Page 46 of A Smile Full of Lies (Secrets of Stonewood #1)

Chapter

Thirty

ROS

They let me go ten days after I almost died.

The scars were still fresh — stitched tight over my abdomen and floating ribs for the slash, then the stitched up stab wound sat high on the left side near my sternum, dangerously close to my heart.

The nurses said I was lucky. The doctor called it ‘a narrow miss’.

Said I’d heal fine, long as I didn’t push it.

But the worst damage wasn’t physical.

It was the look in Knox’s eyes when he carried my discharge papers in one hand and gripped my overnight bag in the other like it might disappear if he didn’t hold it tight enough.

He’d barely left my side. Not since I woke up in that too-quiet hospital room, full of tubes and monitors and the weight of everything we hadn’t said before.

After our initial conversation, he hadn’t brought up the wire again. He also hadn’t asked me for the full story. But the way he’d kissed me — like he meant it, like he was mine — had said enough.

More than that, he’d told me he loved me, even though he was furious at me for putting myself in danger the way I had.

I didn’t try to talk much that last morning. My voice was still hoarse. My lungs ached. But when the nurse wheeled me out and Knox helped me into the truck, his hand firm beneath my elbow, I leaned into his touch like a lifeline.

He opened the door to his house for me without a word. Led me down the hall to his bedroom like it was already mine. I didn’t argue. I didn’t tease. I just let him settle me into the middle of his bed, the sheets soft and smelling like cedar and safety.

He didn’t hover, not the way he could have. I suspected he wanted to, badly, but he was holding himself back. He just brought me water, made sure the pillows were propped right, and knelt beside the bed, brushing my hair back from my face.

“I’ve got you now,” he said quietly. “And I’m not letting go.”

It wasn’t a promise. It was a vow, and I was too wrecked to do anything but believe him.

NOVEMBER 14

I woke up warm but alone.

The sheets still smelled like Knox, but his side of the bed was cold. My hand drifted to it anyway, fingertips grazing the dip in the mattress where he’d slept the night before — where he’d held me while I drifted in and out of pain-laced sleep, whispering things I couldn’t remember.

Now? All I had was the echo of him.

I pushed myself upright slowly, wincing as the stitches tugged beneath the bandages on my ribs and chest. A dull throb radiated through my side, sharp enough to remind me I was alive.

The sun filtered in through the curtains, casting long bars of gold across the floor.

I waited for the sound of footsteps, the creak of that familiar floorboard outside the door.

What I got was nothing.

I made it to the bathroom and back with monumental effort, then settled in bed again, heart drumming with something I didn’t want to name.

He came in with a tray of tea and toast twenty minutes later, shoulders tense, jaw tight. He didn’t meet my eyes when he set it down.

“You disappeared,” I said quietly.

His gaze flicked to mine.

“I didn’t want to wake you.”

I chewed on my bottom lip for a second.

“I thought maybe you changed your mind about not leaving me.”

He stared at me like I’d said something utterly ludicrous and shook his head.

“You need to rest.”

I crossed my arms, wincing at the way the movement made my entire torso scream with discomfort.

“What I need is you.”

That cracked something in his expression. He knelt beside the bed again, his hand brushing my thigh through the blanket.

“I don’t trust myself with you right now, Ros,” he said, voice low. “You almost died. I’ve never been that scared in my entire fucking life. And every time I look at you, all I want to do is take you apart and remind you that you’re mine.”

My breath caught.

“But I can’t touch you — not like that — until you’re healed,” he said, lifting my hand to his lips. “So I’m staying close. But I’m keeping my distance. Because if I don’t…”

He didn’t finish the sentence. He didn’t have to. I already felt it in my bones. There was going to be a reckoning between us about what I’d done, but not until he felt sure I could take whatever he was planning to do.

Knox sat with me while I ate, his thumb stroking lazy circles over my wrist like he was trying to memorize the rhythm of my pulse. He didn’t say much — just watched me with those storm-dark blue eyes, protective and possessive and barely reined in.

When I finished, he took the tray and set it aside, then turned back to me with a look that made my stomach knot.

“I want to talk to you about something,” he said.

I braced myself for the worst.

“Okay?”

He hesitated. Just for a second, then cleared his throat.

“You made me a promise. About the book… about writing the truth about what happened to my family.”

Oh .

“What about it?”

His jaw twitched.

“You still want to write it after what happened with Thayer when you uncovered the truth?”

I swallowed, my throat suddenly tight.

“More than ever.”

He nodded once.

“Good. Because I think you need space and time to heal. Somewhere quiet. Somewhere safe. You’re not ready to be back in the world yet, Ros — not with the press hounding you, and not with me this close to losing my fucking mind every time I remember how pale and lifeless you were in that fucking hospital bed. ”

He looked down and breathed through his nose, working to rein himself in.

“I have a place,” he said finally. “On the Tensaw river. It’s isolated, there are no neighbors, and I keep it stocked and ready. You’d have peace, time to write, and time to breathe. You’d be protected.”

It sounded like heaven in theory, but it felt like exile in reality.

“You’re sending me away,” I said quietly.

Knox shook his head.

“I’m giving you what you need to get better.”

Frustration boiled up inside me and hot tears pricked at the back of my eyes. I blinked them away.

“But I want you.”

His gaze burned into mine.

“And you’ll have me, sweetheart, but not until you’re fully healed.”

All the hair stood up on my arms and the back of my neck as his voice dropped to a whisper. Something dark unfurled in his gaze and bared its teeth.

My lip trembled.

“Why?”

He smiled, and sirens started going off inside my mind, sending my internal warning system on high alert.

“Because when I finally touch you again, Ros? It’s not going to be gentle.”

And just like that, I understood. He wasn’t pushing me away. He was holding back… for now.

But only because when he finally broke and unleashed that darkness I saw lurking just beneath his tightly controlled facade? He wanted me strong enough to take it.

“I— I’ll think about it.”

That was a damn lie. The truth was, I already knew I’d go.

Not because I wanted to. Not because I believed I needed time and quiet and space to bleed words onto the page about how his family died and who their killer turned out to be.

I’d go because it felt like the only real choice he was offering me. And because some stupid, desperate part of me wanted to prove I could be strong enough to endure the still before the storm.

I wanted to be strong enough to write the story, strong enough to be apart from him, strong enough to make him proud of me.

He didn’t ask again that night. He just brushed my hair behind my ear and kissed my forehead like I was something breakable. He treated me like I wasn’t his to touch. Not again… not yet.

He slept in the bed with me, but didn’t so much as slide a hand beneath my shirt. He didn’t kiss me again. My chest ached when he didn’t even spoon up behind me when I woke up gasping at three in the morning, sweating and shaking from a dream I couldn’t fully remember.

I hated the distance. Hated the silence between us. Hated the way I caught him watching me when he thought I wasn’t looking, his jaw tight, his beautiful blue eyes darker than I’d ever seen them.

He wanted me. He just wouldn’t take me. Not until I was healed.

And I told myself that was okay. That I could wait. That I understood.

But the second he walked out of the room, I curled onto my uninjured side and bit down on a sob that wrenched my insides so hard it bruised my ribs.

Because this didn’t feel like patience. It felt like punishment. I was paying penance for my recklessness.

And the worst part?

I knew I deserved it.