Page 19 of Prelude to Madness

“I didn’t have a chance to buy you anything, but having you home is gift enough for me.”

I took his hand and kissed it. Moving on. That was the best thing to do.

Two days later, a nurse pushed me down the hallway in a wheelchair on our way home, Dex at my side. I took a fleeting look in his room as I passed, but it was empty. No sign of him around.

“What happened to him?” I asked the nurse .

“He’s gone, no longer with us.”

She changed the subject and talked to Dex about something else. Where had he gone? Did he die, or had he been released the same as I was?

I’d never know, and by the end of the week, the dreams had stopped.

My captor didn’t appear again, and I was no longer anyone’s angel.

Epilogue - Silas

“Any idea when he might wake up?” I asked the doctor.

Eric had been in a coma for a month now. It had been touch and go for a while, but the doctors were confident he would make it, just no clue as to when he might come around.

“It’s too soon to tell. There is brain activity, so there’s hope. I wish I could give you some idea of when.”

I nodded. I’d wait by his bedside as long as I needed to, and I knew they were doing all they could.

“Fucking hell, angel. What the fuck did you do this time?” It wasn’t the first time I’d asked him this, and I was damn sure it wouldn’t be the last.

I loved the fucking bones of this man, damaged as he was, but he was mine, and no way was I giving up on him.

I’d come home one afternoon to find him slumped over his piano, barely breathing. I don’t know if it was an accidental or a deliberate overdose. He’d been so down lately, it was hard to tell.

“Whatever’s going on in that beautiful mind of yours, it’s nothing we can’t deal with, angel.”

I stood, the chair scraping noisily across the floor, and walked over to the barred window.

This wasn’t any ordinary hospital. It was a secure unit, one meant to keep him safe.

I should’ve been the one to do that, but I’d failed him. Failed my angel.

It was dark outside, and my reflection stared back at me. I had dark circles beneath my eyes and a heavy scruff on my jaw. When was the last time I’d shaved?

“He loves you in his own way,” I mumbled to myself. “His love is just unconventional, not like any other. Remember that Silas.”

I rubbed my arms against the chill that had seeped into the room, over the tattoos covering them. Angel loved all my tattoos. My wolf, the roses. I’d had them all done for him.

The wolf signified the one always at the door. The roses on a thorny vine were a reminder of our love and that as hurtful as it could be sometimes, there was always beauty there.

“I do love you, Silas.” His voice was barely a whisper.

I ran to his side and clutched his thin hand in mine as I stroked his forehead with my other.

“I know you do, angel. I just needed to remind myself that you wouldn’t leave me. Not intentionally.”

I pressed the buzzer by his bed and summoned the doctors.

“I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to,” he croaked.

“I know, angel, but we need to do something about it. I need you with me.”

---