Page 54 of Xavier

Was that the expression Father Thomas had seen when he’d hurt my son?

Was that enough to stop him or was it the green light to keep going?

Fuck.

“I’m gonna be sick.”

Gage snapped into action immediately. Both of his arms hooked under mine to yank me up from the couch and drag me down the hallway to the bathroom. We both stumbled inside, the brightness from the hallway our only light source. I sank onto the floor just as Gage lifted up the toilet seat and pushed my head forward to hover over the clean porcelain bowl.

I clung to the rim, coughing up my entire lunch and breakfast. The clenching in my stomach was painful, causing tears to prickle at the corners of my eyes while I held on for dear life.

Gage rubbed my back through bouts of nausea, not at all cringing away from my spitting bile out of my mouth.

My breathing echoed against the walls of the small bathroom, reminding me of the way Dexter’s had inside of that tiny stall.

“Dexter okay?” Gage asked, once it seemed that there was nothing left in my stomach to throw up.

I shook my head, squeezing my eyes shut. “He told me what happened.”

His hand froze on my back.

Both of us had gone back and forth on what Dexter had told me last year, or rather what hedidn’ttell me, on what we thought was possibly going on with him.Neitherof us had ever guessed anything remotely close to this mess.

“The fucking priest.” My voice was gravely and my throat burned as I spoke. “At that fucking church she was taking him to.”

“Fuck,” Gage breathed out. “Where is he?”

“Sleeping.”

Peeling my eyes back open, I reached across the way to snag a few squares of toilet paper to wipe my mouth with before tossing it into the bowl and flushing the whole thing. Pitching backward, I settled myself back against the cool tile of the floor, letting my body relax into it.

I had a sense of déjà vu as Gage hovered over me as I lay there, panting, his silhouette shrouded from the light coming from the hallway.

“Oh, honey...”

He gently swiped his fingers under my eyes and belatedly, I realized I was crying.

“I wasn’t there...” I said.

The guilt crushed me—more than it had when he’d told me how I was a stranger to him an entire year ago. This was something entirely different, the kind of guilt that I’d felt being the only survivor among my troop and now had to grapple with living when they didn’t.

How could I be there for Dexter when I hadn’t been at his most vulnerable moment?

How could I call myselfa father?

“You didn’t know,” Gage soothed.

“I should’ve been there,” I whispered back.

He shook his head at me. “You didn’t know what you didn’t know, baby. It’s not your fault or anyone else’s other than that bastard who hurt him.”

More tears stung my eyes. “I failed him.”

“Baby...”

I stared up at the ceiling, tracing the weird shadows with my gaze.

What now?

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