Sinclair

Chapter Sixty: Healing

WHEN I WAKE up, the rain has stopped, the shadows of evening have further plunged the living room into shadow, Sonny is gone, and there are arms around my waist. I don't tense up or become afraid because I know these arms the moment I wake up in them. I would recognize this scent, this warmth, and the feeling of this steady heartbeat against my ear anywhere.

I trace over one of his tattoos unthinkingly, tilting my head up a little to look at him while he sleeps.

His eyes are open and staring right at me. I suck in a breath, taking them in.

"Hi," I say.

He smiles tentatively, staring at me intensely. "Hi," he says back.

I stretch my neck, trying to see the clock I have hanging in the living room—the one Mom brought me as a housewarming gift after I got my first apartment—only to realize we're not in the living room anymore. We're in my room now.

"What time is it?" My voice is still thick with sleep and I clear my throat.

"It's eight."

"PM?"

Sinclair looks amused all of a sudden. "I'm not sure. It's pretty bright outside."

I give him a deadpan look and make a move to sit up, but Sinclair's arms tighten around me, unrelenting.

I look at him. "What?"

"Nothing," he murmurs, closing his eyes and pulling me close. "Just don't go anywhere yet. Please."

And since when can I refuse him anything? My body slides right into him and I wrap my arms around him, burying my face in his shoulder and filling my nose with his scent with every breath I take.

"Did everything go okay?" I don't need to elaborate on what I mean, he already knows.

He's quiet for a while, so I count his heartbeats. Nine, ten, eleven...

"I didn't believe it at first. I thought he tricked you to get close to me, so he could kill me. But he—he remembers shit from the past. Things no one else knows. Memories I haven't even told you. The time he fell from the swings and scratched up his knees, so I carried him home on my back, the time I got my very first job for that seedy fucker who used me to steal people's shit at the airport for enough money to feed us. He even remembers...that woman." He swallows and looks sick. He always looks that way when he talks about her. His mother. "He remembers her hitting him and me stepping up and taking the beatings for him. He brought up a few different incidents in detail. I couldn't deny it was him."

He sucks in a shaky breath and I rub at his back as comfortingly as I can manage.

"My brother was alive all this time and I didn't know," he whispers. Something about his tone makes tears prick in my eyes. "How could I not have known that he was still alive? Everything he was forced to become was the exact opposite of what I wanted for him and it feels like it's all my fault. I couldn't protect him."

I swallow back the lump in my throat. "It's not your fault, Sinclair. How could you have known? You were a child, too. And for what it's worth, I don't think Timothée blames you. Not anymore. All of his hatred for you was born because your father created it. The moment he realized none of it was true, he helped me escape because he knew I was important to you. The Timothée you knew is still in there."

His arms tighten around me and he buries his face in my hair. "Little goddess. Freyja. I feel like I'm not alive when you're not near me. Don't go anywhere again, okay?"

The usual thing happens. The uncomfortable dip in my stomach and the feeling of not being able to get enough air no matter how hard I try. Thoughts of a future when none of his words matter plague me. A future where he, like my father did, like all men do, abandons me in the end. That future feels so real and so possible that I can't see anything past it.

I breathe. I try to see around it, to focus on anything but the panic building in me. I focus instead on the warmth flooding through my chest at his words. I focus instead on the part of me that likes his words. The part of me that likes his arms and likes his promises and his smile and his sincerity.

I focus on the part of me that believes it.

It's easy to embrace him back just as tightly as he does with me when I do.

That night, I decide to make Alfredo, even though it's not a Wednesday. We finally manage to pull away from each other, clean up, and head out. I would prefer heading to the grocery store alone, but Sinclair seems to need to keep his eyes on me for the time being, so I relent and let him tag along.

Like I expect, everyone watches us as we wander from aisle to aisle and I pick up ingredients for the Alfredo, and extra things I'm missing or need to replace. No one blatantly stares, but they sneak peeks at us and whisper to each other as we pass.

As much as living in a small town offers a sense of community, it also offers nosy ass people who can't seem to mind their business.

I sigh, plopping the pack of chicken breast into my shopping cart.

"I think I might call Mom tonight," I say, mostly to myself. "I was going to wait until tomorrow, but I want to hear her voice. It's pretty late. She might not even be up."

Sinclair moves closer behind me, bends to my ear and says, "Make sure to pretend you were sick when you do."

I swivel my head around and our noses brush against the others. I drag my gaze from his mouth to focus on the matter at hand.

"What?"

He grins. He looks more like his old self when he does, save for the shadows under his eyes.

"I figured you wouldn't want her to be stressed about what happened." He frowns. "So I told her you caught strep throat and couldn't speak." He watches me. "Was that okay?"

I nod. "Yeah." And I mean it, too. I'm happier with the idea that Mom and Odin haven't been worried sick about me. I'm happy that Sinclair thought to think about my family and how worried they would be when I didn't call them on the normal day I usually do every week.

I let out a breath. "Well, since she thinks I'm sick, maybe I'll let her sleep before I call her." We're in the frozen section now and I survey the pints of Ben and Jerry's. "Odin's graduating soon. Mom's been busy helping him apply for colleges and stuff. She's probably too tired to deal with me."

Sinclair chuckles and gently tugs at my sloppy ponytail. Tingles ricochet through my stomach.

I clear my throat. "Let's get home so we can eat. Sonny says you haven't been eating well since I've been gone. You're probably starving."

His hand moves to the small of my back. "Always."

Sinclair puts the things away while I start dinner.

This—being with him in this completely ordinary way—seems so surreal to me that I have to bite my nails into the palm of my hand to remind myself it's real. Just a few months ago, something like this would have been too normal—too intimate—for my liking. Doing something like this makes us seem like we're together...like we're a couple. Like Carla and Bruiser or Sonny and his partner, Rixon.

I don't think I'm one-hundred percent healed. When I think of the panic that clawed its way at me earlier, I know I'm not, but I think I'm better. I think I'm healing and I think this healing is changing me for the better.

Sinclair comes behind me while I make the Alfredo sauce, dips his head down, and kisses my shoulder before burying his head there.

I wait for the panic to come like it used to when he held me so intimately without the intent of sex, but it doesn't.