SINCLAIR HASN'T TAKEN his eyes off of Timothée. Even after Carla and Bruiser come out of the bar, trailed by Sonny and a few other guys. His body is rigid when Carla, after hugging me tightly, ushers both of us inside and out of the rain. When her eyes moved over to Timothée, still standing awkwardly by the car, unable to fully meet Sinclair's eyes, she seems to get the hint and guides him inside, too.
Now it's just the five of us in the bar, standing in an emotionally charged circle. Carla has gone off in the back to call the guys Sinclair has sent off to search for me back.
Bruiser clears his throat, looking back and forth between Timothée and Sinclair for a bit before his eyes settle on me. The blue dye in his hair has completely disappeared.
"You said this is Timothée, right?"
I nod. "It is."
Sinclair sucks in a breath, studying him hard. Then he swallows.
"Are you really...I swear if you're fucking with me-"
"I have no reason to lie about something like this," Timothée snaps back. His eyebrows are drawn together and his hands are balled into fists at his side. His body language screams of someone who's pissed, but he doesn't look angry to me. He looks like a scared child in this moment.
Him and Sinclair both.
And I'm reminded again of how unhappy their childhoods were. How dark and cruel. I'm reminded that children were forced to cope with a life most adults wouldn't be unable to handle. They only had each other through it all and then some man with a God complex had come through and upheaved their lives.
I grab for Bruiser and Sonny. "We'll give you two time to talk."
As I push the two of them toward the backroom Carla's coming out of, Sinclair reaches over and grips my arm. He looks lost when our eyes meet, his chest rising and falling quicker as if he's moments away from panic.
I lean in and whisper, "This is the chance you've wanted for a long time, Sinclair. Take it. He's missed you, too." When I lean back, there are tears glistening in his eyes. "I'll be in the back."
"So Timothée was still alive all this time." Sonny shakes his head in disbelief, blowing out a breath. "Fuck."
"I couldn't believe it either when he told me," I agree. "Even though they look alike."
Carla, who's sitting beside me with her arm around my shoulder, squeezes me tightly. "Are you okay, querida? Do you need anything?"
I shake my head. "Honestly, Carla, all I want is to go home, bury myself in bed and stay there a couple days."
Being kidnapped was scary, and it's definitely not an experience I ever want to try again, but I'm okay. I mean, I'm probably going to have some trouble sleeping through the night for the fear of a group of men beating down my door from now on, but other than that, I'm fine. I'm alive and in one piece, at least.
What I want more than crying or panicking is to hear Mom and Odin's voices. Better yet, what I want is to see their faces. The entire time I was in captivity, I thought of the two of them just as often if not more than I thought of Sinclair.
"You need real rest, though," Sonny says, giving Carla a look. "You shouldn't be here right now. I'll take you home." He looks over at Bruiser. "Tell Sinclair."
Bruiser agrees and in the end, so do I. It feels like the events from the past few days have started catching up with me. My body is so leaden and my eyes are so heavy, it's like I've participated in the Olympics rather than just sat and done nothing but be afraid.
Carla squeezes my shoulder one more time and promises to call, and Bruiser pats my shoulder on the way out.
The rain is coming down full force now. Cold early January weather plus rain equals whether akin to the deepest, coldest depths of Hell. Sonny slants the umbrella over me, keeping me covered even as rain patters on his shoulder and drenches his shirt.
Once Sonny makes sure I'm inside and he's crossing over to the driver's seat, I take a long look at the bar. We're in the rear of it, but I stare at it for a long time, as if it's going to disappear.
I feel like it will.
The first time it disappeared was because of me. Because of my fears and my actions. But this time, I thought it was going to be taken from me. I thought I'd never be able to see this place-my safe, happy space-again. Looking at it gives me as much relief as it does anxiety.
I can't help but wonder if the day will ever come when the bar, and the people I love inside of it, will disappear and never come back.
My house is exactly as it was left. All the lights are off and the room is saturated in the natural light from the afternoon rainstorm. My hands find the switch and I flick it on as I pass it, trudging over to my couch and slouching down on it. The tension in my body eases a little.
Sonny comes to stand over at me, looking at me worriedly. "Shouldn't you go to your room to sleep?"
His question is an innocent one, but I flinch. The memory of Sinclair telling me goodbye in there is still so hauntingly vivid.
I shake my head. "The couch is fine."
He watches as I kick off my shoes, sending them in different directions, and toss my coat-Sinclair's coat-haphazardly across the room. I lay down and curl up on the couch.
Relenting with a sigh, Sonny reaches over and grabs the throw blanket hanging over the back of the chair and places it over me.
When he starts to leave, panic seizes me and I grip his wrist.
"Where are you going?"
"To check around the house, make sure nothing's been planted in here or no one's hanging around. Sinclair's been sleeping here since you were...um, gone, but it can't hurt to check myself."
I try to swallow, but swallowing with a dry mouth is a difficult thing. "You'll come right back?"
Sonny's face softens and he pats my hand. "Of course, I'll come back, honey. I'm not gonna leave you here by yourself."
I loosen my grip on his wrist and watch as he walks through my front door and out into the rain. The minutes feel long while I wait, gripped with anxiety, for him to return. I listen to the raindrops to calm myself, and when that doesn't work, I recall those old myths Mom used to tell me and Odin about when we were younger. I recall her in my childhood kitchen-the shitty one we had before she got her good job when I turned ten-with its bright yellow seventies vibe and the thrifted table and chair set she'd been so proud of up until the day it fell apart and was unusable.
I recall Odin in his high chair in that abysmally yellow kitchen, throwing chicken nuggets at me.
My throat starts to close up and I have to breathe in deep to keep myself from crying. Because, shit, I came really close to dying. If Timothée hadn't been there, those guys would've sexually assaulted me. If Timothée hadn't helped me escape when he did, who knows what Sinclair's father would have done to me...
My mind is suddenly coming up with all these scenarios of things that would've and could've happened if I had been just a little more unlucky.
Thunder crashes off in the distance and I curl up, trying to keep my breaths even. There's no sense in panicking now, not after it's all done and over with, not after I escaped unscathed which isn't something a lot of women in my situation can say. But still, getting air in my lungs is such a struggle and takes so much of my concentration that I don't notice Sonny's back until he puts his hand on my shoulder.
"You okay, honey? You look like just saw a ghost."
Not a ghost, I want to say. I'm just now realizing I survived being kidnapped and I'm fucking terrified all of a sudden.
Of course, I don't say that, though. Because I'm big sister Freyja. I'm always having to be okay so Mom doesn't have to worry about me and Odin Freyja. I'm completely fearless on the outside but fucked up on the inside Freyja, so I swallow and do the breathing exercises the therapist taught me when I was young. Breathe in slow and deep through the nose, and exhale slowly from the mouth.
When I'm a little calmer, I croak out, "I'm fine. I just...I wasn't as okay with the whole kidnapping thing as I thought." I look over at him worriedly. "There was nothing out there, right?"
His face softens up with understanding. "There wasn't anything. Honestly, I was just being a little paranoid." I watch him as he hesitates, visibly weighing the words he'll say next. "You getting taken gave us all a scare, you know. Sinclair, especially. He's been really...not himself. Even worse off than when you left on your own."
I flinch a little at that. Leaving had been something that I thought was a good decision for both of us at the time and it wasn't a decision I necessarily regretted, even now. As I was, staying with Sinclair would have only brought more trauma for both of us. Still, there's a sliver of guilt that lances through me.
"So, me going around your house and checking for dangers is just my own paranoia," Sonny continues. He sits down on the floor near my feet, casually grabbing for the remote and turning on the TV. "So, don't worry. No one's gonna come anywhere near you while I'm here. Get some sleep."
I relax a little. Sonny flips through a few channels before he opts out of cable and instead goes to Netflix, mumbling something about catching up on the new episodes he's missed in the last few days.
The familiar glow of the TV, the comfort of being back in my own home, and the feeling of safety with Sonny's presence eventually are what lull me off into a relatively peaceful sleep.