Page 34 of Wild Heart
We hadn’t spoken since the night I begged him to get me inside Ivan’s building. Toby was too polite to ask questions, but I knew he wondered. I thought maybe I should shoot him a courtesy text, thank him for letting me in on his secret, and casually mention he wasn’t the only guy who liked to spend his nights in a murderous mobster’s bed.
It was a fuck of a thing to have in common, but I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t share Ivan.
Even if it was in the simplest of ways...
Even if he technically belonged to Toby first…
“Your nose is wrinkled.” Hannah poked the tip. “It does that when you’re thinking too hard.”
“My brain isn’t big enough for all the shit it’s trying to sort through.”
“Something you want to talk about?”
I choked on the sandwich I was eating. It was soggy and tasteless and too heavy for my seizing stomach but I forced it down my throat, anyway.
“I was just thinking about Toby,” I said, which wasn't a lie but also wasn’t anywhere close to the truth.
“I texted him last night. He’s been painting portraits for his students whenever he’s been feeling up to it.”
For as authentic as Hannah thought his absence was… it was nothing but a carefully constructed line of forgery. Built by Ben Thomas and played out by me. As far as anyone here knew, Toby’s horrible attendance was nothing more than a result of an angry Lupus flare-up.
“Two weeks is a long time to be sick,” she said, and holy fuck, had it been that long?
Two weeks, and Ivan had become the center of my existence.
My chest began to ache… paralyzed with longing. Palm to my sternum, I rubbed circles over the bruises he’d sucked into my skin—the same ones he refused to let fade.
Across my body was a map of where he’d been, drawn up with nails and teeth. My papa liked to suck and nibble and carve.
Concealed by the fabric of my clothes was a man that belonged to him. One that embraced vulnerability and had a tenuous kind of patience that left me clingy, demanding, and with much less grace for bullshit.
It was an impossible solution of certainty and bone-numbing anxiety. I’d ditched healthy coping mechanisms and the 3-3-3 rule forhim, and though she never said it, I knew Hannah was starting to notice the change in me.
How exactly was I supposed to explain that?
Oh, hey, girl. Remember the quiet giant that follows Toby around? He was shot outside the locker rooms, and I watched the whole thing. We’re trauma bonded now, and I’ve slept pantless in his bed for the past week.
That was insane. Certifiably.
Hannah dropped her half-eaten salad between her legs and spread out against the marley floor. Her shoulders popped when she pushed her arms over her head, and I followed her gaze to the old clock that hung above the ballet barre.
With the music low and lights dim, the ticking sound it made seemed louder, and I could almost feel it reverberate against my lungs, reminding me of the minutes we had left before this room was full of pointe shoes and magic.
Finishing my sandwich, I bit into a piece of string cheese and chewed because I knew it made him proud even if my stomach was in knots, and I’d probably just barf it up later.
Hannah climbed to her feet. Swiping her bowl off the floor, she tossed a smile at me. “Meet you outside the locker rooms in ten?”
My gut curled, and I dropped my cheese. “I’ll, uh, meet you in there.”
Her eyebrows did that thing, dipping low and causing her entire face to pinch before springing back up again. Lips parted, I expected a dispute, but after a beat of nothing, she nodded and said, “See you in a bit.”
I was alone then, sinking beneath the sound my blood made as it drummed in my ears.
A step toward those locker rooms was a step too many. I hadn’t allowed myself to go anywhere near them or the hallway that ran their length. The tile was polished now, as perfect as they’d ever been as if they weren’t once a witness to cruelty. Blood still ran down that hallway, and my eyes would never not see the ocean it created—the one he nearly drowned in.
I sort of wanted to burn it down.
Breathing heavily, I placed both hands on the back of my neck and wound my shaky fingers into the hair there. My body quivered, and panic draped itself over my lungs like an old friend.
