Chapter Twenty-Six
“I really can’t apologize enough,” Xavier told Sarah for what had to be the hundredth time since their appointment had started.
She smiled at him kindly, shaking her head. “You have nothing to apologize for,” she reminded him.
The two of them were meeting in her temporary office space while her original office was being repaired from all the destruction Jed had caused.
In his fit of rage, Jed had pretty much torn apart the entire room, so it would be a while before she could feasibly work from that space again.
She had too many patients needing help to take time off, and she had insisted on moving to a makeshift office in another part of the building and starting up her appointments again as normal.
Xavier was grateful for that. It had been nearly ten days since Jed had attacked him and taken Hannah, and he still felt unsettled sometimes. Being there in the middle of that shootout and feeling himself drawn back to all of the memories he had tried to leave behind was scary as hell.
Losing himself completely, forgetting where he was, not even being able to recognize his friends and allies—he never wanted that to happen again. So he was taking all the steps he could to help ensure he never lost himself to his past life again.
“We all made it out in one piece,” Sarah reminded him. “That’s what matters most.”
“Yeah, we got lucky,” Xavier agreed. “Though sometimes I can’t help but think about how horribly wrong it all could have turned out.”
“And how do you feel about the fact that it didn’t turn out badly?” Sarah asked, gently steering the conversation back around to the focus of their appointment.
“I feel…grateful,” he replied finally, letting out a long breath. “Extremely grateful that I didn’t lose Hannah or anyone else. I don’t think I could have survived it if I had. The guilt of harming one of my friends would have been it for me.”
“Well, grateful is a great place to start. A good emotion to focus on,” she agreed, jotting something down. “Has it brought up anything else you’re struggling with right now?”
“I… When I was out there,” he confessed. “In the middle of it, it was like my memories…fractured. Like everything that happened with Max was spilling over into the present moment, and I couldn’t tell the difference between what had happened in the past and what was happening right in that moment.”
Sarah nodded and wrote something else down on her pad.
“The mind is a powerful thing. And sometimes, when we’re reminded of those moments that have stayed in our memory, it can feel like they’re happening all over again.
It’s the brain’s way of trying to protect itself.
You didn’t want to have to face the possibility of losing the woman you love, so your brain put in place the memories that you’d already started to deal with. ”
“Makes sense,” he agreed. He was still trying to wrap his head around the way all of this worked.
He had spent so long avoiding these conversations, actually accepting this help was still foreign to him, but the more he learned, the clearer all of this became.
Instead of being stuck under the control of the nightmares he’d had for so long, he could look at them a little more objectively and deal with them more clearly than he had before.
“And what about the dreams?” Sarah asked him. “I would expect you’ve been dealing with some of them lately.”
“I have been dreaming about my brother,” he admitted. “But not the same flashbacks I’d been having before. The ones from the last time I saw him alive.”
“No?” she prompted him, sounding interested.
“I had this dream about the two of us racing across the field behind our house when we were young,” he said, feeling a smile spread over his face.
“To see who would make it to the edge of the woods first.” Xavier briefly closed his eyes, pulling up the memory again.
“It was so long ago, I’d almost forgotten we used to do that.
And I always gave him a head start, but he still accused me of cheating, even though I mostly let him win.
” He smiled and shrugged, looking a little sheepish.
“I didn’t want to deal with him whining about how I cheated.
” He chuckled at the thought. “Max was always a sore loser. And slow, for the record. He never actually beat me.”
Sarah laughed. “It’s great that you’re finally able to talk about your happier memories with your brother. And even better that you’re not having the dreams about his passing anymore.”
“You think so?” Xavier asked. Some part of him had felt guilty about the dreams turning from painful to happy, as though he should have had to contend with his failure to keep his brother safe a little longer.
“I know so,” she replied.
“Why do you think it’s happened? It seems wrong in some way that I’ve gone from reliving his death to memories of our childhood,” he asked, frowning. He’d only just started therapy again. It seemed too soon to have made such huge steps forward and for his feelings of failure to suddenly be gone.
“I can’t tell you the exact reason,” she remarked. “But I can give you my theory, if you want.”
“Go ahead,” he replied, gesturing for her to keep talking.
“You’ve struggled for a long time feeling like you failed your brother,” she explained.
“Even though there was nothing more you could have done to help him. But now, this time, you saved her. And I think your mind knows on some level that he would be proud of you for that. Proud of both of you, actually. You’re starting to forgive yourself, because this time, it went differently. ”
Xavier paused, taking it all in. It sounded right to him.
His mind accepted that explanation. He hadn’t been able to save Max, no matter how much he had wanted to, but he had been able to save Hannah.
And maybe that was enough to start the process of forgiving himself. And letting him find some peace.
THAT EVENING, HANNAH SNUGGLED next to Xavier on one of the couches in front of the fireplace in the lodge’s reception area.
They had all decided on gathering in this room to warm themselves up after a long day of work putting the lodge back together.
Sarah’s office was the main focus, but Hannah and River had been out planting some more flowers, too.
Her hands were still chilly as she pushed them into Xavier’s and rested her head on his shoulder.
Even though the spring days were warm, it still got chilly at night. Perfect for snuggling by the fire.
Opposite them, the rest of the space was filled with their friends—Cade and River, Bailey and Aaron, and Sarah and Lawson, wineglasses in hand and a quiet peace resting over all of them.
After the chaos of the last several months, there was something distinctly precious about this time they had together, without having to look over their shoulders and worry about what was going to happen next.
As the season changed from winter to spring before their eyes, Xavier’s mind had drifted to the future, too.
There was so much he wanted to do, so much he wanted to try.
Now that some of the weight of his past had been lifted off his shoulders, it felt like he could see a whole new future, something he had never let himself imagine before.
“Those flowers are already starting to bloom, Hannah,” Bailey remarked as she peered out of the window beside her. “They’re looking gorgeous. I can’t wait to see how they’ll look when summer comes.”
“Yeah, everything looks better in summer,” Aaron agreed, shooting Xavier a conspiratorial grin.
He knew what Aaron was planning, because he had had come to Xavier to ask for help picking out the ring.
He could have gone to Hannah, but he was worried she might spill the beans to Bailey before he was ready, and he wanted it to come as a complete surprise.
Xavier knew Aaron could hardly wait to see the look on her face.
“Good time for a wedding, too,” Aaron added as casually as he could.
Hannah frowned. “What do you mean, a wedding?”
Bailey’s lips parted in surprise, but before she could say anything else, Aaron handed his wine over to Xavier and dropped to one knee in front of Bailey.
Hannah’s hand flew to her mouth, and River spluttered into her drink in shock.
“Bailey, our paths to each other haven’t always been easy,” Aaron began as he reached into his pocket to pull out a ring.
“But all that matters to me is that our path to our future is one we embark on together.” He popped open the box, showing off a glittering band with an oval-shaped diamond planted in the center.
Bailey’s eyes nearly bugged out of her head.
“Will you marry me, Bailey?”
“Yes! Of course I will!” she exclaimed, almost dropping her wine as she sprang to her feet.
Aaron laughed and stood up to meet her, planting his lips against hers and pulling her into a warm embrace.
Hannah squeezed Xavier’s hand gently as they watched the scene unfold in front of them, two of their friends dedicating themselves to one another.
“Now get that damn ring on my finger already,” Bailey ordered him, and everyone laughed as he slipped the sparkly ring onto her finger. She gazed at it for a moment and then back to him, sinking into his arms again.
The rest of the evening was spent celebrating the newly engaged couple.
Sarah went to the kitchen to dig out a bottle of champagne, and they shared it as they toasted to Aaron and Bailey’s future happiness.
It was a perfect evening, the antidote to everything they had been through with Sampson less than two weeks prior.
It was these nights at the lodge that Xavier lived for, surrounded by his friends, knowing he was safe…they all were safe…and there was nothing for him to worry about or fear any longer.
By the time the champagne was gone, he could tell Hannah was starting to get a little tipsy, and he led her outside so they could head back to their cabin. The two of them were living together now, as if he could spend a moment apart from her.
Even if his room hadn’t been trashed, he would have wanted to wake up next to her every day. Their little coffee dates every morning gave him a reason to get out of bed, and eating dinner together at their tiny kitchen table was the perfect way to end each day. He couldn’t ask for anything more.
He pulled her into his arms and planted his lips against hers in the cool evening air.
She giggled and smiled up at him, gazing at him with those beautiful eyes that still set his heart pounding in his chest. As he stared down at her, she cocked an eyebrow at him.
“Don’t tell me that proposal has you feeling all romantic,” she teased him.
“It’s not that,” he replied. “Just you.”
He kissed her again, brushing his thumb over her cheek and pausing to take this moment in.
There had been so many times where he had felt as though he would never feel true happiness again.
Never be rid of the guilt weighing him down or the nightmares about his brother.
But when he was with Hannah, it all seemed to fade away.
He could just be there in the present with her.
He knew there was still a lot of work to be done when it came to healing himself entirely.
But this? This was the start he needed. The reason he needed to keep going.
To become the man she wanted him to be, the kind of man she could spend her life with.
He would work every day of his life to make sure he got there.
“But there is something I want to tell you,” he murmured.
“Something I should have said a long time ago.” He paused, looking down into her expectant eyes with a smile on his face.
He wanted to linger in this moment forever.
There were so many memories in his mind that he wished he could escape, but when he was with her, none of them seemed to matter.
The only thing he cared about was her, and he wanted her to know just how deep his feelings for her ran.
She pushed her fingers into his hair, hand tracing the nape of his neck.
He was sure she could tell what was on his mind.
The two of them had felt this way about each other for so long now, but they hadn’t actually spoken the words out loud yet.
He needed her to hear it from him. Needed her to know.
“I love you,” he told her softly, the words feeling right escaping his lips.
She smiled, that beautiful smile that seemed to light up the whole world around her, and stood on her tiptoes to plant her lips against his.
“I love you, too,” she replied. “Now, let’s get back to the cabin before I freeze out here.”
“Hmm, I can think of a few ways to keep you warm,” he remarked playfully, and she giggled.
“I bet you can,” she replied. “Why don’t you come show me?”
Taking his hand, she led him down the path toward their cabin, the flowers along the path just starting to come into bloom. Just like their love.