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“Sure I do,” I tell her as I carefully clamber out of bed.
There’s no way I’m letting him deal with this on his own. A part of me must have anticipated this happening because why else would I be awake when my head aches like a piledriver’s hammering it into the ground and my eyes are burning from staying open?
With his past, nightmares are to be expected.
And all this time, he’s been dealing with them alone.
Another shout makes itself known to me and, hurriedly, I tell Diana, “I have to go. I’ll call you in the morning.”
I don’t let her get a word in edgewise—just disconnect the call and drop my cell on the bed.
Savio needs me and there will never come a day when I’m not here for him.
No one knows better than Diana that I protect what’s mine.
And he is—mine.
The sooner he accepts that, the better.
CHAPTER 20
Andrea
Everybody Hurts - Jasmine Thompson
Unfortunately for me, my heart has different ideas than my brain.
The second I stand in my rush to reach his side, blood surges behind my eyes, turbocharging the spots dancing in my vision. Lightheaded isn’t the word.
I’m supposed to practice gentle exercise to increase my mobility, but in the past few days, I’ve done a lot of walking. There’s been stress too, and I’m supposed to stay calm.
Oops.
Pressing the back of my hand to my forehead, I scramble onward, rushing out of my bedroom and barging straight into his.
My first impression is that this place is no home. It’s another cell. Plain, unadorned. I know men like to keep things simple, but this is so bare it’s representative of his soul.
There are no pictures on the dresser or nightstand, none even on the bookshelves that line one wall.
It’s just a simple room.
Spartan.
Miserable.
He’s tossing and turning on the one luxury—a double bed.
He has to be enduring excruciating agony from the pressure of his back colliding with the sheets, but he doesn’t seem to care.
The anguished sounds escaping him, the noises he makes have a different variety of pain filling me. If I didn’t already know of the many types of agony a human being can experience, I’m looking at proof of it.
But Diana was right about one thing—he’s violent in his slumber. At this moment, my body isn’t equipped to handle that.
He doesn’t just whimper or make mewling sounds in his sleep—he thrashes. Half the sheets are off the bed, torn from the mattress. His feet kick, his arms flail like...
I close my eyes when reality hits.
Because, dear Lord, he’s trying to get loose.