1
Jamie
“Holden…” I can see him beneath the truck, lying on his side, his eyes closed, blood oozing from his mouth, his nose, his chest barely moving. “Holden,” I sob, and I find what little strength I have and crawl to him.
In the distance, sirens blare.
“Holden,” I cry out, coughing up blood. I lift his arm when I get to him, but he doesn’t move. Not willingly. “Holden, wake up!” I lie down beside him, put his arm over me, and hold him close.
“Jamie,” he whispers, and I cry into his chest, relief swarming through me when his arm tightens around me. “It’s okay, baby. You’re safe.”
I gasp awake, sitting up in an unfamiliar bed, an unfamiliar room. Sweat coats every naked inch of me, pooling at my hairline as I struggle to breathe. I flinch at the warm hand landing on my shoulder, while the mattress shifts beside me. “Another nightmare?”
Blinking back tears, I force air into my lungs, fight to come back to reality.
“Jamie?”
I swallow the ache in my throat and turn to the man sitting next to me.
“You okay?” he asks, big brown eyes blinking away his fatigue.
“Yeah, Dean,” I mumble, getting out of the bed and taking the covers with me to hide my shame. “I’m fine.”
It’s no more than five steps from the bed to the bathroom, but each of those steps feels like a heavy anchor weighing me down, trying to drag me under. With the blanket wrapped around me, I make it to the sink, my vision blurred as I turn on the tap, quickly splash water on my face before rubbing the coolness against my nape. Oxygen burns against my throat, builds a fire in my chest.
Dean’s touch is like ice against my scorching flesh, and for a moment—just one—I want to immerse myself in the contact, drown in it. “You’ve had one every night since you got back…” he says, his fingertips gliding across my forehead as he lowers his eyes to mine, holding my stare for longer than I’m comfortable. Palm flat against my jaw, his thumb strokes at the liquid regret streaking down my cheek.
I pull back—away from his touch, from the pain and pity set in his stony eyes. “I think that’s the problem…” I mumble, pausing a moment to breathe through the agony searing through my bloodline. “Being back here…”
Dean’s single nod is slow as he moves behind me, settling a hand on my hip and dropping a gentle kiss on my bare shoulder. “Can I do anything?”
I keep my head down, refusing to look at him, but I can feel his stare—like tiny pricks along every inch of my flesh, slowly exposing my inner secrets to him. Only they’re not really secrets—at least not between us.
He doesn’t say a word. He knows that saying anything right now would mean pushing me away, and I’m already as far as I can go. “I just need a minute,” I tell him.
It seems like an eternity passes before he speaks. “I’ll wait for you in bed then.” He holds out for a response, and when nothing comes, he adds, “You should try to get some sleep. You’ve got a big day tomorrow.” And then he leaves, closing the bathroom door between us.
I take my first full breath since I startled awake and focus on my hands, watch them tremble beneath the harsh bathroom lights. Then I zone in on the crystal in my hand, large and intrusive and dark—so dark it’s almost black—like the memories that keep me up at night, taunting me, teasing me.
I don’t know how long I stay in the bathroom, waiting for my breathing to level until I feel safe to do something as basic as move. As quietly as possible, I make my way back into the bedroom where Dean’s fast asleep, snoring lightly as he lies on his stomach, one hand beneath the pillow.
I leave him there and move to the living room, where the sheer curtains shift, caused by the slight breeze blowing through the open balcony door. Light on my feet, the plush carpet agitates my soles as I make my way toward the drinks trolley beside the vintage record player. He doesn’t even own any records.
His apartment is newly built, purchased off the plans, and decorated like a display home. I happened to be in town when he inspected it. It’s one of the many “investments” he plans to “add to his portfolio,” so he says. All the appliances are shiny and brand spanking new, and nothing—not one single item—is out of place.
It’s not a home.
At least not for me.
I make quick work of grabbing a glass tumbler and the bottle of the most expensive whiskey in his collection. He won’t even notice. He doesn’t even drink whiskey. Like all the other things in the apartment: it’s all for show.
With my salvation in my grasp, I glance at the digital clock in the kitchen. It’s almost three in the morning. I take slow, quiet steps around his dark living space, occasionally stopping to look at the artwork hanging on the walls. I tilt my head, inspecting the areas of thick paint no doubt made by a palette knife. Then, reaching up, I run a finger along a particularly large glob of red paint and scrunch my nose. It’s not really my style, but then again, I’m not really into art.
Not anymore.
I glance back at the closed bedroom door, wondering for a moment if it’s even worth going back. I already know I won’t be getting any more sleep, and so I move to the balcony door, slide it open as silently as possible. The floor tile is a complete contrast to the carpeted inside, but the patio furniture here matches everything else inside.
Shiny.
New.
I drop the glass and whiskey on the table and sit. Stare at it a moment. And then I pour.
One shot.
Two.
My eyes close, as if on their own, and I take a minute, a moment, whatever I need to clutch on to what little sanity I still have.
When I open my eyes again, I realize how dark it is. How quiet. There’s a stillness I recognize, a silence. A calm.
Right before the storm…
The overhead lights of the hospital burned through my irises while the police officer’s uneven footfalls matched the beating of my heart.
“He’s going to be okay, right?”
The officer wasn’t much taller than me, her hair pulled back in a tight knot. She smiled over at me, trying to hide the pity in her eyes. She knew it before I did. I was up and walking… and Holden… Holden was…
I’m forced out of my living nightmare at the sound of a car starting, and the first thing I see is the brown liquid of the whiskey.
Pulse pounding in my eardrums, I try to fight the battle.
But I can’t.
I take a sip.
Just one, I promise myself.
But then one turns to two.
To three.
Until I no longer remember what I’m fighting for.
“Kiss me,” Holden croaked, one eye cracked open as I stood over him. It was the first thing he said to me after our attack, and it wasn’t an order, but it wasn’t really a question either. And so I leaned down and gave him what he wanted.
Black and blue, his face contorted into an unbearable grin. “Mmm,” he moaned, reaching for my hand. “Sunshine and solace.”
2
Jamie
Thunder cracks so loud I can hear it over the music blaring in Dean’s car. He instinctively turns the volume down as we pull into the parking lot, dipping his head to look out the windshield and up at the gray, doomed skies. “Damn,” he remarks, watching the sheets of heavy rain come down around us.