Chapter 19
CHAPTER 19
NATE
It’s just after two in the morning and the bar is officially closed. Most of our table left a couple hours ago, but Liam and Quinn are both still sitting across from Savanna and me, downing the last of their beers so they can get out of here and let us finish closing.
“Well, beautiful, what say you?” Liam says to Quinn. “Wanna take a walk?”
She glances over at him and grins. “Take me home, handsome.”
I can feel the question in Savanna’s gaze as she gives me a sideways look. I smirk. I’m used to these two, but this is the first time Savanna has ever seen them together, so it’s no wonder she’s confused.
They flirt with each other on a regular basis, but it’s harmless, and completely platonic. Has been since the day they met. I think there’s some kind of unwritten agreement between them that says they can flirt endlessly, but it’ll never go further than that. Neither one of them dates, both of them choosing to play the field to have fun instead, and they often play each other’s wing person at the bar. While I know that Liam doesn’t think he’s capable of a relationship, I don’t actually know the reasoning behind Quinn not dating.
“You two,” Liam points between Savanna and me as he pushes out of his seat. “Have a fabulous night. Do everything I would do when picking a girl up at the bar. Which includes using protection.”
I didn’t notice it, but he must have grabbed something from his pocket because he’s tossing it at me now. It hits the table and bounces once before stopping right beside my hand resting on the table, and I realize it’s a condom.
“You’re welcome.” He holds out his arm to Quinn who is full of drunken giggles. “Come on, beautiful. Let’s take a walk.”
“I’m sure I’ll see you again soon, Savanna,” she says, looping her arm through Liam’s. “Unless Nate deems us unfit for company, but he shouldn’t because we’re fun.”
Savanna, though blushing exquisitely, laughs. “All of you were a hoot. I enjoyed myself thoroughly.”
It takes them a couple more minutes, but when they’re finally out the door and I’ve locked it behind them, I find Savanna starting to clear the table. I don’t bother telling her I can handle it because I know she won’t listen. Instead, I go to work moving the tables and chairs back and getting them in order before I grab what she couldn’t and follow her into the kitchen.
I’m two steps from the swinging door when there’s a loud crash and the sound of shattering glass. I’m inside the kitchen in a flash, finding Savanna already on her knees, trying to pick up what she can. Glass is everywhere, and I cringe, setting my dishes down on the counter before I kneel to help her.
“You okay?” I ask, her sandy blonde hair wrapping around her like a shield. Unable to see her, I’m unsure if she’s cut herself, or if something serious made her drop things in the first place.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to, it was an accident,” she says hurriedly, and the tone in her voice makes my stomach twist with knots. She shrinks into herself with each word. “You can take it off my pay. I know things are expensive. I shouldn’t have been so reckless. I shouldn’t have had that last drink. I’m sorry, Nate. Please don’t be upset, I won’t let it happen again.”
There are a few things ringing every alarm bell for me at this moment, and none of them are the actual broken glass on the floor.
I’ve never heard her sound so small and distressed, like breaking a glass will be the end of her world. It sets my blood to a boil to think of someone hurting her over something as silly as this. I think back to her running from someone, and I’m more convinced than ever the someone is an ex, and he was abusive towards her.
I reach out to touch Savanna’s hand so that she’ll look at me, something she has yet to do, but when I’m about to touch her, she recoils from me so sharply, one would swear I slapped her across the face. The jerking motion has her hair moving from her face while her gray eyes dart up to mine, making it impossible for her to hide the tears pooling.
Every muscle in my body is screaming to grab her and pull her into me, but I have the sense I need to tread carefully, and rather than allow that raw emotion to kick in, I slip into my training as a firefighter. Savanna reminds me of a wounded animal, ready to take flight if I move too quickly or say the wrong thing. I want to tell her it’s okay, that I’ll protect her from whatever is haunting her, but I’m certain it would send her fleeing.
I may have pried earlier when she went to some other place in her mind, but I won’t this time.
“I promise I’m not upset,” I tell her in my calmest voice, the one I use for victims at work. “Why don’t you let me clean this up, and you go see if Bryn, or Martin, need help with their cash out?”
She’s shaking her head before the words are out of my mouth. Her voice cracks when she responds with, “It’s my mess. I need to clean it up.”
“Sav,” I say gently, glancing down at her hands which are trembling so ferociously that I fear she’s going to do more damage if she keeps trying to clean up. “I need you to go take some deep breaths and try to calm down a little. I don’t want you to cut yourself.”
Following my eyes, she looks down at her hands and sucks in a sharp breath. I don’t know if she realized how badly she was shaking until that moment. It’s enough for her to rise to her feet, dropping the pieces she had in her hands into the trash before disappearing through the swinging doors into the bar without a word.
A big part of me wants to go after her, to make sure she doesn’t run out the front door and out of my life. I fear she thinks I’ve seen too much. She’s been opening up to me little by little over the last week, but there have been a few things tonight that she’s let me see, or hasn’t been able to hide, and I have this feeling she’s reached her limit with what she wants me to know.
I work quickly to get everything cleaned up, but Bryn and Martin are quicker. They come through the doors together, carrying everything for their cash out. I glance up as they come into the kitchen without Savanna, and an icy feeling of dread rushes through me.
“Where’s Savanna?”
“She was just coming out of the bathroom,” Bryn says, and I can see the question in her eyes. I doubt Savanna said anything when she went by, but Bryn is perceptive. “I left a glass of water on the bar for her.”
“Thanks.”
“You need anything else?” Martin asks casually, but his head turns a fraction towards the bar and I know he saw whatever Bryn did.
I shake my head. “Nah, you guys go ahead. I’ll finish up. Have a good night.”
I drop the contents of the dustpan in the garbage, give my hands a quick wash, then head back into the bar, worried I won’t find Savanna anywhere.
My fear is unjustified, however, because she’s sitting on a bar stool, the water glass between her hands, her head bowed. She looks just as small as she sounded a few minutes ago, making my insides churn.
I don’t go to her at first, even though that’s what my body and heart are telling me to do. The analytical side, the one trained to assess, calculate, and plan, needs a moment. And I wouldn’t doubt that Savanna needs one as well.
I head behind the bar to get a glass of water for myself, letting her feel my presence before I try to talk to her. Once I’ve got my water in hand, I come around the bar and slide the stool out beside her, remaining quiet as I settle in, facing the bar. Trying to convey that she’s the one in charge of how this conversation is going to go.
“The first time I dropped a glass,” she starts after a moment, her voice barely above a whisper, “he yelled at me. I told myself it wasn’t a big deal; he’d had a bad day, and sometimes after a bad day he’d get snappy with me over stupid stuff. We all get snappy at stupid stuff sometimes.”
Savanna pauses and lifts her glass to her lips, taking a small drink before setting it back on the counter. I slide my eyes to the side, letting them rest on her hands that are once again on the bar in front of her. They aren’t shaking as badly as they were, but there’s still a tremble in them. It’s not her hands that bother me as much anymore—not with the threat of cutting herself gone. It’s the way she caves in on herself, making herself small. As though somehow by balling herself up she can protect herself.
Protect the vital, most vulnerable parts of her.
I want to reach out and touch her, but I force myself to remain motionless. Already I can tell that I’m not going to like where this is going, but I need to do my best at remaining cool and collected so she can voice whatever she needs without my feelings interrupting her.
“The second time I broke something, it was a plate. Nothing special like his grandmother’s china or anything, but it still set him off. I was kneeling down to clean it up and I remember him grabbing me by the throat and hauling me up until I was on my tiptoes.” Savanna blows out a heavy breath as I take a slow, deep one into my lungs, resisting the urge to curl my fingers around my glass until it shatters.
If I ever meet this douchebag, he’s going to wish he’d never laid a hand on her.
“There were plenty of times in between where he’d yell. The bad days often outweighed the good ones. But I was young, and I thought I was in love.” She pauses, taking a moment to collect her thoughts, to think about the story she’s laying out for me.
My head turns faintly, just enough that I can do a sweep of her face. The same look from earlier is back. Eyes unfocused and droopy, mouth pulled downward, skin the color of ash. Haunted. The ghosts of the past resurfacing to plague her again.
“Pretty soon I didn’t have to break anything for him to lift me to my toes. And soon after that, lifting me to my tiptoes wasn’t enough for him. My reaction wasn’t enough. God, I’d gotten so used to it that when I didn’t react it made him angrier.” The entirety of her body releases a shudder as though it too is remembering what it was like. What the horror was like. “I didn’t always dent the drywall, but when I didn’t, his fist would.”
“He’d scream at me. I can still hear him, ‘What the fuck, Savanna? You’re so goddamn useless, you can’t do anything right! You know things cost money! Do you think I’m made of money? Do you think I had a good day?’ Do you think, do you think, do you think…” Her voice is louder, bitter, but her tone is lower, mimicking that of a man.
I clench my jaw, grinding my teeth back and forth. I knew I wasn’t going to like this, but this is…gut wrenching. My instinct to protect and help those around me has always been strong, but there’s a stirring in my chest where that instinct seems to bury deeper in a part of me that says I need to protect her at all cost.
Savanna laughs, the sound humorless. I hate it. I hate the sound of this laughter because it’s nothing like the one she usually gives me. The real one. I swear to myself in that moment that I will do everything I can to always hear that kind of laughter from her. Not this cold, dead sounding noise full of apathy and pain.
“I tried to be so careful. Not that it mattered; he always found something to berate me about. There was always another reason to throw me into a wall. But I learned to handle those things.” Another laugh sends a shiver slicing down my back at how flat and lifeless it sounds. “Wow. How pathetic you must think I am right now.”
“No,” I say sharply, my head whipping in her direction. I didn’t intend on saying a word until she was finished, but I couldn’t help myself. I need her to know that I don’t think she’s pathetic at all. “Nothing about you is pathetic, least of all this.”
Sucking in a breath, I let it out, pushing my water away from me. It feels dangerous to have it in my hands for a question I’m not sure I want answered. “Were there things you didn’t learn to handle?”
At my question, Savanna slowly turns to look at me for the first time. Fresh tears are brimming in eyes that are already red rimmed.
I’ve never known restraint before this moment. Every shift I have to practice restraint at the firehouse. The bar can be the same way. Dealing with panicked people in the worst moments of their lives. Corralling drunk people having the time of theirs.
But looking at this woman who has become a fixture in my life so quickly, all I want to do is wrap her in my arms and make everything bad that’s ever happened disappear forever. And when a tear falls, and she gives one small nod, I know I’d do anything in my power to take away the look of pain and fear from those beautiful gray eyes.
“What happened?” I ask, my voice as quiet as hers was when she first began to tell me her story.
“By the time I broke the next glass,” she says, voice thick with the emotion I see reflected in her eyes, “he’d learned what really broke me.”
I don’t want to know. I really fucking don’t.
But I need to. I need to know the worst. I need to know how badly this asshole hurt her, and how badly I’m going to fuck him up if I ever meet him. Not that it matters right now.
The only thing that matters is Savanna, and how hard this all must be for her. Despite what this guy did to her, she’s opening up to me, letting me in, and I’m grateful to her for it. The vulnerability she’s showing me has my chest squeezing with tenderness for her. She’s trusting in me not to take any of this information and use it against her.
Every day I have to go out and trust my brothers with my life while they put their trust in me. Trust is sacred to me, and I would do nothing to break it intentionally.
I turn on my stool and reach out, hesitantly at first, but when she doesn’t flinch away, I run my thumb along her cheek, brushing away another tear that falls. “What did he do?”
Her lip trembles, almost making me regret pushing her for the answer. She angles towards me, our knees brushing, mine on the outside of hers. It’s making it harder to stay on my stool and not envelop her in my arms, especially when she can no longer meet my eyes, casting hers down between us.
There’s a long moment of hesitation, then, barely audible, she whispers, “Locked me in the basement.”
“Fuck.” The word is a harsh exhale whooshing from my lungs like I’ve just been gut punched. Squeezing my eyes shut, I recall how just a few hours ago I commented about locking her in the office. The way she looked at me after, white as a ghost, had little to do with the fire, though I don’t doubt the little room I found her in did her any favors.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. I triggered her. I put her right back into the moment with her ex. Me. I did that. By telling her a part of me should have kept her locked in the office. How does that make me any better than her fucking ex?
Hands are suddenly at my face, pressing against my cheeks. As though she can read my mind she says, “You are not him.”
My eyes flash open and I grit my teeth together, ready to argue with her. I should be the one comforting her right now, not the other way around. But she sees my protest before I can say a word.
“Nate, you are not him.” Her voice is unexpectedly confident, full of life that had been sucked dry while she told her story. Warmth is pressing in close to me, and I realize that she’s standing between my legs, having come off her stool.
Christ, I need this. Need her close. Need to know she’s okay, that she’s still here with me. Which is asinine considering all she went through, and I only had to witness it through her eyes. But I need to know I didn’t do irreparable damage with my comment earlier.
“You are kind, and good, and thoughtful,” Savanna says to me, her fingertips fluttering along both sides of my jaw.
My hands rest on my thighs, but at the brush of her fingers on my face, they slide over my jeans until they’re gently grasping her hips. “Stop.”
“No,” she whispers, her hair dancing along her collarbones and shoulders as her head shakes. “You gave me everything when I had nothing. You’ve been my hope, and my joy. In the last week you’ve made me feel safer and more protected than I’ve felt in years.”
Her gray eyes, now clear of old memories, peer up at me, imploring me to believe what she’s saying. “You’ve made me realize that there are still good people in this world, and you’ve surrounded me with them. You’ve opened your world up to me and made me want things I didn’t think I had any business wanting again.”
Snaking my hands around her, I press them into the small of her back, pulling her flush to my body. My pulse, which quickened with every word she spoke, is now hammering in my veins. She’s making it extremely difficult to keep my control because I suddenly find myself in a position I’ve been in before—on the verge of kissing this woman.
My voice is gruff when I ask, “What do you want?”
“You, Nate,” she breathes, the pads of her fingers pressing into my jaw. “I want you.”
Perhaps I should think of why this moment is happening. Maybe I should consider if it’s because I’m the only one that has offered her comfort. But I can’t.
Her words are my undoing. The thin thread I had on my control snaps with her admission, and before I can think about it, my mouth is on hers.
Soft and warm, her lips are pliable beneath mine. My kiss isn’t rough, but I’m not gentle either. And when that first little gasp of a moan slips past her lips to mine, I know only one thing.
Nothing is ever again going to be the same in my world.