“Sorry, boss. Thought you were choking.”
“Fucking asshole.” I shove him, releasing some of my tension in the process.
Ignoring our bickering, Bianca pushes past me and resumes pulling supplies out of the first aid kit. “Okay boys, that’s enough.” Bianca uses one hand to press gauze to Lena’s sideand the other to help her lean back into the bed. “Rem is infuriating and high-handed and can be a total pain in the ass, but right now you don’t need to worry about him. This is my house and our focus for tonight is getting you fixed up, rested, and ready for a proper breakfast in the morning. No male interference allowed.”
With that, Bianca shoos me and Johnny into the hall, putting a solid door between me and the woman who has just gone from a job to a very serious problem.
5
LENA
The house is on fire. I cough as smoke fills my lungs. Panicked, I crawl out of bed and head for the door, keeping my body as close to the ground as possible. Smoke clogs the air above me, thick and gray and so, so hot.
It makes my eyes sting. I blink away tears as I feel my way across the room, searching for the door.
Except, when I reach the wall, the door is gone.
I feel along the baseboard, back and forth, over and over, but no, there’s nothing.
Another cough wracks my body. I lie flat, trying to breathe slowly, carefully. Each pull of oxygen burns. Along with the knowledge that if I don’t get out of this room very soon, I’m going to burn too.
Wiping away more tears, I focus on the wall in front of me. The air is darker, heavier now. It’s getting harder and harder to see. I reach out one hand, run it quickly along the wall, praying over and over and over that this time I’ll find the door.
Except, I’m not in the house anymore. My room at Aunt Mabel’s is gone. Still lying chest-down on the ground, I rapid-fire blink, my head spinning as I take in the furniture aroundme. A few pieces from IKEA, all past their use-by date. My favorite sweater draped over the back of a chair. A black violin case on the ground.
I’m in my apartment. It’s still night and freezing. After the heat of the fire, the cold feels extreme on my exposed skin. I start shivering, long, body-wracking shivers that make my teeth chatter so hard I worry they’re going to crack.
How can I be so cold, so fast? I push myself into a sitting position and the reason becomes obvious. I’m wearing nothing but a thin t-shirt and underwear.
I start to stand and just as quickly drop back down to my ass. A shadow steps out of the darkness in front of me. It looms large and seems to suck all the air from the apartment.
I’m so cold now I feel frozen to the floor. The shadow steps closer, closer, and solidifies into a man. It’s harder to breathe now than when I was suffocating in the smoke.
The stranger is dressed entirely in black, a hood pulled tight around his face. No matter how close he gets, I can’t see his features. He’s practically on top of me when he raises one arm and levels a gun at my head. The sound of him cocking it reverberates in my apartment.
I feel my scream before I hear it, the ferocity of it tearing me apart from the inside out. My back is against the kitchen island. I’ve got nowhere to go, no way to escape.
The man presses the muzzle against my forehead. His hand is perfectly steady. My teeth are clattering inside my skull.
“Shhhh,” he says. “It will all be over soon.”
Tears pour down my face. I can’t help but watch as he squeezes the trigger, so very, very gently.
“Shhhh, it’ll all be over soon.”
I’m screaming, screaming so loud my throat hurts, and suddenly… I’m not on the floor of my apartment. There’s no gunman. I’m in a bed, in another room, in another house. It’s dark, still night. Hot tears stream down my face. The trembling has turned into full-body shakes, like a sailboat caught by a tsunami, my limbs so numb they feel nonexistent.
I barely have a chance to figure out where my dream has dumped me when warmth wraps around me. Solid, human warmth. Powerful arms hold me, the chest I’m cradled against rocks me in a slow, gentle sway.
The sense of safety is…profound. Something I haven’t felt in a long time. And such a stark contrast to the fear that’s been riding me hard all night.
The person holding me must have a face, even if it’s one my subconscious has dreamed up. I don’t look up. Cocooned in strong limbs and soft covers, I don’t want to burst this bubble. In my real life, there is no one who can hold me like this, who can comfort me like this. There hasn’t been since the Haywoods died. Aunt Mable and I weren’t close enough for this kind of comforting embrace. I don’t want to see this figment of my imagination, this imaginary person who will vanish come daylight. Just someone else I’ll have to let go. That is more reality than I can handle right now.
So, in the blind, ignorant safety of sleep, I let go. I let the feelings of loss I’ve been holding back overwhelm me, silently sobbing into the night. I don’t know how long I cry or how my fingernails come to be digging into a heavily muscled back, but I’m at the stage where I don’t care. In the span of twelve hours my entire world has exploded. I’ve lost everything that meant anything to me. If now isn’t the time to take comfort in some delusional dream, I don’t know when is.
The clockon the bedside table reads 1:07 PM. Sun streams through a gap in the curtains, warming my feet where they’re snuggled beneath the covers.
It takes a second for my brain to play catch up. Disorientationis quickly replaced by disbelief, quickly stomped on by pain.