Light spills out for a brief moment, illuminating them before the door shuts.
As I drive back toward my empty hotel room, I regret not staying for that coffee, or something stronger.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Emily
Jared’s soft groan pulls me from a half-sleep. I blink in the dim light of my living room, disoriented by the stiffness in my neck.
The clock on the mantel reads a little after five in the morning. I must have dozed off in the armchair after tending to Jared’s wounds. The sting of the antiseptic wipes I used earlier hangs in the air, mingling with the copper tang of blood I scrubbed from my hands, but can’t wash from my nose.
Jared lies on my couch, one arm flung above his head, the other curled across his taped ribs.
By the time I’d placed the last bandage, Jared struggled to breathe without wincing. The walk to his room might as well have been a mile,so I left him where he was, the couch turned makeshift recovery bed.
The blanket I draped over him has slipped down to his waist, exposing the white bandages wrapping his torso. In the soft glow of the single lamp, bruises bloom across his body in shades of purple and blue, and his split lip has crusted over with dried blood.
Mixie lies curled in a tight ball of black fur on his stomach, and her purr fills the quiet room with a soothing rhythm, as if she’s trying to heal him through vibration alone.
Horror fills me as I take in the damage those men did to him. All because he went out searching for me while I was with Auren.
The guilt sits heavy, constricting my lungs until each breath hurts. I could have lost him tonight to violence because of a misunderstanding and my own inability to make a clean break from the past.
I rise from the chair, wincing as my stiff muscles protest. The floorboard creaks beneath my foot as I approach the couch. Mixie cracks open one eye before settling back to her important work of warming Jared’s bruised body.
As I reach down to adjust his blanket, my fingertips brush his shoulder, and his eyelidsflutter. For a moment, I freeze, holding my breath as I wait to see if he’ll slip back into sleep.
Instead, his lashes lift, and he stares around, unfocused at first before awareness sinks in as he settles on me. He takes in my red-rimmed eyes, the untouched coffee mug on the side table, and the rumpled clothes I haven’t changed since the hospital, and tension slowly fills his body, the air coiling taut between us.
“I saw you leave with Auren,” he says, the soft words holding an accusation. “At the hospital. You were helping him into your truck.”
I sink onto the edge of the coffee table and clasp my hands between my knees. “I took him to an Omega protective house in Pinecrest.”
Jared’s jaw flexes, the bruise darkening as his muscles tighten. “You left me here alone. You didn’t even call to let me know what was going on.”
“It wasn’t... I wasn’t thinking clearly.” I rub my palms against my thighs. “He tried to manipulate me into bringing him here, but I couldn’t— Iwouldn’tdo that.”
“Were you coming back?” The question slips out rough and uneven, as it catches in his throat.
My heart stutters. “What?”
“To me,” he clarifies, struggling to sit up.
Mixie chirps her displeasure as he displaces her, hopping to the floor with an indignant flick of her tail.
“After you dropped him off,” he continues. “Were you coming back, or were you going to stay there? With him?”
I blink, confusion washing over me. “Of course, I was coming back. This is my home.”
“Home,” Jared repeats, the word flat. “Sure.”
He shifts, wincing as his ribs protest the movement. “Why didn’t you call me, Em? I waited for hours.”
Everything since I left here earlier is a blur. Did so much time really pass?
“There were forms to sign. The police had questions. And the Omega house needed paperwork, too.” I press my palms together, tension gathering in every muscle. “I couldn’t step away long enough to make a call.”
“You could have texted,” Jared insists. “A single word to let me know you were okay. That you were coming back.”