Page 209 of Hold Me Until Morning

And it was her name that was tearing up Hailey’s throat.

“Brooke! Brooke!”

The stallion whinnied, agitated, tromping around the confined space.

But the lump in the middle didn’t move.

“Brooke!” Hailey screamed it, terror lighting her through. “Brooke!”

Hailey was scaling the fence and throwing herself into the stall, not caring that the stallion was in there.

Because Brooke was, too. Unmoving, her limbs bent at odd angles.

Blood everywhere from where she’d been trampled.

Hailey skidded onto her knees, and she gathered her into her arms. Agony raked from her chest. “Brooke! Brooke! Please, oh God, no, please!”

She hugged her best friend to her chest, rocking her, wailing, besieging toward the sky, “No! Please, no!”

FORTY-SEVEN

HAILEY

Daylight barely cracked at the horizon, those first bleary rays that lit at the edges of the earth and covered it with a feathery haze.

I gazed over at the man who was long asleep, his head rested on the pillow, his arms still firm around me.

They’d been firm around me since he’d finally succumbed to the exhaustion and the pain meds they’d given him for his injuries.

The man had held me until morning.

Refusing to let go.

Even in the depths of slumber his arms had been unyielding.

Sure and strong.

And I knew it was time that I was strong for him.

Taking in a steeling breath, I carefully unwound myself from his hold and slipped out from under his arm that had to weigh as much as a tree.

I froze when he stirred, distorted discontent filtering from between his lips as if even in his slumber his soul had recognized I was no longer at his side.

I breathed out a sigh when he settled back in, then I pushed from the bed and tiptoed around the room to gather my clothes from the floor.

I dressed as quietly as I could, then I glanced back once more at his sleeping form, my chest squeezing in a swell of devotion.

Then I crept out the door.

Silence swam through my house since Maddie and Lolly were still asleep. I grabbed my purse from where I’d dropped it on the floor next to the front door last night and let myself out into the waking day.

It was beautiful out, those last cool moments of the night hanging on before the sun would fully take to the sky.

I didn’t wait around in the peace of it.

Not when that’s what I was fighting for.

Peace.

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