Page 65 of Running Feral

Gunnar stands up, scooping me into his arms as he goes. I’m too tired. I can’t care about how bad I must smell or how disgusting I am. I don’t even care if I still have Eamon’s sweat on my skin.

I just want to sleep.

“You’ll watch while I sleep?”

“Of course I will, baby.”

I’m out before we even get upstairs.

Chapter Twenty-Two

As I watch Tobias finally rest, I want to feel peaceful. I should feel peaceful.

He’s here and safe. He’s not nearly as injured as he could be. I deposited him on the couch, because I know how comfortable he feels there, and put on one of his favorite gore-filled movies on in the background before covering him with more blankets than I probably needed to.

Now I’m sitting, watching him and keeping him safe, and he believes in that enough to let himself really rest.

Everything is fine. Or it’s going to be fine.

So why do I feel like I’m so full of rage that I’m choking on it?

All the images are playing on repeat in my head while I sit. Everything I can imagine Eamon doing to him, interspersed with what I saw on that goddamn security footage. I try to distract myself by making a list of everything Tobias needs to do when he’s feeling up to it.

Micah gave us a little care package with PrEP and DoxyPEP before, so he’s mostly covered on that front. Not 100%, butbetter than nothing. Tobias told me he was on PrEP regularly before this all went down, so he’s only had some inconsistencies in being able to take it, instead of being completely unprotected.

I find the website Tristan recommended anyway and order another home STD screening panel. The fact that I have to get this makes me feel nauseous, but I’d rather face the truth than ignore it and have him get sick.

There’s other stuff, as well. More legal stuff than just the police report. Seeing if he’ll be willing to try for a protective order, although I can already see him saying no. I look up support groups he probably won’t go to—spoiler alert: they’re fucking thin on the ground out here if you’re not into Jesus—and make notes about therapists he definitely won’t let me pay for him to see. If I could even afford them, anyway.

It doesn’t help. I’m trying to be proactive, but instead that angry, impotent feeling is coming back even stronger than before.

The only thing that doesn’t make me useless is something so unrealistic that it’s laughable. I picture killing Eamon in a thousand different ways. I plan out how I could hunt him down. How I might find him holed up in another sleazy hotel and surprise him.

I’m a little bigger than him, but he fights for a living, so I’d have to be prepared. I could shoot him before he even knows I’m there. Or I could do something to immobilize him, like a stun gun or a tranquilizer, before tying him up and telling him how much he deserved it as I tortured him to death.

Maybe it’s the grotesque movie playing in the background. I hate violence. Even when I was angry all the time, it never gave me this specific kind of bloodlust. But it’s the only thing I can think of that doesn’t make me feel like I’m about to vibrate out of my skin with how useless I am.

It goes on for hours until I feel utterly consumed by it. I have nothing else to do but think these sick, soothing thoughts and wait for Tobias to wake up again.

He doesn’t wake up with a gasp, like I was expecting him to. I can tell he’s awake because of the way his body suddenly stiffens, but he doesn’t move, and his eyes stay closed. I don’t move either, giving him the chance to work through whatever he’s thinking about.

When his eyes do eventually open, he looks around the dark room for a while before focusing on me.

“Good morning,” I whisper. “Or good night, technically.”

It’s 3am, and he’s been asleep for about nine hours. Thank god, because he needed it. I’m eternally grateful to Tristan for whatever painkiller he gave him. Even if he said it was a non-narcotic, it clearly helped.

“You stayed awake this whole time?” he asks, sitting up against the arm of the couch.

“I promised.”

I try to smile at him, but it doesn’t feel right. I shouldn’t be able to smile when I’ve done nothing but simmer in my worthless anger all this time.

He brings up a hand to scrub at his eyes and makes a face at me.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”

“Yeah, you did,” I say, cutting him off. “It’s fine. I wanted to. I’m glad you slept.”

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