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Chapter Twenty-Six

Ronan

I wasn’t sure what was happening. My head felt heavy, like it was filled with fog, and my body felt like it didn’t belong to me. A dull ache was everywhere—pain that had settled deep into my bones. It was like I’d been hit by something I couldn’t remember, and I didn’t know if I wanted to remember.

The first thing I became aware of was the warmth in my hand, the slight pressure. The touch was soft, familiar. I tried to focus tried to open my eyes, but it felt like moving through quicksand. I blinked a few times, my eyelids fluttering open with effort, and when my vision finally cleared, there was only one thing I could make out in the dim light of the hospital room.

Elias.

He was sitting there beside me, his head resting on his arm, his face haggard but peaceful. His strawberry hair had fallen in front of his eyes. It seemed longer than usual, disheveled and out of place. I could see the exhaustion in the way his shoulders slumped, the way his fingers gently curled around mine.

He looked…like he hadn’t slept in days. Like he had been holding himself together for me.

For us.

I didn’t know how long I’d been out, but something told me it had been too long. I could feel the thickness of my thoughts, like they were stuck in the mud, unable to break free. The memories hit me in fragmented flashes—my mother’s bruised face in the hospital bed, Jack’s violence, the prison, the chaos. But the more I tried to remember, the more the pieces slipped through my fingers.

I wanted to move, to speak, to do something, but my body refused to cooperate. I felt weak and fragile. But my hand, still in Elias’s grasp, gave me something to hold onto.

The last thing I remembered clearly was the pain—both in my body and in my heart—before everything faded to black.

“Elias…” I tried to whisper his name, but it came out like a croak, a broken sound that made my throat sting.

The effort alone exhausted me, but the moment I said his name, his head shot up. His eyes locked onto mine with such intensity and raw relief that it almost made me want to pull away and curl into myself again. But I couldn’t. Not with him so close. Not when he had been my anchor in all of this.

“Ronan?” his voice cracked, low and trembling, like he couldn’t quite believe I was awake.

He stood up quickly, brushing his hand through his hair like he was trying to make sure this wasn’t some dream.

I opened my mouth to speak, but no words came out. I was too weak, too exhausted even to try. Instead, I squeezed his hand slightly, a small movement, but enough to communicate everything I couldn’t say.

Elias was here.

And for whatever reason, I was alive…if not whole.

He took a deep breath, a shaky exhale that sounded more like a sob than anything else. His thumb stroked the back of my hand, tracing the lines of my tattoos over and over again like he needed the reassurance, too. He leaned down close, his face hovering near mine, as if afraid I’d slip away again if he weren’t careful.

“Ronan,” he said again, his voice barely above a whisper now, as though speaking any louder might break the fragile moment. “You’re safe. You’re…you’re okay. I’m right here. I haven’t left you.”

I wanted to respond and tell him I could feel it. I could feel him here, with me, holding me together when everything else had been falling apart. But my throat was too dry, my head too fuzzy. I tried to smile, sending my message with my eyes.

I let out a soft breath, my eyes flickering closed again, a sense of comfort washing over me despite the confusion and pain ravaging my body.

“Shh, it’s okay. You’re gonna be okay,” Elias said softly, his voice filled with both tenderness and relief.

His hand brushed over my forehead, pushing the damp strands of hair away. He was here. He was real. And even though everything felt like it had shattered, somehow, with him beside me, I was holding onto the only thing that had ever felt certain.

Elias looked at me, studied my eyes, and then his eyes moved to my lips. I wanted him to kiss me. I wanted to lean up and accept the unspoken question.

I didn’t know what had happened. I didn’t know how much time had passed or what Jack had done while I was gone. I didn’t know how things would go from here. But as I lay there, tethered to the present by Elias’s touch, I felt a glimmer of something inside me—something I hadn’t felt in what felt like forever.

Hope.

“I’m not going anywhere, Ronan,” Elias murmured, his voice like a promise, my anchor.

I finally managed to lift my hand, though it was weak and shaky. My fingers brushed against his cheek, feeling the fresh beard growth, just barely grazing the skin, and I felt the tremble in his breath as he leaned into it.

I wanted to say so many things to him. I wanted to apologize for everything. I wanted to tell him how much he meant to me, how he was the reason I’d held on so tightly in the darkest moments. But the words wouldn’t come. They were stuck behind the weight of everything that had happened.

Instead, I just squeezed his hand again, a silent plea for him to stay with me, not to leave me now.

“I’m here,” he whispered again, his forehead resting gently against mine. “I’m here, Ronan. I’m not going anywhere.”

His lips pressed into mine carefully, so carefully as if I was made of glass, and he was fearful I would shatter. He tasted like salty soup and coffee. I couldn’t help but smile, trying through my weakness to link my hands in his hair and pull him tighter to me. He laughed and lightly tapped my nose.

“Behave yourself, my Sinner. You need to heal right now. I am not going anymore. And neither are my lips.”

For the first time since everything had started to fall apart, I allowed myself to believe that maybe, just maybe, we could put the pieces back together.

Maybe we would be okay.

Maybe…he would choose me after all.

* * *

My head was still a mess. I went from periods of being awake and trying to eat mushy baby food to long bouts of restless sleep that made me sweat from nightmares of strangers and rough hands. I didn’t know where the fog came from, but every time I tried to focus, it was like a curtain of haze fell over my thoughts.

I could feel Elias’s hand in mine, warm and steady, but my fingers were weak, and I could barely hold on. There was too much…too much to process, and every time I tried, my body fought me, like it was too fragile to hold on to any of it.

I wanted to say something, anything, but all I could do was stare at him. Elias’s face was tight, his eyes darkened by exhaustion and something I couldn’t quite place. It was the way he looked at me like there was something he wanted to say but couldn’t. I wasn’t sure I wanted to hear it. I didn’t think I was ready.

But I couldn’t keep pretending I didn’t know something was wrong. Something was off.

I didn’t know how to ask. So instead, I squeezed his hand slightly, trying to say that I was here and listening, but I didn’t know how to listen to something this big.

“Ronan,” Elias’s voice broke through the quiet, soft, and jagged like he was struggling with the words. “There’s something…something you need to know. About your mother.”

The words made my chest tighten immediately, and I felt my heart drop and my stomach twist. Her face flashed in my mind, memories of her in better times—her smile, the way she’d always burn anything she tried to cook, how she had so many paper cuts from cutting coupons, even when she couldn’t drive to buy anything.

But then it all turned dark. My chest hurt, and the air around me felt heavy. It was like I knew what was coming, but I didn’t want to hear it.

I can’t hear it.

Elias looked at me, and there was pain in his eyes—his pain, raw and real. And maybe that was what made it worse. He didn’t want to say this, but he had to. And even though I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t look away.

“Your mother…Miranda,” he said, the words breaking like glass against the silence. “She’s gone, Ronan. She didn’t make it. It was too much on her body this time. I am so sorry.”

The blood in my body felt like it dropped, fell out all over the floor, and everything inside me went numb. I wanted to scream, to shout that it was not true, that it couldn’t be true. But no sound came out, just a low, aching thud in my chest.

My vision swayed, and the world felt like it was slipping away from me, like I was drowning in something too heavy to bear. Most days, I fucking hated her. She was a sleazy moron who made my life a living hell…but now with her gone…

I blinked, my head spun, and I didn’t know how to breathe.

“No,” I whispered. That was all I could say.

No. No, you’re lying. You have to be. That crazy bitch owes me more than this. She doesn’t get to leave me like this. No. Not now.

Elias didn’t look away, allowing me to rage and break down before him. His hand squeezed mine, and I could feel his fingers trembling slightly like he was trying to hold himself together, too. I didn’t know what I was expecting from him, but when he opened his mouth again, I wished I could block it out.

I wish I could turn back time, back to before all of this bullshit. Before I ever came back and broke every fucking thread of my life.

He didn’t give me that chance.

“Ronan, it wasn’t you,” Elias said, his voice low and strained. “It wasn’t your fault. You didn’t…you didn’t do this.”

I didn’t understand him. I couldn’t make sense of it. Everything in me was screaming that I was the one who was responsible for her death. I’d always been the one who fucked things up, the one who caused pain by avoiding everything that fucking mattered. I’d always been the one to block her from Jack’s wrath, but this time I couldn’t.

When it fucking mattered, I wasn’t there.

I opened my mouth, but it was like there was a wall in my throat. I didn’t know how to say the words. I didn’t know how to tell him that I’d been waiting for this, for the truth, but I couldn’t accept it. I couldn’t accept that the ‘pain in my ass’ was actually gone.

I felt my hands shaking and my fingers turn cold even as Elias held onto them, as though he was grounding me, keeping me tethered to something.

“Where is he?” I said, my voice thin, fragile, like it could break into a thousand pieces. “Where is that fucking asshole?”

Elias’s face twisted like he was in agony, too, but his eyes held mine, steady and sure, even when the world around us felt like it was anything but those things.

“Jack is gone,” he said, and just the sound of the name makes something inside me burn, like a fire in my veins. “He’s trying to flee the state. He?—”

He stopped himself, breathing in like the words were too much. But it didn’t matter how many times he said Jack’s name. It didn’t matter how much he tried to convince me. I already knew. I knew what needed to be done. I knew I had to end this.

I’d known for a while, even if I didn’t want to admit it. But doing what needed to be done would make me lose Elias for good.

My chest tightened again, a different kind of weight settling over me— resolve mixed with guilt, which twisted inside and made breathing hard.

Jack was out there.

Jack needed to be found and put fucking down for good. He couldn’t continue living on this earth, threatening the man I loved. He didn’t deserve his breath when he took them from Miranda. I would fucking find him.

The silence stretched between us, thick and suffocating. My fingers twitched, and I could feel tears threatening to spill, but I wouldn’t let them. I couldn’t, not after everything.

I didn’t even know what to say to him. I didn’t know how to tell him how sorry I was for everything—for all the ways I’d failed him, for all the ways I’d failed myself and my mother.

And then, as if he knew what I was thinking, Elias shifted closer, his voice barely above a whisper.

“I’m so sorry, Ronan,” he said, and I felt the weight of his words settle on my skin like the air after a storm. “I should’ve been there for you. I should’ve protected you.”

I shook my head, trying to pull my thoughts together.

“No,” I manage to say, my voice a little hoarse. “You were…you were there. You’re here now. You didn’t leave me.”

“No. When we were kids, I should have known. I should have talked to you, drove to your damn house, and realized why you lived so secretly. I should have known. I failed you.”

“You didn’t fail me, Elias,” I whispered, my voice cracking. “None of this is your fault. I am not letting you fucking blame yourself for a ghost of the past. There are a million things we could have done differently. But ultimately…if it ends with you like this by my side…I don’t regret the life I have survived. I just wish my mother had that chance.”

His eyes softened, and I felt the weight in his chest, the guilt, but also something else. Something that made him lean forward, his forehead resting against mine as if he was just waiting for me to pull away. But I didn’t. I needed him here more than I ever had.

“I’m here,” he murmured again, like a promise. “I’ll always be here, Ronan.”

I moved my head, letting his lips fall against mine again, this time feeling every part of his soul. The fragility in the way he kissed me back. It made me feel as though he would shatter.

His breathing evened out, the shuddering, the tightness in his chest loosening as the seconds passed with his lips on mine. I put every ounce of strength I had to give into that kiss. Desperate to give him what I could—what he deserved. It was all I could do.

But it was something.

For the first time in what felt like forever, I let myself believe that we could rebuild our world. It could have happened if it hadn’t been for Jack and the weight of what needed to happen. Our love was broken. Fragile as the kiss we shared, but it wasn’t irreparable. We could have taken our time laying down the new foundation brick by brick.

We could have done it.

Together.