Chapter Twenty-Nine
Landon dropped to his knees by the bed and grabbed her hand. He needed to be as close as she would let him; he had to know if she’d meant what she’d said. “You remember?” he asked.
Rose slowly lifted a hand to her forehead. “Hurts,” she said. “Oh, God, it hurts.”
“You lost a lot of blood.” He hated how many times in his life he’d said those words. It was a cruel joke, lacking entirely in humor.
Rose opened one eye, then quickly shut it. “Bright,” she said. It wasn’t. The lights were low, probably deliberately. The room was calm, dark, and quiet.
“You don’t need to open your eyes.”
“I want to,” she said. The words were coming out more clearly now. “I want to see you.”
“You know who I am?” he asked, terrified her recognition had been some sort of fluke, and almost as terrified that it had not been.
“Yes,” she said. “I know you. But I…” She winced. “I don’t understand.” She squeezed her eyes shut tighter, as though if she could just shut them tight enough, she could make him disappear. “What are you doing here, Landon?”
There it was again. His name. She remembered his name.
“I can explain.” How much did she know? Where should he begin?
“I told you, didn’t I?” she asked.
“Told me what?” Had his heart ever beat so quickly? Rose. His Rose. She was here. She was back. They had time.
“Not to follow me.”
That old hurt rattled behind his ribs. “No,” he said. “You didn’t. You didn’t tell me anything.”
“Exactly.”
Landon ran hands through his hair and rubbed his eyes, burning from the lack of sleep and the horrors of the morning. “What was I supposed to do, Rose?” he asked, as earnestly as he’d ever asked a question. “You’re the love of my life.”
“And you were the love of mine.” Hope. God, it felt so good to hope.
It felt so good to hear those words straight from the source; words he thought had been banished to the realm of memory forever.
Rose opened both eyes. Her voice skipped like rocks they’d once tossed across the water of their little lake, catching on an ache far too big for words. “But so was she.”