Page 19

They’re both smiling in this dimly lit room where specks of dust catch the sunlight and shimmer like orbs.

It’s comfortable and easy until their eyes lock and looking away becomes a struggle.

Tension crackles between them in a brand new way and the urge to glance down at his lips almost overwhelms her.

He swallows hard and heat spreads between her legs in a forbidden reaction.

It’s unfamiliar and shocking, and more than enough to startle her from whatever trance captured them both.

She coughs to clear her throat of a non-existent tickle and turns her attention back to the arrow. When she sneaks a look at him again, he’s already working on the next bolt in his pile, seemingly unbothered.

The tension was solely a figment of her imagination, and if she doesn’t stop creating these fantasies, she’ll only face heartbreak later.

* * *

Olivia makes a dozen arrows before they quit for the night and head for the master bedroom. The idea of him sleeping on the floor in his condition isn’t appealing and so she tries her best to offer what she knows he won’t take.

“We can share. There’s plenty of room. I’ll even put the baby between us like a barrier.” She jokes, trying to ease the mood, but it doesn’t work.

“Thanks, but I’ll be moving around a lot. I’ll keep you both awake trying to get comfortable. I’m good down here.” He grabs a blanket off a chair and takes the pillow she sadly hands over.

“You’re sure?”

“Mhmm.”

She doesn’t like this. He’s hurting and miserable, and when the top of his head disappears past the mattress, her face breaks when she knows he can’t see her, flushing with regret and frustration.

Maybe everything she hoped they were building with all these tiny steps isn’t as strong as she thought if she can’t even keep him off the floor.

Reluctantly, she accepts defeat for now, laying Lucy on the bed on her stomach. She hasn’t spent much time out of the sling or the swaddle and it’s important that she gets to do normal baby things, like all that ‘tummy time’ stuff Olivia read about in books.

She didn’t expect what she sees next, though, and it has her scaring the crap out of Cole with her surprise. “Cole! Look!”

He’s on his feet at a moment’s notice, knife in hand, ready to fight whatever might challenge them. She’ll feel bad about startling him later. Right now, the smile on her face stalls his mission as she points to the baby.

“She’s picking her head up?” he whispers, as awestruck as she feels once his adrenaline tapers off.

Olivia nods, her excitement and pride blossoming. Her first thought was to share this milestone with him.

“You know…” He settles back down on the floor, arms braced on the bedside and attention on Lucy. “I thought earlier that she was looking at me harder. You know what I mean? Focusing.”

“I saw that, too. She’s been watching us more. Tracking with her eyes.”

Her happiness over Lucy is something she’s kept to herself for nine months, expecting that to hold true for the foreseeable future, but there’s something so unexpectedly perfect about seeing her feelings reflected in Cole’s reaction.

“You’re the smartest one.” He taps Lucy’s hand with a light finger. “Today, picking your head up, tomorrow crawling around.”

Olivia lets out a gentle laugh. “I think that’s still a ways off.”

“Gonna be the best at it when it happens, though,” he says confidently, as if her daughter is the most skilled baby left on this planet.

Leftover hormones make her eyes water. Lucy is growing and changing, and that’s enough to have her emotions in overdrive.

The fact that Cole seems as delighted as she is has absolutely nothing to do with it.

Nope. It definitely doesn’t have her affection for him growing three sizes when she assumed it already reached reasonable levels.

* * *

A nightmare startles her awake while it’s still dark. Although she isn’t screaming this time, she is alone, and instead of Cole’s voice reassuring her, there’s only silence.

Scanning the room proves it empty aside from a sleeping Lucy and a purring Flower stretched out across a window ledge.

It’s safe enough to go look for him, so she moves quietly toward the hall.

Her knife is ready, but the bathroom across from the bedroom offers a quick solution through the cracked door.

Cole’s hands press firmly to the sink, his head hanging low and the rest of him half obscured by the wall.

Her fear of spooking him is at an all-time high. He’s suffering and he wouldn’t give up on her if it were reversed. He’s stoic and silent when she pushes the door open, maybe sensing her there and resigning himself to the fact that she won’t let this go.

There’s a white bandage hanging off his back coated in blood, but her attention is drawn to the other scars across his skin climbing like ivy in every direction.

Burns, she assumes, noting the flat patchwork of healing his body has attempted.

They were created a long time ago, and their impact still resonates and flourishes in a flinching ripple as she moves closer.

Anticipation causes his shoulders to hitch as she prepares to make contact, the hard muscle in his braced arms coiling tightly.

He hasn’t run yet. If he wanted her gone, he’d have made that known, so she waits silently, hoping he’ll allow himself what he needs but is so afraid to accept.

Fear rolls off him and vibrates into her palm as it lays flat against his shoulder.

“I was at my lowest when you found me,” she says, softly. “I’ve told you what haunts my nightmares. Talked to you about embarrassing things. You’ve seen me hurting and vulnerable, but you’ve always made me feel safe. You can trust me to give you that in return. Let me help you. Please. ”

He only nods, head still bowed and arms stretched taut like the sink is the only thing keeping him upright.

She doesn’t waste time now that she has permission, carefully peeling the bandage away to reveal a deep, weeping slice as long as her hand. “You need stitches. No question. Gimme a second to grab the supplies.”

He pilfered an extensive first aid kit from a nurse’s room at the drug store and she pulls it from a bag in the bedroom, rushing back to lay it out on the counter. She promised not to, but she’ll hurt him all over again.

Cole lets her clean the area and spread a dollop of numbing cream across the outer edges without so much as a twitch. When she apologizes for what she’s about to do, he absolves her with an even “It’s alright”.

She works fast, stitching clean and straight until there’s a simple line left behind.

Forces herself not to pause even as she fights to keep her fingers from shaking.

Doing this on someone else isn’t the same as doing it on herself.

Before, she could stop when the pain was too much, but Cole gives her no indication one way or another.

He holds still without protest, his muscles rippling with every stitch.

She’s finished only a few minutes later, and places a fresh strip of gauze across the area, mindful not to tug at the edges.

“All done,” she tells him. “These should dissolve on their own, so at least we don’t need to worry about that. Come on, let’s get back to bed.”

He’s been stone still and quiet until now, but all that built-up stress comes out in rapid puffs, his hands squeezing hard against the counter’s edge.

She guides him toward the bed, but he won’t lay down, preferring instead to sit up with his arms hanging off bent knees, the way he keeps glancing at her from the corner of his eye hinting that he’s working up the courage to say something, and so she perches on the edge of the mattress and waits.

“He caught me smoking,” Cole begins. “It was one of the house rules that no one was allowed to smoke. Gave us some speech when we got there about how his father died from it, and his father before him, and so on. Didn’t seem to give a shit what else we did, but smoking was the one thing we were explicitly told not to do. ”

He pauses, running his hands through his hair, and she already hates where this is going.

“I was fourteen. Got cigarettes from some kid at school and smoked ‘em out back one night, coughing my lungs up because they tasted like shit. He heard me. Came looking. He was so much bigger than me, so much bigger. Grabbed me up so fast I hardly saw it coming. Dragged me back into the house and into the bathroom and filled up the tub. I tried to get away, but he punched me in the face and I dropped like a fucking rock. Next thing I know, he’s shoving me into the tub face first, holding me under until it felt like I’d drown, until the water burned my chest. Would ask me if the smoke was worth it and dunk me under a second time…

a third time…the fourth time I almost blacked out and I must have headbutted him without even knowing because I got loose and he was bleeding and fuck I never a felt a beating as hard as what happened after.

Never felt worse than trying to breathe after almost drowning while getting punched in the gut.

When he left me alone I stumbled back outside, and I was so dazed, so fucking dazed, I didn’t even know where I was going, only that I had to get away and then I fell into the fire pit he snuffed out earlier, still smoldering deep inside.

Scalded a few layers off my back. Roll ed away and into the dirt and passed out.

That’s where the scars came from. That’s what I scream about at night. That’s why I can’t go near water.”

“Cole…” Her voice is gentle, and he bristles.

“It was my own fault. He warned me not to smoke, and I did it anyway.”

“You were a child, doing what children do. They test their boundaries. It’s normal. Nothing he did was your fault.”

“I can go weeks, or months without thinking about it at all. No nightmares, nothing. And then stress from something else will get my brain all screwed up and I’m right back there like I never left. Feeling the water in my lungs and the panic of not being able to breathe.”

He exhales hard, like finally telling someone has lifted a weight, but then the shame of speaking it all aloud colors his cheeks.

“Some marks go deep enough that they become part of who we are. I still have nightmares about things my husband did to me years ago, even now, when I should be dreaming about other, more dangerous horrors, like all the dead people walking the earth.”

He snorts, wiping at his face. “Living in a real life horror movie and it’s these fuckers haunting us instead of—” He gestures vaguely to encompass the state of the world. “Alla that.”

“I never claimed it made sense. Come on, try and get some sleep okay? It’s still early enough you can grab a few hours.

” She urges him onto his side and tucks the covers to his chest. He has to be uncomfortable, but he goes easily this time and it doesn’t take long for his breathing to even out, and not even Lucy waking to be changed later causes him to stir.

It’s only then, after the baby is settled back in her spot between them and Olivia rests her head on the pillow, that she allows herself to really look at him.

Sleep has smoothed out his stress lines, making him appear younger, and she feels an instinctive urge to protect him.

So much of his behavior makes more sense now that she’s seen these extra pieces of his story.

He’s been a consistent source of strength for her since they met, helping her feel safe for the first time in years while lacking that same safety himself for who knows how long.

‘ Not your job to keep me safe.’ He told her earlier, but he’s wrong.

It is her job now, one she’s glad to accept no matter how much he might refuse and she expects he will again. She’s learning how to navigate that minefield, though. Go slow and easy, ignore the outbursts or the fear like it’s no big deal. Be gentle and quiet, as if she’s coaxing a cornered animal.

It’s not far off from how she needs to be treated herself when she’s hurt or afraid. He mastered those skills with her right off the bat. Now she knows why.

The possibility that they met for a reason, that fate gave them a shove, seems even more likely than before. He might not believe that yet, but she can believe it enough for both of them.