Page 91 of Still Beating

I have no idea where I am for a moment when the mattress sinks with a new weight and an arm slinks around my midsection. I have one foot in a dream and the other in reality as I breathe in the familiar scent of cedar and leather. My body recognizes him, and I instinctively snuggle in closer to the warm body on my left, still not sure if he’s real or not.

“My sweet Corabelle.”

His breath against my ear makes me shiver. I blink myself awake as the room comes into focus, and my head tilts to the side, finding his eyes.

He’s real.

“Dean.” His name tumbles out like a broken whisper, our gaze locking, our emotions rising.God… to think I would have never seen these eyes again if he hadn’t found me. “I’m sorry.”

Dean touches his fingertips to my temple, then glides a loose strand of hair behind my ear. He looks tired and distraught—but there’s a distinct glimmer of relief swimming in his baby blues. His hand settles against my neck, his thumb skimming my jaw. “I thought I lost you.”

His words are familiar and they cause my brows to pull together. I force a smile. “You can’t get rid of me that easily.”

“Promise?”

My breath catches as déjà vu tickles me from head to toe. I think this is the part where I’m supposed to lean in for a kiss, but I press my lips together in resistance and nod instead.

“You scared the hell out of me, Cora. I had no idea you felt like that—which fucks me up even more because the signs were all there. I feel like I failed you.” Dean tightens his hold on my neck, desperation lacing his words as he swallows back his grief. “If you need space, I’ll give you space. If you need time, I’ll give you time. If you never want to see me again, I’ll pack my bags and move to fuckin’ Mexico, all right? But don’t youevertry to take away the one thing you fought so goddamn hard to keep.”

Dean places his hand against the swell of my breast encased in a hospital gown, closing his eyes as he revels in the feel of my heartbeat against his palm. I touch my hand to his, tears welling in my eyes.So many tears. I roll onto my side, trying not to tangle myself in cords, and press our foreheads together. “Mandy found out about us. She saw your text. She… she wassomad, so furious, and I flipped out, Dean. I was out of my head.” I inhale a rickety breath. “It was the lowest moment of my life. I thought I’d lost everything.”

He exhales slow and deliberate, pressing his hand further into my chest. “You only lose everything when you lose this, Corabelle.”

I nod, and it takes all of my willpower not to lean up and capture a kiss.

We lie like that for a while, pressed together, face to face, his lips trailing tiny kisses along my hairline, my eyes, my nose, my chin. He avoids my mouth, and eventually we hold each other in silence, just staring and thinking. I ask him at one point, “How did you get in here?”

Dean smiles softly. “Your mom texted me. She said you were awake.”

“My mom was okay with you seeing me?” I wonder through a frown.

“She saw what a wreck I was. I was losing my damn mind the night they brought you in. I thought you were gone.” He shifts on the bed, pulling me closer. “Your mom took me aside and said it would be better if I stayed away for Mandy’s sake, but she’d keep me updated on your condition. Trust me, Cora, if it were up to me I wouldn’t have left your side.”

I raise my hand and press the pads of my fingers to his cheek, grazing them down his jawline. I watch his eyes flutter in contentment. I’m overcome by the feelings sweeping through me, wondering how something so beautiful, so powerful, soright, could be so very wrong.

But right or wrong, I know one thing is for certain. “This is real, isn’t it?”

I’ve been trying to deny it. I’ve been pushing away the blinding truths, telling myself we’re still trapped in that emotional prison of Earl’s basement. These feelings aren’t genuine, they aren’treal—they were manufactured by trauma and isolation. This was all a part of Earl’s twisted plan, and he succeeded tenfold.

Only… it’s getting harder and harder to believe that. The truth is in the way Dean holds me, the way he sings me to sleep and silences my demons with a gentle stroke of his hand. It’s in the way my heart beats differently when he’s near. It’s in the way I envision a future, a future I can never have, and he’sthere. He’s always there.

It’s in the way he’s looking at me right now.

Dean studies me, his eyes darting over my face, memorizing every fine line, every crack and crease. A smile touches his lips, as if we’re finally coming to terms with what we both already knew. “Yeah, Corabelle. It’s real.”

I bury myself into his chest, nuzzling my nose to his shirt and breathing him in. “Can you hold me until I fall asleep?”

“Of course.”

He hums a song against my hair like a soothing lullaby as I soak up his warmth and let it fill every cold, empty pocket inside me.

I cling to what will never be mine.

As my eyes close, my body calm and my mind in a temporary state of peace, I find myself drifting out to sea. I’m back on that beach, running into his arms, watching the seagulls fly overhead as he spins me around beneath the setting sun.

I’m still not sure where the words came from.

Were they a whisper on the wind in a magical dream? Or were they spoken into my hair, a soft confession, a haunting promise of everything that will never come to be?

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