Page 53 of What We Bury

He’s doing exactly what I asked him to do.

Watching over her, keeping distance between Sage and me.

I hate him for it.

Me:

I didn’t ask. Go home, Knox.

His headlights come on and he pulls away without further argument.

I settle in and watch her dark windows.

For three minutes, I feel better.

That’s how pathetic I am. Three minutes of looking at a rectangle of darkness and knowing she’s somewhere behind it breathing, sleeping, existing, and the pressure under my ribs eases like I’ve given the monster a scrap of meat.

Then the disgust catches up.

I grip the steering wheel again.

I try not to think about how good her hand felt in mine. How carefully she touched me, like she didn’t know she was putting her fingers through the bars.

I try not to think about the beach. About catching her when she ran. About all that fight trapped under my hands. About the sick, bright punch of want that cut through the panic before I had time to kill it.

I hated myself for that.

Still do.

Because she was terrified. Bloody. Freshly hurt. And some part of me still noticed the heat of her under me, the power in her body, the way she fought like survival was a language she’d learned young and fluently.

There’s a special place in hell for men who notice things like that.

I know.

I built the stairway down.

Less than an hour later, Micah strolls up to the car looking freshly showered. Without speaking, he opens the passenger door.

Fuck you, Knox, you interfering shit.

“Why are you here?” I ask.

He should be face-down in his own bed. The man has been going since Friday night, spent all day in the dirt with a shovel, and instead he’s here, sliding into my passenger seat in gray sweats and a hoodie with his eyes already half-shut.

“Nice to see you too.”

“You’re dead on your feet, Micah. I’ve got this.”

“I’m on watch tonight. You’re the one who’s not supposed to be here.” He covers a yawn with the back of his hand. “Don’t you have a room full of five-year-olds to face in a few hours?”

“I don’t mind staying.”

“I know you don’t.”

There’s something quieter under it when he says that. Something we’ve circled a hundred times and never landed on. Something that knows the difference between duty and compulsion, between guarding a door and using the door as an excuse to stay close to what you want.

“But you can’t run on nothing and stand in front of a class at nine,” he says. “I can sleep tomorrow. You can’t.”