Page 38 of Tangled Past
Her breath shuddered. “I hate him,” she said bluntly.
“Good.”
She let out a startled laugh through the tears.
“I’m serious. Hatred can eat you alive, or it can fuel your refusal to let him win. I’d rather see it burn in you than fear.”
“I’m scared too,” she admitted.
“So am I. Only an idiot wouldn’t be, but fear is not calling the shots anymore. Not for you. Not for me.”
Her shoulders sagged, some of the tension leaking out with the confession and the tears. “Do you think my mother’s still alive?” she asked, her voice hoarse.
He didn’t answer immediately. She appreciated that. She’d had enough people offer easy platitudes over the years.
“I think she fought hard to get you here,” he said finally. “I think she trusted my father more than anyone else on the mainland. I think she called for help even when it made her a more obvious target. That’s who she was.” He squeezed her hand. “Whether she’s alive or not, we’re going to find outwhat happened to her. She doesn’t stay a question mark. Not anymore.”
The words spread over her like a blanket. Not a promise of a happy ending, but a promise of pursuit.
Her eyes felt heavy all at once. The kind of exhaustion that came after too much adrenaline, too many memories dragged into the light and forced to stand.
“You can sleep,” Asa said, as if reading her mind. “We’ll keep watch.”
“We,” she echoed drowsily.
“Me. Rachel. JT. Will. All of us.” His thumb brushed lightly over her knuckles, a gesture so gentle it almost undid her again. “If you wake up and it’s bad, I’ll be right here. If you need space, I’ll be out in the hall. You get to decide.”
She stared at their joined hands. For the first time since she was four, the idea of closing her eyes didn’t feel like surrendering to the dark. “Stay,” she whispered. “Please.”
“Then I stay,” he said.
He didn’t let go as she slid down under the covers, the blanket rustling softly. He shifted the chair a fraction closer, stretching out his legs, his other hand resting lightly near his holstered weapon.
She heard the house around them—the murmur of Rachel and JT in the other room, the low rumble of Will’s voice outside on the radio, the wind against the patched window. She heard her own breathing. Steady. Present. Not four years old anymore.
“Maya?” Asa said, just as her eyes started to close.
“Mm?”
“He didn’t write all the rules. You get to write them now. Remember that when you dream.”
A lump rose in her throat. “Okay.”
Sleep came in fits at first—jagged images of boats and barns and boots—but every time the panic tried to pull herunder, something else floated up. A rabbit’s ear, bent but still attached. The sound of her mother’s voice saying Raymond’s name like it meant hope, and a man in a chair beside her bed, fingers wrapped around hers, refusing to let go while the storm battered the island outside. For the first time in a very long time, the night didn’t feel like it belonged solely to the man who haunted her.
It was shared now, and somewhere beneath the fear and the fury and the ache, a small, stubborn ember of something else flickered.
Not safety. Not yet. But the beginning of something that could one day grow into courage.
