Collared(21)

I shift in bed. I don’t want to talk about me. I’d much rather talk about him. “I spent the last ten years in the same house, with the same man, on a fifteen-foot length of chain.” The words spill from my mouth like an avalanche, gaining speed with each one. I can’t stop them. I can’t take them back. “There. Now we’ve talked about what I’ve been up to.”

He swallows another apple, his forehead creasing. “Jade—”

“I don’t want to talk about it, Torrin.”

It’s the first time I’ve said his name in months. Maybe years. It seems to hit him as hard as it does me. His eyes seal shut.

“A psychiatrist already talked me to death about it earlier, and I’m going to have to go over the whole thing tomorrow with a couple of detectives. I don’t want to talk about it any more than I have to.”

His fists curl at his sides. He tries to unclench them, rolling them a few times, but it doesn’t work. “He kept you chained up?” The words come out sounding strange. Like his jaw has been wired shut and he’s trying to speak.

“It wasn’t, like, in a dungeon or anything,” I say quickly. I won’t mention the first year when I was kept in a dark, damp closet that could have qualified as a dungeon. He doesn’t need to know that. His dreams don’t need to be haunted by it too. “I got to roam the kitchen, my bedroom, the bathroom . . . even most of the living room.” I’m so concerned about making him feel better that talking about Earl Rae doesn’t cripple me like it did with Dr. Argent earlier.

He moves closer and looks at the chair beside my bed. He looks like he’s going to take a seat, and at the last minute, he stands taller. “Did he . . .” He has to work his jaw loose to continue. “Hurt you?” His eyes flash again.

“Not in the way you’re thinking.” My voice wobbles. He notices.

He looks away again, but not before I notice him wince. “I’m so sorry, Jade. God, I’m sorry.”

I bite my lip because I’m not going to cry in front of him. I’m not going to let him see me in pain. I’m going to end this nightmare for him once and forever. At least one of us can find some peace.

“I am too,” I say.

“I never should have let you walk yourself home that night. I shouldn’t have left your side until you were inside safe.” He stops to take a breath, but he’s going to keep going.

I jump in because I know this path. It never ends. “This isn’t your fault, Torrin.” My hand curls around the bedrail close to him. “It’s not your fault there are sick people in the world.”

He stares at my hand, studying it. I wonder if it looks as foreign to him as it does to me. “No, it’s my fault I let my girlfriend get taken by one of them.”

“No, don’t.” I shake my head. “That’s all in the past now. Forget it. Let it go.”

He turns until his back is facing me. Even beneath his rain jacket, I notice him quiver. “I’ll never be able to let that go. He took your life from you. He took my life by doing so.” Torrin’s knuckles pop when his fists curl again. “He took everything. I’ll never be able to forget it. Never.”

I’ve known Torrin Costigan since we were five and my family moved in down the block. I know him better than I know my own brother and sister. I feel like I know him better than I know myself now. Something’s wrong. Other than the obvious.

There’s more. I can feel it. I can see it. He’s trying to tell me something, but he can’t.

Acknowledging that makes my stomach feel like it’s being ripped open. “What’s the matter?”

“Besides finding out that this whole time you were two hours away?” His voice is rigid just like his posture”

My legs tingle like they’re going numb or just waking up from being numb. “What aren’t you telling me?”

He takes a moment to reply. “It’s been ten years. Probably a lot.”

I wait for him to add something else. He doesn’t. He doesn’t want to say whatever it is, but I need him to. How can I move on unless I know? He was most of my whole life back then. I need to know if he can still be in it. My eyes drop back to his hands again. No ring. But that doesn’t mean anything. That just means he isn’t married. It doesn’t mean he isn’t in love. Someone else could crawl into bed beside him every night, curling around his warm body.

Even if there is no one, just because I’m back doesn’t mean he wants me back. A decade’s gone by. I’m not the same girl he fell in love with. I’m not sure if even a sliver of her is left in the broken woman lying in this hospital bed.

“Your knuckles. You still pop them when you’re nervous, you know?” I say when I catch him rolling them again.

He stops the moment I mention it.

“What’s wrong?” I ask, turning in the bed to face him.

He doesn’t turn around, but his head drops. “I didn’t know . . . I wasn’t sure . . . if I’d ever see you again. I never stopped looking—I never stopped hoping—but I just didn’t know.”

I’m falling. I’m falling and there’s no end. “I didn’t think I’d ever see you again either. It’s okay. Whatever you have to tell me, I’ll understand.”