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I didn’t think I’d be able to sleep. Mom and Dad were luckily unaware that I’d gone missing again, because Veronica couldn’t bring herself to tell them. But she did spend most of the rest of the night in my room, holding my hand and telling me how sorry she is that this is my life.
The more I told her that I’m perfectly fine, the harder she trembled. But in the end, we both fell asleep on top of the covers on my bed, and this time it’s my phone ringing that wakes me, not some creep shining a flashlight into my eyes.
Lots of things ache as I stumble out of bed to get my phone, which Veronica found in my car by Eden’s bookstore. My hands hurt from banging on the metal door, my throat from screaming, my shoulder from getting pulled by Ruin as he tried to save Eden. A whole different kind of pain envelops me as I remember that. Deep in my chest, fear mixed with regret and anger. The kind of pain that nothing can make better. The best you can hope for is a dulling. I hope they find her soon. I hope we get her back alive.
The dulling of the pain comes in the form of seeing Ruin’s name on my phone’s screen.
“Hey,” I say hoarsely.
“Good morning, my warrior lady,” he says. “I’m coming to see you.”
“Yes, please do,” I say.
He promises he’ll be here in twenty minutes tops.
Veronica is still sleeping, and I drape the covers over her, leave a short note telling her I’m with Ruin and not to worry, because I couldn’t be safer than with him.
Then I take a quick shower and am waiting for him on the curb with my hair dripping wet. But I’m sure it’ll dry quick enough as we ride.
I feel the rumble of his bike approaching long before I spot him coming down the street.
He parks right beside me and then I’m in his arms, getting kissed in a way that makes all pain impossible.
“I was so afraid I wouldn’t see you for a while,” I whisper once we pause and we’re just standing there staring into each other’s eyes. His are blue like the earth is blue when seen from space. All I need is to look into his eyes and I will never need anything else. I can go anywhere when I look into his eyes. And yet stay in his strong arms. Safe.
“Try and keep me away,” he says and smiles. “I love you as much as I love my two arms. More even.”
I smile too. “Are you trying to say you love me?”
He looks confused for a moment, the world in his eyes blurring slightly, but then he smiles widely and the sun comes out again. Bright and beautiful and hot enough to warm me forever.
“Yeah, I think I am.”
“Good, because I love you too,” I say.
He kisses me again, softly at first, but with a growing intensity that just builds and builds. I hear every bird chirping around us, every rustle the wind makes in the trees, every beat of his heart. The darkness that was my mind is pushed so far away by all this light we’re creating it might as well not be there. And if he kisses me for one more minute, it will be gone. Never to return as long as he holds me.
“You ready?” he asks breathlessly after a while, his lips and his eyes glinting.
“Are we going to our place in the woods?” I ask.
“Where ever you want.”
“I want our place in the woods,” I say.
Then he leads me to his bike and I hop on, holding him tight as we ride. The kisses dulled the pain, the ride erodes it. The clean, fresh wind in my hair, the engine rumbling beneath me and his strong body in my arms. It’s all I need. All I’ll ever need.
I never thought I’d get even a fraction of this happiness, this belonging, this kind of love in my life. And now I know I not only got it, but will have it for the rest of my life.
Good memories will replace all the bad. They’re already starting to. And it won’t ever end. Not for as long as we live. And not after we die either.
EPILOGUE
Some weeks later…
Ruin
Everything is still a total mess. Eden is still gone. Ice has more or less lost his mind, because we can’t find her. I think most of the rest of us have too. So I have no right to feel as good as I do, lying in a soft bed with Ariel in my arms, her warm breaths tickling my chest, her silky hair draped over my arm like a blanket.
