Page 100 of Obsession
The swelling around my eye has gone down enough that I can see clearly again, though the skin is still tender, fading from deep purple into a green-yellow shade that looks worse than the original damage. The stitches along my forearm pull when I turn too fast, and my ribs ache with every breath that goes deeper than careful. Harlan says healing isn’t pretty, which is a uselessthing to say to a man who has to watch himself become a map of what happened.
The clubhouse doesn’t know what to do with me either. Before, suspicion had a shape. Men wondered whether I was Canon’s son first and Saint’s husband second, whether the ring on my finger made me protected or dangerous, whether my quiet meant harmless or watchful. Now conversations cut off when I enter a room before someone remembers I’m allowed to hear them.
A prospect I don’t know by name nearly drops a crate of beer when I pass him in the hall, then mutters, “Sorry, Oisín,” with the panic of a man who has been told my name matters. Pike gives me updates without making me ask. Moth sends files directly to the bedroom with notes in his precise, nearly illegible handwriting, as if clean columns and corrected route overlays can pull the world back into order.
The worst part is that nothing really stops. Maybe that’s good or maybe I’m just worried about being forgotten. Conversations about lingering Rogue members being picked up hit my ears, the chaotic aftermath of a club falling apart continuing as I heal.
I should have known that it wouldn’t have stopped at whoever had taken me, that Obsidian would need to obliterate whoever was left but it still hurts a little.
I don’t ask for details unless someone brings them to me. Part of me wants every name, every place, every consequence. Another part of me can still see the laptop screen Canon forced in front of my face, grainy headlights and moving shadows, Rogues crouched in the dark because pain pulled old information out of my mouth.
Other mornings, I wake with my body trying to twist against restraints that aren’t there, and Saint is always in the room when that happens. He barely sleeps now, if what he does can be called sleeping. Mostly he sits in the chair beside the bed until hisbody loses whatever argument his mind is having with it, then wakes the second my breathing changes. Everything with him has changed too, mostly for the better.
Saint’s softer around me, but he’s also more hesitant to touch me, which might be the strangest part. Saint, who used to solve almost everything with a hand on the back of my neck, now stops himself so sharply I can feel it in the space between us. His hand hovers near my shoulder, near my hair, near the blanket over my waist, and then he waits, until I nod or shift closer or say his name in a way he understands.
It’s painful to watch, not because I want him to stop trying. I don’t. But Saint doing careful is like watching a wolf try to carry glass in its teeth. He means it, and a few days ago I might have found the effort satisfying. Now it mostly makes my chest ache because I selfishly need more.
After dinner on the third night, I’m still in the main room when Saint stands before I can gather my plate. He doesn’t announce what he’s doing or make a performance of it. He just reaches across me, careful not to brush my ribs, and takes the plate, fork, glass, and crumpled napkin I’ve been pretending I’m not too tired to deal with. Demo is across from me, halfway through some story about a prospect locking himself in the back freezer, his voice trailing off when Saint carries everything to the bar without being asked.
Men who have watched Saint put bullets in people for less than a wrong look now watch him set my plate beside the sink and stack the fork on top of it like he’s not entirely sure where dishes go when they stop being useful. Tally looks up from the bar, her mouth twitching, but she’s smart enough not to make it worse.
“Thank you, Saint,” she muses.
Saint gives her one flat look. “Don’t.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were about to.”
“I was not.”
Demo picks his story back up too quickly, his eyes fixed hard on Pike like eye contact with Saint might get him killed. “So anyway, Kip’s yelling that the freezer door is jammed, right, except it turns out it wasn’t jammed. He was pulling instead of pushing.”
Pike exhales through his nose. “That boy’s going to die before patching in.”
“Probably,” Demo says. “But he’ll be cold first.”
I laugh before I can stop myself, one hand going to my ribs when the movement pulls at the skin. Saint’s attention snaps back to me at once. He’s beside me in the next breath, close enough that I feel the heat of him at my shoulder. His hand lifts toward my back, pauses, then lowers to the chair instead.
“I’m fine,” I say quietly.
The muscles in his jaw pull tight as he resists the urge to touch me. “You always say that when you’re lying.”
“I’m sitting down.”
“That’s not a medical condition.”
“It might be the closest I get today.”
Something almost like amusement touches his face, but it doesn’t last. His eyes move over me the way they’ve been doing for days, checking for pain he can’t fix and damage he can’t threaten into healing. Then he steps back because he’s learning that hovering and helping aren’t always the same thing, and the fact that I can see him force himself to do it makes me realize how much he truly wants this, wantsus.
Later, when the room thins and Saint gets pulled into the hallway by Moth with a file in hand, Bricks takes the empty chair beside me like he’s been waiting for the opening. He drops into it with a grunt, sets his beer on the table, and angles himself toward me with that particular expression that means he’s aboutto say something he knows he shouldn’t enjoy as much as he does.
“He’s whipped,” Bricks says.
I look at my water glass instead of him. “You’re very invested in that theory.” Bricks has only mentioned it three times in the last 24 hours, though I stopped listening after the first one.
“It’s not a theory. I’ve seen men whipped before. Usually they buy flowers or start lying about liking brunch. Saint Masters cleaned up after dinner and didn’t even shoot anybody for noticing.”
