Page 17 of What We Burn

Holden made the only call there was to make. The same one I’d have made if I’d been awake to make it.

I still hate that I’m the kind of girl who can swallow around a raw, wrecked throat before the doctors said I was ready, but can’t seem to swallow so much as a single drop of bitterness when it comes to the men in my own life. I’m furious that I don’t get to own this story, and I’m also grateful they rewrote it so I could keep breathing. I try to remember who I was before the night with Brock, before the jetty, before all the ways my body has been rewritten and recontextualized, and I come up empty, every time.

Ro finishes her notes and tucks the clipboard against her hip.

“The doctors want you trying ice chips again in an hour,” she says. “Tiny ones. No heroics.”

I give her a look.

Her mouth twitches. “I mean it. Your throat is not impressed by your pain tolerance.”

“Rude,” I whisper.

She smiles, dimple appearing. “Do you want me to ask anyone to step out so you can rest?”

“No,” I say immediately. I honestly don’t know if I’ll ever want to be alone again.

They made the guys leave for the psychologist. Walked Knox out into the hall like he was a hazard—which, fair. Then it was just me and a kind-eyed woman with a lanyard, asking me gently whether I’d been having thoughts of hurting myself. Whether I felt safe. Whether there was anything I wanted to say now that we were alone.

It took everything I had not to laugh in her kind, patient face.

I am safer than I’ve been in months. I am guarded and surrounded and loved by men who would burn this place to the studs if I asked them to. The only person in this story who ever wanted me dead is still out there—and it isn’t me. But I sat in that bed and let her look at me like I’m made of spun glass, like a sad fragile thing that needs watching, because the alternative is the truth, and the truth hurts all of us.

Worst trade I’ve ever made. I’d make it again every day of my life.

Rosaline is about to say something else when the door opens.

I know it’s Holden before I see him. I don’t know how—maybe the cadence of his footsteps, or the fact my body has learned to recognize him the way it’s learned to recognize the sound of rain or the smell of the ocean. Something cellular. Something I couldn’t unlearn if I tried.

He comes around the curtain and stops.

He looks terrible. His eyes are wrong—too bright and bloodshot, like he’s been running on adrenaline and caffeine since Saturday night. I’m told he’s been working extra hours behind the scenes to make sure the narrative holds. I haven’t been awake when he’s come to visit.

“Hey, wildcat.”

I break.

I’d steadfastly managed to maintain my composure behind a polite wall of “thank you” and “I’m fine” and “please” and “no, I don’t need anything.” But the moment I hear his voice, the structure liquefies and the pain I’ve been holding back floods in.

An ugly sob tears through my damaged throat and hurts so badly I almost choke on it, but I can’t stop. I’m reaching for him before I know I’m doing it, hands out like a child, and he’s across the room in three strides. He sits on the edge of the bed and pulls me into his chest and I just . . . let go. All of it. The fear and the pain and the helplessness and the memory of the rope and the dark and the not-breathing, all of it pouring out of me in broken, shredded sounds that don’t even sound like crying. They sound like an animal in a trap.

“I’ve got you.” His arms are tight around me, one hand cradling the back of my head, his chin on top of my hair. “I’m here, wildcat. I’m here.”

I fist his shirt and hold on. He smells like coffee and leather and whatever detergent he uses and underneath all of it, like Holden, and it’s the safest smell in the world. I press my face into his chest and cry until there’s nothing left, until I’m shaking and hiccupping and leaving a mess of tears and snot on his clean shirt.

He doesn’t let go. He holds me, solid and immovable, and lets me fall apart.

When the worst of it passes, I pull back enough to look at him. His shirt is ruined. His jaw is tight. And his eyes—those too-bright, too-sharp eyes—are suspiciously wet.

“Sorry,” I rasp. “Your shirt.”

“Fuck the shirt.” He tucks a strand of hair behind my ear, his thumb tracing the line of my jaw. His gaze drops to the bandage on my throat and his whole face hardens. “I’m getting you out of here.”

“The doctor hasn’t⁠—”

“I don’t care what the doctor says. You’re not staying in this place another night.” He looks over his shoulder at Rosaline, who’s been standing quietly by the monitors, clipboard against her chest, very carefully pretending she isn’t witnessing the complete emotional disintegration of a grown woman.

Rosaline straightens. “Dr. Chowdhury wants at least another forty-eight hours of observation. The tracheal swelling is improving, but there’s a risk of secondary edema—her airway could re-occlude without warning. She needs monitoring, regular vitals, and someone qualified to intervene if her breathing deteriorates.” Holden glares, but she holds her ground. “She can’t leave.”