Infinite Possibilities (The Secret Life of Amy Bensen #2)(14)

I can barely breathe just hearing my real name being spoken out loud for the first time since the fire, but even more so at the news he’s delivered with it. I’m dead. The real me didn’t just leave Jasmine Heights behind. Someone buried me alive. The finality of all that once was and can never be again. There is nothing left. Nothing. The shaking has turned to trembling all over. “I...no. I...no...” I squeeze my eyes shut, the flames flickering in my mind’s eye, hearing my brother’s shout. My mother’s screams. “No.” I press my hand to my face.

Liam curses and then I don’t even remember him moving but he is kneeling in front of me, wrapping a blanket around my shoulders. “I knew I should have waited until we were safe and dry.” He caresses hair from my face. “It’s going to be okay. You’re not alone anymore.”

“Nothing is okay,” I rasp out, grabbing his shirt “Nothing has been okay for six years.”

“I know, baby, and I’m going to try to change that for you now.”

“Were you involved? Tell me if you were involved. Good or bad or right or wrong, I have to know.”

“No. God no, Amy.” His hands go to the sides of my face. “I would never hurt you.”

“Then tell me, who is making my life hell?”

He looks stunned and his hands go to my shoulders, almost as if he’s steadying me. “You don’t know?”

“Do you?”

“No. But I’m trying to find out. I’m going to find out.”

A confusing mix of relief and disappointment fills me. “You really don’t know?”

His lips thin into a grim line and he shakes his head. “No. I wish I did.”

“You tried to find out?”

“Yes. Of course.”

“So even with all your money and power, you have no answers.”

“Not yet. I will.”

Blood rushes in my ears and my hands go to his shoulders. “No. No, if you are what you seem to be--”

“If I am what I seem to be? What do I seem to be?”

“Good. Right.”

He grabs my hand and holds them between us. “I am right, Amy. Right for you. Right for us.”

“Then you need out of this. You don’t know what you’re involved in.”

“Do you even know, Amy? Do you have any idea what you’re running from?”

“Death, Liam. I’m running from death, which is exactly why I tried to keep you out of it. That’s why I told you not to dig around. So you don’t end up dead too, but what did you do? You dug around. You think no one knows what you’re doing? You think they won’t be watching you for me?”

“I’m not going to end up dead and neither are you.”

“My family’s dead. People have died. You could die. I can’t let that happen.”

“You ran to protect me?”

Ashamed, I look away, fighting the burn in my eyes. “I was too weak to run to protect you.”

“Amy,” Liam prods gently, his finger sliding under my chin, turning my face to his.

The instant my eyes meet his, I confess, “I kept telling myself to leave but you were...we were...I just couldn’t.”

“You are not weak. You’ve been through hell and survived and you’re going to keep surviving. We are not going to die.”

“You don’t--”

“I do. We will get through this.” He unhooks my belt and stands, pulling me to my feet with him. “I won’t have it any other way.” And the conviction in his voice, deep in his eyes, vibrates through me, intense but somehow soothing.

“I want you to be right.”

His lips quirk in that arrogant, confident way of his. “I am.” He sits down and pulls me into his lap, draping me over his legs as I had been in the car. “And we are.”

I inhale his familiar scent with a deep breath, and it is sweet honey pouring into the emptiness that has become my life. Slowly, my body melts into his, my lashes lower. I just don’t have it in me to fight him, let alone distrust him. I don’t want to be alone when I can be with Liam. But as I snuggle closer to him, I cannot help but wonder if my story was a book and someone was reading it, would they call me naive and stupid? The very idea makes me angry, defensive even, and I do not know why when it’s nothing but an invisible critic. But then, everything and everyone who has attacked me has been invisible and I find myself mentally making my own case. I was eighteen when I heard my mother being burned alive, suddenly left without money and resources, barely breathing from the pain of loss myself. Maybe I should have tried harder to find answers, but most days just waking up felt like climbing mountains. Except now. In this man’s arms. Would those who would judge me truly pick hitchhiking, and collapsing in flashbacks while digging uselessly for answers on their own over gambling on this man’s arms?

If they would, then they are not me. I am staying with Liam Stone...live, die, or whatever that means.

***

I’m having the dream again. The one where Liam is with me, holding me, making me feel safe and cared about. There is warmth and happiness when life has taught me to expect ice and pain. I like this dream, and wanting it to last, I squeeze my eyes shut tighter, savoring a sense of being warm and safe I do not remember feeling much in my adult life. Inhaling, I draw in the rustic, spicy male scent that tells me I am with Liam. I am with Liam. My eyes pop open and the night’s events flood my mind. The diner. The car and the driver who took us to the airport. Liam pulling me onto his lap on the plane. The plane. The hum of the engine is still present, just as I am still on Liam’s lap, curled into his body, his head resting on mine, his breathing slow and steady. I’m on top of him and he’s asleep. And because I was with him, I was able to sleep, too.