Chapter 14 #2
“I’ve got you,” he murmurs. “You’re safe.”
And just like that—something breaks open in me.
I launch forward and wrap my arms around him, clutching his shirt like it’s the only thing keeping me from falling apart again. I press my face into his chest, sobs tearing through me—raw, desperate, uncontrollable.
Silent tears fall, one after another, soaking into his shirt. No words. Just the quiet collapse of something too heavy to carry alone.
He holds me without hesitation.
One arm circles around my back, the other sliding up to cradle the back of my head. He doesn’t speak. He doesn’t ask. He just holds. Firm and warm and unshakable. His hand strokes slow patterns along my spine. His scent grounds me. His heartbeat steadies me.
And just for a moment—it happens.
That impossible thing I wished for five years ago. That dream I whispered into the dark, bruised and broken:
“Maybe when I wake up… he’ll be there.”
He’s here.
Holding me the way I needed. The way I always hoped he would.
And even though everything still hurts—even though the nightmare is still bleeding into my skin—his presence is a salve I didn’t know I could still feel.
I don’t know how long we stay like this.
His arms stay wrapped around me, his body a quiet fortress.
He doesn’t ask me to speak. Doesn’t let go. Just breathes with me.
And then I say it.
Barely more than a breath.
“That night… my flight was delayed, and my phone was dying. I managed to text my dad not to wait, that I’d grab a cab.
I was exhausted when we finally landed. All I wanted was to get home.
And then… he called my name. Andy. He was a cab driver.
I recognized him from one of your sites.
Familiar enough to feel safe. I was so tired… I just wanted to get home.”
His body goes still. I feel it in the way his chest stiffens, the way his breath catches.
I shift back slightly, just enough to see his face.
And God—his eyes.
The pain in them. The fury. The guilt.
All tangled together in a single, devastating truth—he wasn’t there.
My hands are shaking, knotted in the hem of my shirt. I look down and force myself to continue.
“Once in the cab, with that little battery left I wanted to let you know I landed. But then, I realized he got off the main road.”
My throat tightens. My gaze floats past Dorian’s shoulder, unfocused.
“He took me in the middle of nowhere” I whisper. “He pulled me out of the car like I was nothing. Threw me on the ground. Said you ruined his life, so he’d ruin yours… hurt what you loved most. Me.”
Dorian’s jaw flexes. His fists curl at his sides. But he doesn’t interrupt.
“I fought; I tried to run but…” My voice trembles now, a thread unraveling. “He… he was stronger, faster.”
Dorian closes his eyes for a moment. Like each word physically wounds him.
My throat closes. I shake my head, and the words come broken, shattered.
“He beat me so hard, I fell to the ground and then he…”
I stop. I can’t say it. I can't name it.
But my body remembers. Every crack. Every bruise. Every breath that felt like my last.
My voice breaks. Tears stream silently down my face, but I don’t wipe them away.
“He didn’t stop. Not when I screamed. Not when I begged. He… tore everything apart.”
I can feel Dorian’s whole body turn to stone.
The silence between us expands. Tight. Electric. Every muscle in him trembles, his jaw clenched so tightly I can hear his breath break through his teeth.
“The last thing I remember is the sound of my phone ringing—your ringtone. And him laughing, saying, ‘Glad you could assist, boss.’ Then he smashed it with a rock.”
His entire body coils like a wire pulled too tight—face twisting with something raw and feral. For a second, I swear he looks like he might shatter the air around him.
“I blacked out. If it weren’t for the two factory guards who noticed the cab lights in the field and came to check it out….”
Dorian doesn’t move. Doesn’t speak. Just stands there—like if he lets go, something inside him will never come back together.
“I woke up after twenty-five days of induced coma. I couldn’t talk. Couldn’t walk. Could barely breathe without pain. I had to learn it all over again. And just when I started to think maybe I could survive…”
I swallow hard. I turn my head; I cannot meet his eyes.
“They told me I… I lost the baby. Our baby.”
The silence that follows is unbearable.
Dorian stares at me like he’s just heard his entire world crack in two. His eyes are wet, shining with horror—helplessness.
“Jesus, Della,” he says hoarsely, his voice wrecked.
His arms come around me like a lifeline—steady, protective, full of silent promise. One hand cradles the back of my head, the other wraps gently around my waist. Like he’s trying to keep my pieces from scattering, to hold me together. Like if he could absorb my pain through his touch, he would.
“I was six weeks. I didn’t know. And after that… I felt guilty, tainted, unworthy—a broken doll.”
His face buries in my hair, his breath shuddering against my neck.
“Don’t—” he breathes, leaning in. “Don’t say that.”
My voice slips into something smaller.
“I was crushed, lost, unable to move, to speak.”
My eyes drop to my lap. “I wanted to call you. A thousand times. But the words wouldn’t come out. And when I finally did…”
I meet his gaze.
“I lost you, too.”
For a moment, he doesn’t speak. Just looks at me like my words carved open something deep inside him. His jaw tightens. His throat moves with a hard swallow.
Then he exhales shakily, like the guilt’s been lodged in his chest for years.
“Can you ever forgive me?” he whispers. “I should’ve known something was wrong. I should’ve come for you. Fought harder. Believed harder.”
His voice cracks, thick with grief.
“You were out there, breaking, fighting to survive—and I… wasn't.”
He leans in, presses his forehead to mine, eyes closed, breath unsteady. Then he cups my face gently, reverently.
“If you’ll let me, Della… “
He pauses, voice barely a whisper now.
“I’ll carry this with you. All of it. I’ll spend the rest of my life trying to bring back your smile. The way you used to laugh. The light in your eyes. I swear I’ll find it again, with you.”
His thumbs brush away my tears like a vow sealed in silence.
“Whatever you need—whatever I am—it’s yours.”
He gently pulls me closer to his heart, arms wrapping around me with trembling tenderness. He holds me like I’m something he thought he lost forever. Like if he holds me long enough, he can undo the nightmare.
And I hold him like his embrace is the only place I’ve ever belonged. Like after all the breaking, all the silence, all the time… we still fit.
Two pieces of the same ruin, finding their shape again.
I can feel his heartbeat, his breath… his tears falling silent.
“You are not broken,” he says. “And none of that—none of it—was your fault.”
I look at him then, really look. And the way he watches me—like I’m not ruined, not shattered, but something sacred that was taken from him, like I’m still whole underneath the ache—makes me believe I can be whole again.
He shifts, gently, tugging the blanket around us. His arms don’t leave me—not even for a moment. I bury my face into the curve of his neck, breathing in the quiet safety that only he has ever made me feel.
His heartbeat is a steady drum beneath my palm.
My fingers twist lightly into the fabric of his shirt. His hand stays on my back, warm and sure.
There’s nothing more that needs to be said. Not tonight.
And maybe healing doesn’t come in big, sweeping waves. Maybe it comes like this—a breath, a heartbeat, a quiet night where pain doesn’t win.
Sleep takes me slowly.
But for the first time in five years, it doesn’t take me alone. He’s here.
And I believe I might wake up whole.