Page 42 of Crimson Flames

Pulling out my phone, I put in an order for a hundred packs of the red rope candy to have on hand.

“That he is,” she agrees before the room goes silent again.

“He um… he told me that I would make a good leader one day. Said I reminded him of himself. I got scared after that because I didn’t want to be anything like him.”

Turning my head in the shadows so I can peek into the room, I see Nessa reach her hand out to rest it on his shoulder. They are face to face, their eyes locked.

“You are nothing like him, Kai. Nothing. I knew that man growing up. He has always been the definition of evil. You are far from that Kai, so far from that you aren’t even on the same planet.”

He shrugs and hangs his head. “I don’t know about that. I’ve killed people, done a lot of bad things.”

Nessa’s lips lift slightly. “I’ve killed a lot of people, does that make me like him too?”

Kai looks up so fast I swear the kid almost gives himself whiplash.

“No, you’re nothing like him.”

Leaning back and picking up her cup of tea, she nods. “Exactly.”

More silence passes as we sit there, the air a little less oppressive than yesterday. And even though my ass is starting to go numb, I can’t find it in me to care. Nessa laughed for the first time in days. She smiled, really smiled at him.

“Before they took us to the camps, I was in a foster home. It wasn’t the worst situation, but it wasn’t great. I was expected to take care of the kids—Pokey being one of them.”

“Is that why you sleep on the couch with him most nights?” Nessa’s voice is steady and without judgment.

“How did you know that?”

She shrugs as I wonder the same thing.

“Sometimes, when I can’t sleep, I’ll check on all of you. I go to each room that is unlocked and count every face to know that you’re all here. Seeing you guys safe brings me some comfort. It reminds me that even though I lost something great, I also did something right.”

I don’t know how Boris and I sleep through these nighttime adventures of hers. Flicking my gaze over to him, I suspect it was just me who didn’t know this.

Stupid old men and their sensitive sleep habits.

“Do you ever wish you could take it back? Erase that day?”

She shakes her head at him. “Not once. I knew it was dangerous to hold onto something I could potentially lose. Now, I just have to decide if all this is worth risking any of them. Being reminded of that pain again makes me want to keep everyone at arm's length.”

“You don’t keep me at arm's length.”

She smiles again, and dammit if it doesn’t make me feel like I’m on cloud nine, despite her words.

“For some reason, I can’t. I think it’s because I saw you try to step in front of that bullet. Putting up a wall in front of you feels harder, like you don’t deserve it because of what you tried to do.”

She stares into her cup as Kai watches her.

“Good.”

“Good?” she echoes.

“Maybe because of that, you’ll listen to what I think.” He scoots closer so that their knees are almost touching. “I know what life is like keeping everyone at arm’s length. Even Pokey, I try to keep him at a distance because I want him to be able to leave me one day and have a life of his own. But trust me when I say this. The love here is different from anything I’ve ever felt. It’s something that would be impossible to let go of.”

He sighs heavily. “That’s the thing with punishing ourselves, or keeping people at arms length. If we let it go because we are scared it could be taken away from us, then it’s like we lose it twice. We lose our chance to have loved and lost, and all we feel in the end is loss that we can’t explain.”

Nessa’s brows pinch as Kai reaches for her hand and takes it in his.

“So, I decided something for myself. Instead of questioning it and being afraid it’ll disappear, I’m going to hold onto it until my last breath. Even if these days are all the love I’ll ever know, it will have been worth it.”

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