Page 31 of What We Burn

“Micah.”

“You called me. I walked away. Sage almost died.” I push off the counter and move toward the door because if I stay one more second, I’m going to lose it, and I can’t. Not yet. “I need you to understand something, Eli. I’ve never hated anyone more than I hate you right now. You broke her. You broke me. You broke all of us. And I don’t know if I can forgive you for that.” I don’t look back. I follow the others outside, breathing hard and hating the sting in my eyes.

The day is warm. Out on the steps, Knox is telling Sage a story, voice low and even, his arm a wall behind her on the step. They look up when I come out, and I sit down two steps below, forearms on knees.

After a minute, Milo slides down a step to sit beside me, his shoulder snug against mine. He doesn’t say anything as he leans against me, like he’s plugging a leak I don’t want to admit is there. Down the steps, the yard opens into weeds and wildflowers. In the sunlight, you could almost pretend this was a normal day. Birds, bugs. The world managing fine despite the horror show inside the house.

The sun is so bright it makes me squint. I rub my eyes with the heel of my hand. Something about the light keeps the tremor in my chest from becoming a quake. Then Sage laughs again behind me—torn raw, rusty, more air than sound—and the tremor comes right back. That’s what her laugh costs now. Somebody did that to it.

“You okay, man?” Milo asks quietly. I wait for a dismissive joke, the Milo classic. But it doesn’t come.

“Not really,” I say.

“Yeah,” he says. “Me neither.”

The silence is fine, actually. Not heavy or awkward, but shared. I watch Sage lean into Knox, her shoulders relaxed. Her hair’s tied back, exposing the full extent of the bruising. I feel sick looking at it and yet I can’t stop, half-hypnotized by the mottled colors.

Milo must feel it too, because he says, quietly, “She’s so fucking tough. Tougher than she should ever have to be.”

I nod. “Yeah. Toughest person I’ve ever met.”

We’re silent for a beat.

“Do you want me to kill Eli for you?” Milo says.

I smile. “Not yet. But keep that in your back pocket.”

TEN

HOLDEN

It’s past midnight when I pull into the driveway.

The house is dark except for the porch light, which Knox leaves on for me. He has a system: light on means someone’s still out. Light off means all personnel accounted for. I kill the engine and sit for a minute, letting the silence settle over me like a weighted blanket.

Sage has been out of the hospital for two weeks and we’re still no closer to figuring out who hurt her than we were the night it happened. I’ve just spent twelve hours cross-referencing rope suppliers and staring at a list of registered dog owners in the area until the words blurred into noise. It’s useless busywork—Fenrir is far more talented and has abundantly more resources than I can access—but I need to do something.

Somewhere out there, the person who hung Sage is sleeping peacefully, when they should be dead.

I grab my jacket and head inside, turning the deadbolt behind me to lock up tight.

Eli’s couch is empty. The blanket is folded, pillows stacked. He must be on the back porch. He does that sometimes—sits outside at night, staring at nothing. I don’t check on him. None of us do.

I’d really like to break his nose.

The house breathes around me. The tick of the hallway clock. The hum of the fridge. Knox snoring faintly from upstairs—a sound I’ll never admit I find oddly comforting.

The night nurse stopped coming three days ago. Daytime checks only now. So I take the stairs quietly. I know which steps creak and I avoid them without thinking. Second from the top. Fourth from the bottom. The landing.

Her door is cracked open. She can’t stand it shut anymore. The therapist she’s seen twice this week says that’s a normal trauma response. I hate the word normal in this context. Nothing about any of this is fucking normal.

I push the door open enough to look in.

She’s in my bed. My old bed, technically. I gave her the main bedroom because it has the en suite, and it was the best place to set up all the medical equipment when we first got home from the hospital.

Home.

It strikes me that this house has never felt like a home the way it does when she’s in it. Hell, with all the guys in it too.