AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I nod my understanding, but I don’t want her to go down that road, so I cut her off before she gets too far. “I know you did, sweetheart. It will be,” I assure her. “Right now, we need to focus on getting you back to feeling good again, get your head right, but I meant what I said. You haven’t lost anything. Every single thing you had a day ago is still there, it’s just on pause. It will all wait for you. You can have it all back. This is just a hard time you have to get through, and we will make sure you have everything you need to get through it. Just please, get through it. You can’t hurt yourself, you can’t do that because I can’t survive losing another person I love. I just can’t.”
She holds me tighter. “I won’t,” she promises. “I wasn’t going to, I just… I won’t. I’m sorry.”
We hold each other for a while, mourning and comforting simultaneously. When I pull back and she looks up at me, her gaze is so trusting, I want to kiss her, but I don’t. I caress her face instead.
“I would like for you not to sleep in Jonathan’s room anymore. You can’t be with him in my room, but I would like for you to sleep there. If you still need to… be with him while you’re working through this, you can come in here for that, but please use protection.”
Her eyes wide with horror, she shakes her head. “No, I don’t… it’s not like that. I don’t want to keep sleeping with him. I only needed that last night. It was a one-time thing.” As soon as she says that, she hesitates. “Well... He actually… he did take me a second time this morning. I’m so sorry, I hate telling you this. I just want to be honest. But I didn’twanthim to.”
My heart slams to a screeching halt.
“He didn’t know,” she adds quickly. “I didn’t tell him. I didn’t know how. He didn’t force himself on me or anything, but Ireallydidn’t want him to. I felt shaky and terrible after.”
Christ.
I push her face into my chest, wrapping my arms tightly around her body.
“I’m sorry. I should have just told him no, but I was afraid, and… I didn’t have anywhere else to go.”
“Oh, Kennedy.” This is just getting fucking worse. “You always have somewhere to go.”
“I can’t go back there,” she says, shaking her head. “I never want to go back to that apartment or see that woman again.”
“You never have to,” I assure her.
“I’m going to drop out of school,” she says.
“No, you’re not.”
She looks up. “Yes, I am. I have to. I need to get a full-time job so I can get my own place.”
“You don’t need your own place; you need to finish high school. This is your home now. If you want to, you can even quit the job you already have. Your time would be better spent focusing on school than working at some shitty fast-food restaurant.”
“I have to make money, Milo.”
“No, you don’t. Not right now. Finish up school, you can make money later. I’ll get you a credit card, a new phone, whatever you need or want. Whatever you weren’t able to fit in those bags you brought over last night. You don’t have to worry about it. I can replace anything you left behind.”
Kennedy shakes her head. “I don’t deserve you.”
I grab her chin and tilt it up so she has to look at me. “Yes, you do,” I say seriously. “What you don’t deserve is all the bad shit that’s happened to you. That’s over now. You will always have a safe place here, and I will always take care of you—and that is not tied to a sexual relationship with anyone in this house. You do not have to let men touch you to secure shelter or anything else you need, all right? No men, ever. Not me, not anybody. This is your home now. We are your family. No conditions.”
Chapter twenty-three
Kennedy
It’s late and I’m exhausted, but when Jonathan glances over at me questioningly, I nod, and he starts another episode of the show we’re currently binge-watching.
I don’t even like the show, honestly, I’m just afraid to go to bed.
It felt like an enormous weight being lifted off my shoulders earlier when I finally spoke to Milo and he promised he didn’t hate me. I was so fucking happy to move my stuff back to his room, but I’m nervous, too.
I don’t know how things will be, but I’m afraid it won’t be like before, and I feel like it could crush me.
I was even a tad uncertain if it would be awkward with Jonathan, but Jonathan is the least awkward person I’ve ever met. Nothing seems to bother him—at least, this certainly hasn’t. If he minds at all that I vacated his room like a thief in the night, I can’t tell.
Right now, I’m sitting on the couch between them. Jet went to bed a while ago, so it’s just the three of us. Jonathan is on my left, Milo on my right.
When we first sat down together, I felt intensely awkward because of all that’s happened, but the awkwardness faded by the end of the first episode.
