“Cara?” I knew the voice was Arran, the purr of the ‘R’ in my name a dead giveaway, and when I turned to my left there he was, laid out on his side, his top half lifted on one hand as he leaned in over me. “Yer alright, lass. Yer home,” he told me gently as he brushed some hair from my face.
I took another deep breath and looked around me. I knew it was Arran’s room, by the dark blue hue the walls were painted in. I was laid in his huge bed at the back of the spacious room. Much like the room I had been given originally, it had a small lounge type area off to one side, with a sofa and two armchairs, but down one long wall of Arran’s room were floor to ceiling bookshelves and they were crammed with books.
Light was coming in around the blinds at the two vast windows, so I knew it had to be morning.
“How did I end up in here?” I asked. “Where’s Cal?”
I had fallen asleep the night before, in the garden with Cal, then he had moved me, carrying me into my room and staying with me, holding me. But still the nightmares had come, and I remembered waking more than once to Cal being there, trying to calm and soothe me.
“Cal brought ye in, a few hours ago. Yer nightmares were bad…really bad. He thought ye might sleep better if we were both at yer side, so we squeezed ye between us, and it seemed to work. Ye actually got a few hours of peaceful rest,” Arran explained. “He didnae want te upset ye, but he knew ye needed to get some sleep, and he couldnea think what else te do. We were both on top of the covers, and we just held ye.”
“It’s okay, Arran. I’m fine being here with both of you,” I assured him. I turned onto my side so I faced him and shuffled closer. Just as I hoped, he wrapped his free arm around me and held me.
“Jesus, lass. It’s so good to hear yer voice again. I missed ya,” he told me.
He leaned in to kiss my forehead and it helped me to try and calm down from the nightmare, just to know he was there and I wasn’t alone.
“I had an epic meltdown last night. It seemed to shatter whatever has been holding my voice prisoner,” I admitted with some embarrassment. It was pretty horrifying to think about how out of control I had been the night before.
“I think ye were due a release of some kind, Cara. Ye were holding onto so much. It had to escape in some way.”
“I scared myself,” I admitted. “I just lost control of everything and…I just…everything in my head…it’s like it just exploded from me.”
“Of course it did. Ye cannae just hold shit like that inside. It’ll eat ye alive if ye do. That’s why you have to talk to someone. I ken how hard it can be to open up. It makes ye feel vulnerable, and no one wants to feel that way, but it’s the only way. Ye cannae just keep burying the things that hurt or scare ye, deep in yermind. If ye do that, they’re always gonna be there, just waitin’ fer the chance to creep up on ye again.”
“It always worked for me before,” I told him firmly.
“Did it?” he asked as he looked down until our eyes met, then just stared knowingly.
I didn’t want to admit the truth, but I knew it well enough, and the answer was no. It had never really worked. Maybe it had pushed the trauma of my childhood from my thoughts enough for me to function, but I had always lived in fear. I had been terrified because of my past, and it left me with anxiety and nightmares that barely allowed me to sleep enough to get by. Burying my trauma had allowed me to survive, and nothing more, but right then as messed up as I felt, just surviving seemed like a place I would be happy to get back to.
I sighed deeply. Even getting to that point just seemed so unattainable after what had happened in that fucking warehouse. I didn’t see any way forwards after what those monsters had done to me. After Mikhail-fucking-Kozlov took Gia from me.
“Are they dead?” I asked.
It was something I had wanted to know for days, and right then I needed the answer more than my next breath.
“Kozlov’s men? Are they gone?”
“Aye, they are, and Rafe is usin’ his every resource to bring Kozlov in too. It’s only a matter of time,” Arran replied.
“Did they suffer?”
I knew the answer, but I needed to hear the words anyway.
“With every fuckin’ breath they took, including their last,” he ground out, some of his rage seeping through.
“I want to be there when you end Mikhail Kozlov,” I said firmly.
“I’m no’ so sure Rafe’ll be on board wi’ that idea, hen.” Arran pointed out.
“That bastard killed my sister and orchestrated what happened to me. I’m being there. I’ll handle Rafe,” I argued with utter determination.
For several moments there was just quiet as Arran pulled me close again, and I found myself pressing against the soft cotton of the t shirt he was wearing.
“Where’s Cal?” I asked eventually.
“He had a meetin’ at university, that he couldnea get out of. He said he’ll be back home by ten.”
