Page 65 of Finding Her (Lore of the Fields #1)

My eyes floated open to our bedroom cast in gray diffused light, signaling star rise was in its earliest stages.

I’d been in a haze for some time, only getting up to half-consciously use the bathroom and drink the water Graysen lifted to my lips.

Whatever he gave me for the pain had done a wonderful job soothing me into blissful nothingness.

I hadn’t dreamt, nor felt discomfort since the drug settled into my system fully.

All of my systems were shut down to heal.

I faced the dying embers of our fireplace and took turns closing each eye, grateful to find my vision almost fully recovered on the left side.

Shapes were still somewhat fuzzy and abstract, but it was a significant improvement.

I hesitantly raised a hand to run my fingers along my neck, scabs flaked off under my nails as if they had been left to heal without interference for several weeks.

“Are you awake?” Graysen’s breath dusted my fingers. He was wrapped around me from behind with his arms locked in an embrace around my ribs.

“I think so.”

“How do you feel?”

“Better.” It was a loaded question. I knew he meant physically, but I was stuck on the aftermath of trauma. I would have eagerly traded my miraculous healing powers for the ability to selectively forget what I saw in a heartbeat.

“I need to go to the restroom,” I said softly, swinging my legs over the side of the bed and rising to my feet.

Graysen followed me as I made my way to the bathroom.

I let one hand run along the wall as I walked, still not certain of my balance.

He held his palms up for me to grab, but I ignored them.

They stayed presented to me, just in case.

It wasn’t that I was mad at Graysen, but I was in shock.

I’d witnessed him spiral completely out of control.

Things were far graver than I had anticipated, and I didn’t have the mental fortitude to process those implications.

I had done this routine enough times to know that every check in the mirror differed significantly from the last. The four punctures marks lining either side of my neck had scarred.

The bruising around my left eye was more yellow than purple, signaling another stage of healing had passed.

Although still somewhat disfigured, it was a vast improvement from the swollen lump that had been my eye socket when we arrived home.

“I can make you breakfast if you’re hungry. I just didn’t want to leave your side until you were stable.”

“How long has it been?” I asked, realizing he hadn’t eaten, either.

“You’ve been asleep for about a day.”

“Then we should definitely eat, shouldn’t we?”

The weight of our shared experience hung in the air as I silently sat at the counter in the kitchen.

I knew I wasn’t in my right mind to grapple with how I felt yet, but I couldn’t figure out why Graysen wasn’t making an effort to explain anything.

Surely, we had more than enough incentive at this point for him to begin spilling his guts about what the fuck was going on.

That attack had not felt random to me. He had information, and with my life evidently on the line, it was time to start talking.

A plate of Earth-nostalgic eggs was placed in front of me, Graysen avoided eye contact while he set it down. He looked deflated, exhausted, and guilty.

“Are you going to eat anything?” There was no plate in front of him.

“Later, it’s too early for me to be hungry,” he lied.

“Sure.” I locked eyes with him and stabbed at my meal with my fork. “Graysen, you know you have to fill me in now, right?”

“Of course,” he said hesitantly. “I just need to talk with Mykie, and then we can discuss everything.”

Hot anger filled my chest. Mykie wasn’t nearly murdered last night.

I fought back tears of rage as I considered that even after I had nearly died, Graysen still didn’t trust me.

After everything we had been through together, he still didn’t see me as someone capable of handling the truth. He trusted Mykie over me.

I rallied what little energy my body had to challenge him. “Since when does Mykie have a say in our relationship and what we talk about?”

“She has experience—” He cut himself off and restarted. “Just please give me a couple of hours to talk to her, and then we can work this out.”

The flames of my anger roared into a blaze. “Let me answer my own question.” I shoved the chair back with more force than I expected and stood defiantly. “She fucking doesn’t . I’m sick of you buddying up with her and leaving me alone in the dark.”

His elbows fell to the hard countertop, palms still cupping over his eyes. Fresh blood seeped through his shirt from his injuries, despite my wounds having stitched closed.

“Two hours. Give me two fucking hours to get my footing with the situation. I’m begging you. I don’t know what to do. But I promise, I will do everything I can.”

I huffed back into my seat at his defeated posture. “I’m not stopping you from visiting Mykie. Only one of us in this room thinks they can control the other person.”

His muscles tensed in response to my jab. “I’ll be right back. Just, for the love of everything, stay here and rest. I’ll return before the stars have risen above the horizon.”

“Oh, so I can’t leave the house again? What about my job?” I raised a defiant eyebrow. Of course, I had no intentions of going to work, but I needed him to say it. That his control issues were triggered, and he intended to put me back on house arrest.

“That’s not what I said.”

“Well?” I waited.

His eyes glinted bronze, “Obviously you can’t fucking leave the house, Fae.”

I huffed out a horrified laugh and crossed my arms over my chest, watching Graysen swiftly prepare to leave.

He pulled his shoes on in a desperate hurry.

“Lock all the doors, including the bolts. I’ll knock three times when I return so you know it’s me.

” He strode into the kitchen and pulled a large knife out of its wooden block.

“Keep this on hand.” He flipped the sharp end into his fingers and passed me the weapon handle first.

I took it reluctantly.

Graysen towered over me, his cool gray eyes gazing into mine with fierce tenderness. “I love you so much, Faeryn.”

His fingers weaved through my hair as he pressed his lips to mine, kissing me with the full intensity of a man who had nearly lost his reason for living.

Our mouths exchanged heavy breaths, sharing the same strangled air.

Despite my rage, I melted into his embrace.

His companionship was the only thing in my life that felt right, even when everything accompanying it felt wrong.

He pulled away slowly, his chest heaving. His thumb ran over my lower lip tenderly.

“I love you too,” I whispered, unable to find kind words to say at the moment but fully committed to the truth of my confession.

Graysen walked with intention around the corner and down the hall, pausing only a moment to call out “ lock the door and stay hidden ” before closing it behind himself and turning the key.

And there I was, left alone two days after dodging death, covered in scars and bruises, with a plate of increasingly cold eggs in front of me.

The meal perfectly represented the dichotomy between Graysen’s penchant for care, and his utter failure to use common sense when caring too much.

He tended to my wounds. He washed me. He made me eggs.

He told me to lock the doors. And he left me alone and injured after imposing indeterminate house arrest. I wondered if Trebianna had couples’ therapists. We would be needing one.

My agitation grew the longer I sat, watching my food lose its luster with one and a half functional eyes.

The past several days had an increasingly troublesome trajectory of Graysen’s behavior.

We had gone from threatening the innocent to killing the incapacitated to controlling my freedom.

The red flags were no longer avoidable, his behavior was forcing us into a situation where information was needed.

Did I believe him for a moment when he said we’d talk upon his return?

Sure, just not about what needed to be said.

I got up and locked the front door’s triple bolts, beginning to pace the downstairs while swinging the knife and mumbling out loud to nobody.

My heart, gut, and brain were all preaching different courses of action, and it was dizzying.

More than anything, I wished I had somebody to lean on during my spiral, but my closest person was currently with my second closest person, discussing my freedom to interact with my any other people.

Who could I go to? Theo, Ragen, Stella… their loyalties all lay with Graysen and Mykie.

The only person I knew independent of the circle was Cassius, whom I hadn’t seen since our ice skating date.

Maybe I’d visit him at the school. Graysen would probably have a fit about me going to see him.

Ugh . There was a reason I had never told him Cassius’s name—it was none of his damn business.

There was the “ fwip ” of the metal mail slot as I passed the hallway, a hefty newspaper flopping onto the wooden flooring.

Graysen always got the mail before I was up, another way he managed the home.

Desperate to pass the time until his return, I stomped over to the heap and picked it up, carrying it to the living room.