean his wounds, and beneath that lingers the pheromone signature I’ve grown used to these past weeks. Salt air and driftwood, steady as the tide.
His free hand comes up to rest on the back of my head, fingers threading through my short hair. We stay like that, breathing together in the quiet.
“I almost lost you tonight,” I whisper.
His chest rises with a deep breath. “I’m not going anywhere.”
I lift my head. “You should try to sleep. The painkillers will wear off soon.”
“Okay.” Jared shifts to find a more comfortable position on the couch.
I finish packing away the first aid supplies, snapping the lid closed on the medical kit.
When I start to rise, his hand catches mine. “Stay?”
I hesitate, looking toward my bedroom. The distance feels vast, measured not in steps but in choices.
“Please,” he adds, his fingers warm around mine.
I set the kit on the coffee table and sink back to my knees beside him. He tracks my movement, clear despite the late hour and the medication.
When I lean forward, he meets me halfway. The kiss starts soft, a tentative brush of lips, mindful of his injuries. His hand slides into my hair, cradling the back of my head, spreading warmth down my spine.
The gentleness breaks open the walls of self-preservation inside me. I’ve spent so long being strong, holding myself together with stubborn pride, and the care in his touch undoes me in ways raw passion never could.
His mouth moves over mine, and I respond, the kiss deepening. His lips part mine, his tongue carrying the faint bitterness of his pain medication and beneath it, the distinctive warmth I’ve come to recognize as his alone. The desire between us ignites, weeks of restraint giving way.
His hand finds my hip, work-roughened fingers digging into the curve of bone, dragging me closer to the worn leather couch with an urgency that sends my pulse into a hard, pounding rhythm.
My lungs forget how to work as his thumb blazes a trail across the exposed skin where my shirt has ridden up, the contact searing through me like wildfire, leaving my skin prickling with electricity and want.
Then he shifts, his body angling toward mine, and he freezes with a hiss of pain.
I pull back, hands hovering around him. “Easy,” I scold, though I can’t stop the laugh that escapes. “You’re bruised to hell.”
Jared groans, dropping his head back onto the cushion. “Something’s always stopping us.”
His frustrated pout tugs at my heart, and my fingers brush along his jaw, careful to avoid the worst of the bruising. “Then we’ll wait. I’m not going anywhere.”
His eyes search mine for the truth in the promise, and I let him see my certainty.
“Neither am I,” he replies, and for the first time since everything fell apart at the market, we both believe it.
He shifts on the couch, making room beside him, and pats the cushion. “Let me at least hold you while I sleep.”
I rise long enough to turn off the lamp, plunging the room into darkness broken only by the faint glow of streetlights filtering through the curtains.
Mixie protests as she’s moved again, and then the couch cushions dip beneath my weight as I settle beside him, my back to him, his arm draped over my waist.
His breath warms the nape of my neck, slowing as sleep begins to claim him.
Outside, the rain has stopped, leaving the air thick and washed clean, as if the world is offering a clean slate for morning. There will be explanations to give and fears to face, but not tonight.
Tonight is for peace and togetherness.
Tentative, trembling, but ours.