Page 99 of Thorne
"After lunch. Go wash your hands."
She slides off the chair and runs toward the bathroom, Theodore bouncing against her leg.
I look at Julianna. She's looking at the table. At the paper covered in Lily's handwriting. At the check mark in the corner: the one my daughter put there herself.
Neither of us speaks. There's nothing to say that wouldn't crack something open that needs to stay closed.
I turn and walk away, but later that night, I find myself standing outside the safe room door.
The safe room door isn't locked. My hand hovers over the cold steel for a long beat before I do something I haven't done since I brought her here.
I knock.
The sound is sharp, a polite intrusion in a space that has only known violence. I push the door open slowly. Julianna is sitting on the edge of the cot, her tablet dark in her lap. She looks up, and the lack of fear in her eyes is what finally breaks the last of my resolve.
"I came to apologize." My voice sounds hollow, echoing off the cinder blocks.
"Apologize? For what?"
I stay by the door, needing the distance to say the words. "The debt. The punishment. You tried to stop Phoenix, but all I could see was Lily. I was blinded by rage."
I take a breath, my chest tight. "I was wrong. About all of it. I used you to vent a rage that didn't belong to you. I turned you into a target because I couldn't handle the fact that I'd failed Lily. I owe you."
She doesn't move. She just watches me with a steady, terrifying clarity.
"You weren't wrong." Her voice is quiet, a low vibration. "And it helped. I couldn't stand myself—what I'd done, whatI'd built. If you'd pulled that trigger the night you found me, I wouldn't have cared. I embraced it. I needed the weight of it."
"We're not talking about a bullet," I growl, taking a step toward her, my hands curling into fists at my sides. "We're talking about the way I took you. We're talking about rape." There. I named it. I named the ugliness inside of me.
"No." She stands abruptly, the word cutting through the air, and moves into my space, her eyes flashing. "Don't call it that. That's not what it was, and we both know it. It was ugly and jagged, but it wasn't that. It makes me question my own sanity, but I needed it. I needed exactly what happened and how it happened."
She reaches out, her fingers hovering near my chest but not touching. "Please don't think you ever did anything without my consent. I consented to all of it. I still consent. You were trying to hurt me for reasons that felt justified to both of us, but—I think I needed it too. I should probably have my head examined." She lets out a short, breathy laugh that sounds like a sob. "Even the belt. I don't know how to say it without sounding like there's something wrong with me, but it helped. It helped me resolve the debt I hold in my head."
I look down at her, the silence in the room suddenly suffocating. I want to reach for her, but the guilt is a physical barrier I built with my own hands.
"Well." I clear my throat, my voice thick. "I'm sorry. I hope you can forgive me." I back toward the door, my hand finding the handle. "Good night—Julianna."
Her name feels heavy on my tongue, the first time I've ever given it back to her. She flinches at the sound of it, her eyes widening as the "Stratton" mask shatters. I turn to leave, stepping into the cold light of the hallway.
"Thorne."
I stop, my back to her. The air pulses between us.
"Please." Her voice trembles. "Don't go. I don't … I don't want to be alone tonight, and I don't want what we have to change. I know that sounds crazy, after everything, but please. Just stay."
I turn around. She's standing in the center of the room, looking fragile and absolute all at once. I close the door, the click of the latch sounding like a beginning instead of an end.
I cross the room in two strides. This time, there is no collision. I reach out, my thumbs brushing her cheekbones, tilting her face up to mine. When I kiss her, it's a slow, agonizing surrender. My mouth is soft against hers, my hands tangling in her hair with a tenderness that feels foreign, almost frightening.
I move her toward the cot, laying her back with a hand behind her head. I undress her with a focus that borders on reverence, my lips following the path of my hands to apologize to every inch of her skin.
I enter her slowly, a gentle, shallow glide that makes her breath hitch. I stay propped on my elbows, watching her face, my movements rhythmic and steady, trying to show her a version of myself that isn't a monster. I kiss the corner of her eye, my thumb tracing her lower lip.
"Is this okay?" The question is a quiet breath against her mouth. "Am I hurting you?"
Julianna looks up at me, her eyes clouded with heat, and suddenly a small, genuine laugh breaks from her throat.
"Thorne," she gasps, her fingers digging into my shoulders, pulling me down harder. "It's beautiful. Truly. But I think we've already established that my head isn't on straight." She arches her back against me, a wicked, hungry smile touching her lips. "I actually like it a little rougher than this. Don't go soft on me."
