chapter 110
“Run away with me,” Chase whispered, his leg wrapped around me, my body tucked into his chest, my cheek against the smooth muscle of his chest. The hotel room was dark, the sounds of the Bronx subdued.
“I can’t,” I said quietly. “You know I can’t.”
“He doesn’t love you like I do. He can’t.”
“It’s been four years, Chase. I was here that whole time.” And he hadn’t come. I had waited, in Tobey’s parents’ home, listening to every ring of the bell, every call on the phone. I had waited for Chase, and he had never come for me.
“I didn’t know about the baby, Ty. I thought—I thought you had just left me. Chose him.”
“I would never have chosen him.” I looked up at him, surprised to see his eyes wet with emotion.
“Then don’t choose him now.”
There was so much blood. All over the front of my shirt, the wet smear of it worsened by his hands, gripping at me, claws of contact, the knife swinging at me, wild, red, wet motions that were suddenly farther away, space between us as he was pulled away.
Horace. I recognized his face, one of our security guards.
Mitch. Another familiar face. There were more, the stairwell getting crowded, a glimpse of Dan’s face, eyes frenzied, through a space between black uniform and a pinstriped shirt.
I held onto those eyes for the split second that was allowed.
Then someone moved in front of me, said something to me, hands gentle as they raised my feet.
“Ty?” Dad’s voice, through the blood, through the pain. “TY!” he shouted at me, and I reached out for him, unsure of where he was, everything going dark.