“Which, ironically, begins with you standing on your own two feet.”
His hand released me when we approached The Badge, who had been eyeing me for the last half hour.
“Daph?” he let go, but I didn’t. I only locked my thighs tighter.
“What is this?” The security guard snapped before falling silent. I never knew how he conjured death in a single glance, but no one moved.
“By the way,I showedyou how to ride a bike,” I corrected, begging him to listen to my body and turn around.
“No, babe.” He smiled against my ear. “You taught me not to give up, which is better.” Thay peeled my face back to search my eyes. “Because that is what you do. You climb out of the Underworld and become a goddamn midwife!”
“I am kind of amazing,” I teased, anchoring myself to his steely pupils.
“More than amazing, Daph. You’re perfect.” He ran his fingers through my hair and set me down on the ground. “Which is why you will not let this moment keep you captive. We got out of the room, Daph.”
“No,yougot us out of the room.” A rogue tear slipped down my cheek, falling onto my lip.
“Daphne,” he swiped his thumb to clear it, leaving traces of tobacco on my tongue. “It wasyour window.”
It was my heart.
“Listen, I’ll hold a space for her, but you need to move aside.”
“No,” Thay said, still looking at me. “She’s ready.”
Thay turned me around and, with a single heartbeat, lifted my hand toward the security officer. I watched, in slow motion, as my ID and boarding pass fell into his palm.
“All you have to do is breathe and take a step. Once you get by the gropey motherfuckers, put your headphones in and call me. I’ll stay with you until you’re on the plane. And we’ll do this side by side, just like always.”
Like always. I breathed, filling my lungs with borrowed air, when my body tumbled over a line he could not follow.How could places like this even exist?I gawked at my feet.
“Oh, and Daphne?” He smiled when I turned. “I can’t wait to fucking kiss you.”
Asshole.
“Maybe I’ll change my mind.”
Thay smirked, making the freckles above his eyes pop.
“No, you won’t.”
“I already have.”
Thay stretched, his forearms flexing as he rested them at the back of his head. God, he looked like sin in black, and the way his clothes worshiped him told me I was a liar.
“We’ll see.” His brows perked, and I knew he was distracting me.
“Go, Daph! Go!” Nathem cheered from somewhere behind him, throwing his hands in the air in two solid pumps.
“Shut the fuck up!” Wolfe growled, smirking at me from a side bench. They looked tired, as if they had lived a hundred lifetimes in the span of mere hours. I tried to force a smile, but the only emotion I had left was pale horror.
“Come on.” A woman hooked her arm through mine and ushered me toward a cart of bins, where I basically had to remove everything but my panties, no bra, because if I were going to die today, it would not be in an underwire, and stepped through the machines that proved it.
I watched the few items I’d shoved into my pockets crawl out the other side.
True to his prompt, I did as I was told.
Inhale.