Page 65 of Butterfly
“I’m alright,” he replies, turning the next page. I peer past his head to see what he’s reading, but my eyes start to slide closed and I lean back against the couch, listening to the TV drone on as I skirt the edges between awake and asleep. I don’t know how long I linger in this moment, but a sudden movement in front of me forces my eyes open.
“Wha…?” I mumble, as Shiloh moves out of my lap, his chest heaving while he stares at the TV. “What’s up?”
He doesn’t look my way, his eyes trained on the TV and his face paling by the second. I turn my head and focus in on what’s on the screen, trying to figure out what the hell’s got him so alarmed.
And then I get it.
My heart drops as the local news anchor’s face fills the screen, her tone dour and her face dead serious as she outlines the reason for the break in broadcast.
“The child has been taken to hospital with serious injuries, but police are seeking the public’s assistance in tracking down the man neighbors witnessed fleeing the scene. Harold Bronwell, rumored to be the child’s father, is considered armed and dangerous. At last sighting, he was wearing a pair of blue jeans and a dark green T-shirt as shown in this image taken froma local ring doorbell camera,” she says, as the screen flips to a still grainy image of a man walking away from a small apartment block somewhere in Boston. I glance at Shiloh, seeing that all color has drained from his face and his hands have started shaking on his knees. I lean forward to pull him into me so he isn’t alone while the news anchor continues giving information about this incident, but he jerks himself away from my grasp and rises to his feet.
“It’s Iggy, isn’t it?” I ask, but I already know the answer.
I already know.
“I have to go,” Shiloh blurts, taking off at a rabbit’s pace for the door of my apartment. I jump off the couch and trail behind him, reaching the door as he’s shoving his feet into his shoes.
“Where?”
“I need space. I… I need to go.”
His eyes beg me to stop asking. To not demand that he stay here with me when every inch of his body seems to vibrate like he can’t possibly be here right now. I nod as he slips on his jacket, hands fumbling with the zipper for a few seconds before he finally gets it done up.
“Call me?” I ask, reaching out and placing my hands on his shoulders. “Let me know you made it home safe?”
“Yeah,” he mutters, as I lean in and press a kiss to his forehead.
He tilts his head up and connects his lips to mine for a brief second before he pulls away and opens the door. He doesn’t turn around once as he leaves, closing the door behind him, but I head to the window and wait.
I watch him exit the building, bursting through the doors like the devil’s hot on his trail. He moves quickly across the snow-covered ground, head bent down as he hurries away from my apartment and disappears around a corner.
I wonder for a split second if I should have stopped him from leaving.
Made him stay here while he processes the news of what’s happened to Iggy.
I settle back onto the couch and watch as the game picks up on TV again, clutching my phone in my hand as I wait for the news that he’s made it back to his place.
Safe and warm, as he should be.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
SHILOH
Iggy.
All I can think of is his little face and the way he always wants a hug when he comes to class. All I can think of is the bruises that were on his cheek one week, and the smile he had after when he said his dad was gone again and his neighbor had been babysitting him.
When I asked him where, he told me he’d taken him there a few times—an old building close to the water that no one knew about.
He said it was scary.
And now he’s in the hospital and they don’t know if he’s going to wake up.
There’s a part of me that feels bad for leaving Donovan’s apartment the way I did, because I know he realized who Iggy was too…
But he doesn’t know him the way I do.
When I looked at him, all I could see was myself—young and bright and so full of life, with a dark shadow ready to fuck it all up. I’d thought about killing his dad before, but then he’d said he was gone.
