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She’d told him. Told him again and again. To let her be. To leave her alone. It would have been so easy for him to give her that space, and yet, he hadn’t. He came back. Time and time again. He came back.
And years from now, she wouldn’t escape that trapped feeling. She knew that much.
“You’re not coming back now.” Her voice tore open her frozen state and turned her toward Blaine, her limbs feeling soft like jelly.
She scrambled across the room to his side. Despite his rasping breaths, he was the first to speak. “You’re okay?”
She pressed her hand to his cheek, his statement a sign that maybe he wasn’t all that cognizant of what happened. “I’m fine. Hang on. Please. I just need you to stay alive, okay?”
His gaze held onto hers, lids heavy, before they slammed shut again. She bit back a cry and ran for her bedroom. Her phone still lay charging on a bedside table. Even as she tried to place a call, her shaking hands were still bound, and her wrists screamed with pain.
She crossed the hallway, waiting for the call to connect, swatting at the smoke burning her lungs with each breath, while she tried to ignore the glow of fire down her hall. Somehow, she’d have to get them both out of here, but how?
“Blaine!”
He’d fallen to one side.
Putting her phone on speaker, she rushed over so she could lay him down properly.
His eyes fluttered open, and his gaze caught hers again. “You’re not allowed to blame yourself. Promise me.”
“No. I don’t need to.” She shook him, her voice pitchy and panicked, like she tried to convince herself. “You’re going to live. We’re going to be together.”
His eyes closed again, as if to prove her wrong, just as an emergency responder spoke through the phone. Emilia rattled off her address and the basic details of the situation.
The dispatcher stated someone had already called in emergency services, and fire and ambulance crew were already en route. That’s when Emilia noticed faint sirens wailing in the background.
Another sob broke from her. This was all so overwhelming. In a lifetime of being shunted aside, and in a town that kept her so geographically isolated, someone had still noticed she needed help.
Probably Blaine.
He’d likely called 911 on his way back to her house, all before he’d rushed in to save her.
But would anyone save him now? Or would help arrive far too late?
She stayed on the line as requested and grief rushed at her in the sudden quiet. Her time with Blaine was possibly about to end. Decades too early. And before she’d had a chance to tell him how much she loved him. How he’d transformed her life and given her hope. How he was the only man she’d ever wanted. That for all his attempts to hide his insecurities, he'd never needed to be more for her than the person he already was.
She doubled over and rested her head on his chest, his blood soaking her cheek, her mind focused on the fading rhythm of his heart and the growing crackle of fire beyond. He’d never hear all the plans she’d already begun to make for their future.
Anthony, in all his failures, might have succeeded in one thing. He might have dragged the love of her life down with him into death. After all she’d run from and overcome, a lifetime of loneliness stretched before her.
Hot tears slid down her cheek, and she pressed Blaine’s cold hand to her lips, praying he would hear her in what might be their very last moments together. “Please, don’t go. It’s not supposed to end like this.”
