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“Please?” I lock his palm in both of my hands, refusing to let him escape.
“It’s a bad idea, Iz. You know that.”
“No. What Iknowis that I’d lie awake all night worrying about you, so it’s better if you’re here.”
“You don’t have to worry about me.”
“I will always worry about you. Just sleep with me.”
“Pretty sure we did that already.”
“You know what I mean, smartass.”
My eyes have adjusted enough to see his smile, and there’s absolutely no chance those dimples aren’t spending the rest of the night within reach. I yank his hand, and he gives in with a groan.
“Fine. But I still think this is a bad idea,” he says, climbing in behind me. “It can’t be a regular thing.”
I pull the blankets over us and burrow into him with my back to his front. He drapes his arm around me, and I trap our joined hands against my chest. With a content sigh, I melt into our connection, enjoying the security of being close. It’s like nothing can touch us if we stay cocooned in the safety of each other. Maybe he feels it too when his body relaxes and his breathing slows. I draw our hands to my lips and kiss his fingers.
“This isn’t right, Iz,” he says quietly.
I hear the pain in his warning and clutch his hand harder.
“Actually, this might be theonlything that feels right, lately.”
“It’s not. If you knew everything…” His words fade out, and my stomach churns at the implication.
“If I knew everything, nothing would change because Idoknow. We know, okay?”
“Iz… You don’t,” he whispers. “You don’t.”
His arms tighten around me, and I feel the warmth of his breath on my neck as he buries his face in my skin. His silent pain is brutal, but I don’t know what to do. I’m desperate to turn to him. To hold him, to touch his lips and get lost in his eyes. To prove everything with a single look, but I know the dark anonymity of our position is thinning the walls he’s built. I won’t risk that small miracle.
I’m not sure how long we stay like this—clinging, breathing, existing together in a moment scraped from bliss then forged by tragedy. It doesn’t even matter because it won’t be long enough. Until we get back the years that were stolen from us, nothing will be enough. For too long I’ve lived in a world that shouldn’t exist, a world manufactured by misguided choices and bad decisions. For years I loved the right person the wrong way, hating him for the same reasons. I could spend days asking “what if” but in the end, all we have is whatis. Andwhat is,isa tragic ending that might be damaged beyond repair.
“I… I fought back at first,” he says faintly.
Oh god.
I can’t breathe as his haunted confession fractures the silence.
Please, don’t let it be true.
“I didn’t just let them. I swear I fought, but after the hot water, I just... I couldn’t do it anymore. I thought they were going to kill me.”
He’s shaking so hard his terror seeps through my skin.
It wasn’t supposed to be true!
“I was so scared, Iz. Always so fucking scared because I never knew when or how bad it would be. I… At least with Felton it was predictable and they protected me in return. What was I supposed to do?”
His voice shatters. The dark room becomes a suffocating mass in our lungs.
It’s not your fault.
I promise it’s not.
I promise, I promise, I promise.
