Page 105 of Burn Bright (Cobalt Empire #1)

He continues, “The world needs butterflies, Pip. Even if they cause chaos. Think of the ecological damage without them. The world needs you. We need you .” His plea burrows into me.

“We’re going to get through this. I know it might feel impossible now, but it won’t in time.

I’ll be right beside you.” Very strongly, he says, “N’en doute jamais. ” Never doubt that.

I fist his leather jacket, bringing him into another hug, and I whisper, “Je n'ai jamais pu.” I never could.

When we pull back, I exhale powerfully, then twist toward the SUV and go still. My heart skips a beat.

“Is that…?” I start to say.

Harriet.

Harriet.

She’s standing outside the car in her oversized leather jacket. Her choppy blonde hair blowing around her soft, scowling face.

My feet move before my mind does. I’m dropping my duffel. I’m in a sprint. My long legs can’t pump fast enough. She’s clutching her elbows, and I sweep her rapidly for damage. Hurt that I may’ve caused. I left her. I haven’t spoken to her.

Four days.

I can’t fathom even an inch of her broken, and it’s tearing me apart with every step knowing this decision could’ve impacted her in ways I could not mentally stomach. I could not handle. I would not allow myself to think it for even a second.

Harriet lets go and opens her arms, reaching out for me with urgency—it almost brings me to my knees. I wrap my biceps around her frame, hugging her and lifting her up against my chest all at once. Her legs weave around me.

I press her closer. Feeling her deep inhale. Feeling the quickened beat of her heart. “Are you okay?” I ask, combing my hand through her hair. “You’re okay? I’m sorry. Harriet?—”

“ Breathe ,” she demands, her eyes flooding. “I just got you back, okay, you don’t need to hyperventilate on this tarmac. I don’t want to do CPR on you.”

I choke out what wants to be a laugh. But it sounds tortured. I sound fucking ripped open. “I need to know you’re okay.”

“I need to know you’re okay, Ben.” Her palms are on my face, slipping down my jaw like she’s ensuring this is real. If this is all in our heads, having Harriet in my arms is a fantasy I can’t split from. I skim her flushed cheeks, her shallow breathing…her puffy, bloodshot eyes.

She’s been crying a lot. Devastating pain gnaws at me from the inside.

I try to take slow breaths. I cup her jaw, my gaze diving into her turbulent ocean blues.

“I haven’t been…” I can barely manage the words.

“I haven’t been well, not mentally, and I’m sorry I put you through all of this.

Knowing I hurt you…over even the course of an hour let alone four fucking days, Harriet, is brutal for me. You didn’t deserve this.”

“You’re unwell ,” she says strongly. “I could’ve done more?—”

“No,” I interject, stroking her hair as her chin quakes. I kiss the top of her head. “You couldn’t have.” In this moment, I don’t feel like I deserve her, but I want to be someone who does. I’m going to get better. I have to get better. For me, for her.

She glances up at the sky, then down to me. “I know I probably met you at the worst time in your life.”

“You didn’t. I think you met me exactly when I needed you.

” I brush away her escaped tear, my other arm supporting her body, so we stay eye level.

“If we started over, I would only rewind the last four days. I would’ve never left your apartment.

I would’ve sat beside you and watched The Wild Robot and eaten pizza bites and held you in my arms all fucking night.

I would’ve let you be there for me, and I hate that I couldn’t see that as the better path. ”

She dries my wet jaw with her sleeves. “I was really worried. Losing you like this, Ben…” Her nose flares. “Maybe you’d never come back to me, but you were supposed to come back to them.” She flings an arm toward Charlie and Beckett behind me. “You could’ve been eaten by Smokey the Bear.”

I let out a small laugh. “I think it’s Smokey Bear. Does he eat people or warn against forest fires?”

“Then Bullwinkle.”

“The friendly moose?”

“You could’ve died ,” she emphasizes, her agony slicing through me. “You would’ve—” Her voice cracks.

“I’m going to get help.” I hold her face tighter, and she nods faster as I repeat these words three times, solidifying them for myself too.

“I won’t do this to you again, Fisher. I promise with everything in me.

” I sound choked because I’m fucking crying.

“I promise, I won’t leave you. I don’t think I could survive hurting you this badly again…

but I can’t promise that I’ll always be okay. ”

“No faith, Friend,” she tries to tease, but her voice is too hoarse.

I stroke my thumb against her cheek. “I think my odds have now increased with you here. I have faith in that.”

She gets emotional because she said that to me once upon a time.

“You don’t have to always be okay for me to love you, Ben.

We’re all a little fucked up.” Her eyes swim against mine.

“And I didn’t stop loving you when you left.

I won’t stop loving you now that you’re back.

” She holds my neck. “But we have a lot of talking to do.”

“Yeah, we do.”

“Right now, I kind of just want you to kiss me.” As her eyes drop to my lips and mine drop to hers, I crash into her in a soulful, body-pulling kiss. It wrenches us together. My blood heats at her touch. Her fingers curl into my hair. Never let her go.

I’ll never let her go.

B eckett and Charlie linger on the tarmac, catching up with each other, and Harriet and I slip into the warmth of the SUV, crawling past the captain’s chairs and into the cramped backseat. Just so we can sit beside each other.

I remove my heavy winter jacket. Feeling her examine me from a few inches away. I do the same to her as she shrugs off her leather coat. Her striped pants ride low on her waist, and her black sweater molds her chest and slender arms. I can see her hip bones.

“You look thinner,” I mention, my heart in knots.

Her neck flushes. “Puking your guts up all night will do that…and I haven’t had much of an appetite.”

“You want to stop at Wendy’s or Taco Bell?”

“You don’t like fast food.”

“I’d stop anywhere for you.”

She chews the corner of her lip, a smile almost peeking. “Maybe. We’ll see.” She watches me shove my sleeves to my elbows. “You have all your fingers and toes or did frostbite get you?”

“Intact.” I wiggle all ten fingers. “Physically fine. Emotionally questionable. Mentally fucked up.” I slide closer to her. “What about you? Head, ears, knees, and toes?” I place a hand on her head, then pinch her cute ears. “All there.”

“Can you take your shirt off?” she asks. “In case you were mauled.” She’s seriously worried. I don’t tease her because the same concern for her is cycling through me.

I grip the back of my shirt and tug it over my head. Pulling the fabric off, I show her my shoulders and spine first, then my bare chest and abs.

She launches toward me. “What is that?” It’s hard not to smile when she inspects the faintest cut on my ribs.

“I think that’s called a scratch.”

“From what? Metal? Wood? You might have a splinter. Or need a tetanus shot.”

“I’m all up to date on my shots. You think it’s deep enough for a splinter?”

She peers harder. Her cheeks rosy. “Maybe not.”

I can’t stop looking at her. “You threw up because…?”

“You left abruptly that night, dude. I knew something was wrong on a much deeper level at that point. It didn’t feel good.” She crosses her arms, slouches backward, and I extend my hand over the seat behind her head. Letting her decide if she wants to lean into me or not.

Knowing Harriet was sick because of me is very fucking painful. She sees my muscles flex and hears my breathing shorten.

She winces at herself. “I shouldn’t be telling you this.”

“Yeah, you should. I want to know what I missed and how I affected you because these are things I don’t want to repeat. I can’t let this happen again. I won’t.”

“You shouldn’t be worried about me at all though,” she says so quietly, rotating the choker necklace at her throat. “You need to get healthy, and maybe what’s best for you is if we aren’t together.”

I’m going to lose her.

I crash backward. My burning eyes rise to the roof of the car, then fall to her. “I don’t want to lose you. If I can do this with you, please let me try. Doing it without you sounds so much worse, Harriet, but I…” A ball forms in my throat. “I understand if you don’t want to be with me.”

“All I want is to be with you,” she expresses so deeply. “But I can’t be an obstacle for you.”

“You aren’t. Me caring about you isn’t a roadblock. It’s not a hurdle. You aren’t in my way. You are the hand that holds mine while I walk down a rocky path. And I’m asking you to walk it with me, and I know it’s a big ask?—”

“Yes,” she interjects.

“Yes?”

“I’ll walk it with you, Ben. Because…I really, really love you,” she says so softly. “And I know you’d do the same for me. You already have.” She hoists a finger. “But if I turn out to be the worst thing for you, then we reevaluate.”

“Okay.” I start to smile. “I can accept those terms, Fisher.” Because there is no way she’s been anything but good for me. It’s been so clear from the start. She’s been the one that’s helped me breathe. “But I should warn you,” I tell her.

“What?” she hesitates.

“I think you have healing hands.”

She rolls her eyes, her cheeks pinching as a smile forms. “I’d say you’re a dork, but you’re literally slouching and man-spreading like a jock.”

A laugh rumbles through me. Our smiles soften on each other, and I ask her, “Did you make a choice while I was gone? Do I have a rockstar girlfriend or a doctor girlfriend?”

She rests her cheek on the top of the seat near my forearm. “Which one are you hoping for?”

“Long-lasting girlfriend,” I say. “Into forever Harriet.”

“Fortunately for you, whether I become a rockstar girlfriend or a doctor girlfriend, I predict it’ll be long-lasting.”

I ease. “You think?”

“Yep.” She holds my gaze. “Which boyfriend am I getting?”

“Mentally unwell boyfriend. On the road to recovery boyfriend.”

“Into forever Ben?”

I nod. “I’m not going anywhere,” I promise.

She clasps my hand that’s on the back of the seat, then slips her beaded bracelets onto my wrist. “I haven’t decided yet on medicine or music. I’ve been more focused on finding you.”

I rake my free hand through my hair. Pain cinches around my lungs, my heart, my ribcage. “Anything else I missed?”

She tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, then grimaces. “I shouldn’t tell you this…”

“I want you to,” I press. “I want to know.”

“Fine. Only because I think it’s likely your brothers will say something, and maybe it should come from me first.”

Okay. I nod her on. “Lay it on me, Fisher.”

She lets go of my wrist. “I was paranoid I might’ve been pregnant. I’m not. But I took a test.”

I swear my heart stops beating.

Her eyes are steady on mine. “Say something, Friend.”

“You thought you were pregnant? And I wasn’t there?” I visualize what she went through, and it thrashes inside of me like a feral animal clawing, tearing, shredding. My jaw clenches. I smear my hands over my face, bowing forward as nausea builds.

“ Ben .”

I reawaken and wrap my arms around her, pulling her into my chest. “You’re okay?” I stare right into her eyes. Clinging. Holding. I cup her cheek.

“I’m all right,” she assures, her tiny smile easing me more. “I was paranoid, okay. I bought the test the same night you left, before you actually left, because I was freaking myself out.”

“The paper bag.” It dawns on me. I knew she was hiding something…but yeah, not that. “I’m so sorry…you shouldn’t have had to deal with that alone, Harriet. I should’ve fucking been there.”

She has a hand against my bare chest. On my hard-pounding heart. “I understand now why you felt like you had to leave.”

I take some deep breaths. “The test was negative?”

“Yeah, and I wasn’t alone. Your brother kept me company.”

I try to relax at the fact. But I’m sure my brothers finding out about a pregnancy scare went over great , especially while I was missing. “Which brother?”

“Guess.”

“Beckett,” I say like it’s just known.

“I get why you love him so much,” she murmurs softly.

“He doesn’t intimidate you anymore?”

“Oh no, he’s still intimidating as fuck.”

I laugh, and she smiles a little at my chest. I realize now that my pulse has slowed to a calm beat. She lies more against me, slackening into me, and I hold her closer while she rests her head against the crook of my neck.

I kiss her blonde hair as she fiddles with the beaded bracelets and the elastic Capybara one on my wrist. We both catch movement out the window, and we see my brothers walking toward the SUV. Beckett grabs the duffel I dropped.

“Charlie and Beckett,” she says, looking up at me with glassy blue eyes. “I owe them everything.”

Emotion barrels into me. I fight more tears. “Me too.”

Me too.