Page 87 of Rune’s Solace

Barely one.

Enough.

I was out of that chair before I knew I’d stood, putting three steps between us and both hands on top of my head because I would cut my own tongue out before I became another man that scared her.

“Rune—”

“No.” I turned back toward her. “I’m sorry.”

“You didn’t do anything.”

“I raised my voice.”

I stared at her, and she stared right back before patting the mattress beside her. “Come here.”

“Amy—”

“Rune.”

So I went, because there would never be a version of my life now where she asks me to come to her and I don’t. I sat beside her but left some space between us, and she looked down at it, looked back at me, and gave a tired little sigh like I was the difficult one here before sliding across the mattress and putting herself against my side. My arms went around her before I had time to think about it.

I pulled her in carefully, one arm around her back and the other across her legs, until her head was against my chest and I could feel every breath she took. For a while neither of us said anything, and I didn’t need us to. She was here. I could feel her weight against me, feel her fingers curled into the front of my shirt, and right then that was about all the world I could handle.

“I was scared,” she said eventually.

My hand stopped on her back.

“I know.”

“No. I mean I was really scared.”

I closed my eyes again, but this time I kept the room out.

“I thought he would kill me.”

There are sentences a man hears and knows he’s going to carry until somebody puts him in the ground and that was one.

Her fingers tightened in my shirt. “But Sawyer got to you.”

I couldn’t get anything past my throat.

“I knew he would.”

“He near drove through Brenda’s flower bed,” I chuckled, trying to lighten the mood.

A breath of a laugh moved against my chest, so small I almost missed it. “That sounds like him.”

“Purple shirt and all.”

“Lavender.”

“Whatever.”

“There is a difference.”

“Don’t give a shit.”

“You should. He does.”