From Darkness (Hearts & Arrows Book 3)(96)

She bit her lip. “You look exhausted. We might as well get some rest while we’re waiting here.”

“I guess so,” he said, so worn, so tired.

She paused, watching him, not even sure how to start, how to explain, but she wanted to. She needed to. “Jon, I—”

“Not yet. Not here.” He stared at her from across the table with his bright eyes full of so many emotions that she couldn’t pin one down.

“All right.”

They ate their breakfast in silence. One of them would look out the window or watch the bustle of the diner, and then they’d switch, both so preoccupied with their own thoughts and the tension that it was one of the longest and most awkward meals either had been through.

Jon laid his card down at the end of the table, and the waitress closed their ticket out. They headed out and down the street, and before long, they were standing at the desk in the lobby of the bed-and-breakfast.

It, of course, had only one available room with a single queen-size bed.

They climbed the stairs of the cabin to a room that overlooked the main street. The cabin walls were a deep honey pine, as were the wooden beams that spanned the vaulted ceiling. A fire crackled in the fireplace, and paintings of the mountains hung next to old mining photos on the walls. The four-poster bed looked luxurious and comfortable, covered in a white duvet and quilt.

Josie set her bag under the window and brushed back the lace curtain, feeling like a fraud, wishing she were there as a lover or a honeymooner, not a heartbreaker.

She turned to find Jon sitting on the edge of the bed unlacing his boots, his shoulders slumped from exhaustion and emotion.

“You should sleep,” she said softly.

“I don’t want to sleep. Not yet. Come here.”

Her pulse raced as she walked over to him, and when he looked up at her, the pain in her heart was mirrored on his face. He reached for her hand and held it in his, looking down at her fingers as he shifted them ever so slightly in his own.

“Josie,” he said, his voice rough, “I told you I never really believed you didn’t want me. But now…since yesterday, that’s been shaken. You said you didn’t know if you wanted anything from me, and I want to know what you meant. I need to understand. Do you feel anything for me? Do you want me as badly as I want you?”

His thumb grazed her knuckles. He wouldn’t meet her eyes.

She took an unsteady breath, her eyes searching his face, willing him to look at her. “I don’t know how to want anything anymore, Jon.”

Her voice broke as she sank to her knees at his feet, looking up at him through her tears.

“Every breath, every step, every minute of every day has been consumed by Rhodes, and I don’t know how to live anymore. How can I love you when I’m broken? How can I give you what you need when I can’t take care of myself? And all of this, you and me…Jon, everything that I thought about why you’d left was wrong, and I’ve only just realized it after three long years of missing you and hating you and wanting you. I thought that you had betrayed me.”

“But you know now that’s not true.” His eyes shone as he looked down at her, his brows tight, creased with hurt.

“I do, but…” She didn’t know how to explain, pressing her free hand to her aching heart. “All these years, you were waiting for me, but I wasn’t waiting for you. In my mind, you were gone and it was over, but in my heart, you were still there. You were always there, and I spent every day, every hour convincing myself that I hated you. When you came back, it pushed me into a free fall I still haven’t recovered from. I didn’t know what to do, and I still don’t.” A sob caught in her burning throat as she clutched at her shirt.

“Tell me the truth. Tell me if you want to be with me. Just say the word,” he begged.

She pulled in a shuddering breath, closing her eyes. “I can’t do that, Jon. I can’t promise that, don’t you see?” When she met his eyes again, they were heavy with sorrow. “I don’t want to hurt you again, but I will. I know it.”

“You fighting us hurts worse than you not being willing to try.”

“But what does that mean, try? All I can give you is this moment and the next one. Today, then tomorrow, and then…I don’t know. I can’t promise you, Jon. I can’t give you something I don’t have.”

Jon looked down at her and cupped her cheek, brushing away her tears with his thumb. “Then, I won’t ask anything of you but to love me.”

“But I already do.”

With those words, he dropped to his knees at her side, slipped his hands into her hair, and pulled her to him with a breath, a breath that drew her into him, where she wanted to be, where she wished to be, the place where she’d thought she’d never be again.

And when their lips met, he brought her back from darkness.

He was the sun on her skin, warm and alive; the grass under her feet, holding her to the ground; the breath in her lungs, saving her from drowning.

He was everywhere, his hands holding her face, his body against hers. She arched into him, needing his nearness, needing his lips and mouth and tongue as it brushed against hers.

There were no more questions. There was no wondering. There was only the two of them, their broken hearts mending with every beat, every breath.

Their hands roamed, thirsty and searching, under their jackets, skin too far away, fingertips on fire. His chest was hard and hot under her palms, his heart thundering against her fingertips as he pushed her jacket down her arms and pulled his own off, his lips never letting hers go.