Chapter 14
Jaxon
The incessant beeping cuts through everything, sharp and repetitive, dragging me out of whatever half-conscious state I was in and refusing to let go.
It doesn’t stop. I groan, squeezing my eyes shut tighter, wanting to somehow block it out.
It’s not my alarm. It’s too even for that, too spaced out, that slow, deliberate chirp that drills into your skull one second at a time.
Shit. Smoke detector with a dead battery. Exhaustion sits heavy in my bones, making every thought feel slower, thicker, harder to push through. Do I even have batteries? I just want to go back to sleep.
My body aches all over, and my head feels heavy. Why am I so sore? Everything in me is begging to just roll over, shove my face back into the pillow, and pretend the sound isn’t happening. But the beeping keeps going. Relentless. And there’s no way I’m sleeping through that.
“Fuck,” I mutter, forcing myself to move even though every part of me resists it, already knowing I’m going to have to get up and deal with it whether I want to or not.
But my body doesn’t respond. Not even a little.
It’s like the signal gets lost somewhere between my brain and my muscles.
I’m stuck in place no matter how hard I try to push through it.
Something tugs at my hand when I try again, a faint pull followed by a sharp pinch that doesn’t make sense, that doesn’t belong to anything in my apartment. Confusion spikes.
I try to open my eyes, but they won’t cooperate either, my lids heavy, sealed shut like they’ve been glued in place.
What the fuck is happening to me? My breathing picks up without my permission, my chest tightening as panic starts to creep in, and I force myself to take a deep breath, trying to steady it, trying to get control.
Big mistake.
Pain explodes through my ribs, white-hot and instant, stealing the air right back out of my lungs as everything inside me locks up around it.
A strangled sound catches in my throat. The realization comes slowly, sluggish and incomplete, like my brain is wading through fog, trying to piece together something it doesn’t want to understand.
This isn’t my bed. This isn’t my apartment. And something is very, very wrong. Think, damn it. I try to focus, to grab onto something solid. But there’s nothing there. Just the pain and confusion. And there’s also the growing, terrifying awareness that I don’t know where I am.
“Jaxon, don’t try to move.”
That voice cuts through the fog, low and steady, deep in a way that settles something instinctive in me even before my mind can catch up enough to place it. I know that voice. Even like this, even with everything spinning and disjointed, there’s no mistaking it.
Conor.
But that doesn’t make sense. What the hell is he doing here?
The question drifts through my head, slow and heavy, and I try to force my body to respond, to do something, anything, just to ground myself in something real. I manage to crack my eyes open. Just barely.
The second I do, the bright overhead light slams into me, sharp and blinding, cutting through my skull like shards of glass and making everything worse all at once.
Pain flares instantly. I squeeze my eyes shut again, tighter this time, trying to block it out, trying to hold onto the sound of his voice instead of the light, because that feels safer.
I hear his footsteps move away from me, the sound grounding and terrifying at the same time, because even though I don’t understand why he’s here, I don’t want him to leave.
I try to call out to him, to tell him to stay, but the second I try to swallow, pain scrapes down my throat, raw and dry. No sound comes out. Just a weak, broken attempt that never makes it past my lips. Panic flickers again. Then his footsteps come back.
“I turned out the lights,” he says. His voice quieter now, closer, that same steady tone wrapping around me in a way that makes it easier to focus. “That should help with your concussion.”
Concussion. The word doesn’t make sense right at first. A concussion? How the hell did I get a concussion? I try to think. But everything is blurred, fragmented, slipping through my fingers before I can grab onto it.
Was I in an accident? Driving home from work? I remember the job site. Getting in my truck. It hits all at once. Everything comes rushing back in a violent wave that crashes through the fog in my head.
I finally manage to open my eyes, slower this time, more careful, letting them adjust to the dimmer light before focusing on what’s in front of me. Conor is leaning over the bed.
His hair is pushed back, messy in a way that tells me he’s been running his hands through it over and over again, and his shirt is wrinkled. Then he smiles, and it changes everything.
“Glad you’re awake,” he says, his voice quieter now, but there’s something under it, something tight. “I was getting worried.”
Worried. How long have I been out for him to be worried? I try to speak, to ask, to say anything, but when I open my mouth, nothing comes out. My throat is still too raw, too tight to cooperate. Frustration flickers.
Before I can try again, he reaches for something on the bedside table, picking up a styrofoam cup and a small plastic spoon.
“The doctor said you can have some ice chips when you woke up,” he explains, his tone shifting slightly, more controlled, more focused. “They’re worried about the bruising on your neck, so no heavy swallowing until they check you again.”
He brings the spoon up slowly, giving me time, and I open my mouth without thinking, letting him guide it in.
The cold hits instantly. Sharp at first, then soothing as the ice melts, easing some of the burn in my throat, grounding me in a way nothing else has since I woke up.
I let out the smallest breath through my nose as it melts. God. That feels better.
He holds the spoon to my lips again and I take the ice chips greedily.
“You don’t need to talk, but I do need answers,” he says, his voice shifting, harder now, more controlled in a way that tells me he’s done being patient. “Blink once for yes and twice for no.”
I don’t react. Because I already know where this is going, and I already know I can’t give him what he wants.
“Was Henry involved in you getting hurt?”
The question lands heavy, too direct, too close to the truth, and I feel it settle somewhere deep, pressing in.
I don’t blink. Not once. Not twice. I just stare at him, holding his gaze as long as I can, refusing to give him anything, even as my eyes start to burn from it, dryness creeping in until it becomes impossible to ignore.
Eventually, I have to look away. I close them instead, shutting him out the only way I can right now, retreating into the darkness behind my lids.
“Jaxon,” he says, and there’s something different in his voice now, something sharper, something that carries weight. “You wouldn’t let me help you before, and now you’re hurt and in the hospital.”
There’s a pause, just long enough to make sure I’m listening.
“You’ve been unconscious for more than twenty-four hours. I’m done playing this game with you.”
My eyes snap open at that, cutting toward him despite everything, irritation flaring through the fog of pain and exhaustion.
Of course, he thinks this is a game. Someone like him, who probably hasn’t had to fight for anything in his life, who moves through the world like it bends for him, wouldn’t understand what this is. Wouldn’t understand what it costs.
The anger builds fast, hot, and sharp, pushing past the weakness in my body, pushing past the pain. Well, fuck him.
“Conor,” a female voice calls from the doorway, smooth and composed in a way that immediately draws both of our attention. He turns slightly.
“Mom,” he says.
Mom? What the fuck is his mother doing here? I shift my gaze as much as I can without moving my head, trying to get a better look at her as she steps fully into the room, her presence calm but commanding in a way that feels natural, like she belongs anywhere she decides to stand.
“Let the man have some breathing room,” she says as she moves closer, her tone gentle but firm enough that even Conor doesn’t argue.
She comes to the opposite side of the bed, positioning herself where I can see her more clearly, and then she smiles.
It’s disarming. She’s striking, the kind of beautiful that doesn’t need effort, but it’s the warmth in her expression that hits harder than anything else, the way her smile seems genuine.
“Hello, Jaxon. I’m Alessia Murphy, Conor’s mom. It’s nice to meet you, although I wish it were under different circumstances.”
Her voice is soft, warm in a way that doesn’t feel forced, and when her hand comes to rest lightly on my forearm, the contrast catches me off guard, her skin cool against mine, steady where everything in me still feels overheated and off balance.
“I wanted to be here to help Conor talk to you,” she continues, her tone gentle but purposeful, like she already understands more than she’s saying out loud. “He can be, shall we say, a little too impatient when trying to get information.”
She glances at him then, a small, fond smile touching her lips, something familiar and practiced in the way she looks at him, before her attention returns to me just as easily.
There’s no judgment in her expression. Just a quiet kind of patience that I’m not used to, that feels almost out of place considering everything else that’s happened.
“Do you remember what happened to you?” she asks, her voice low and steady, gentle in a way that makes it easier to focus on her than the pain running through the rest of my body.
I blink once.
Conor shifts slightly beside me, explaining the code to her under his breath, and she nods like she already knows how to handle this without making it harder on me.
“Do you know if you are still in danger from them?” she asks next, just as carefully, just as softly.
I blink again. Yes. Always yes. The room feels too quiet after that, the weight of it settling in, pressing down in a way that has nothing to do with my injuries. And the way she’s looking at me, it’s too much. Too kind. Too patient.
I feel somewhere deep, somewhere I’ve kept locked down for a long time, because I don’t know what to do with it, don’t know how to accept something that feels so foreign.
Even when I thought I had someone on my side, it was never like this.
Not even Trent, not even when things were good, not even when I believed in what we had.
Something in my chest cracks under the weight of it. I feel it before I can stop it. The tear slips free, tracking slowly down my temple into my hair. I don’t try to hide it. I don’t have the energy to.
I pull in a shallow breath, wincing at the way my ribs protest even that small movement, and gather what little strength I have left, forcing the words up past the rawness in my throat.
“I think…” My voice barely makes it out, rough and broken. I swallow carefully, trying again. “I think I killed someone.”