Page 134 of Mason

I don’t look away.

Neither does he.

As though he’s too afraid if he looks away, I might be gone.

When he stops beside my bed, I can see everything written in his face—the rage, the guilt, the fear he’ll never admit to.

He drops into the chair beside the bed, rubs his hands down his thighs slowly as he waits.

I part my lips, but the words don’t come easy.

They claw their way up my throat, ragged and raw, scraping past bruised vocal cords and unshed tears. My voice comes out hoarse, splintered—like it forgot how to sound human.

“You…” My chest tightens as I force the rest out. “You came for me.”

It’s not really a question. Not really a statement, either.

It’s a wound.

A quiet confession of disbelief, like I still can’t trust that I’m not bleeding on a concrete floor somewhere, waiting to be found. Waiting to be forgotten.

His expression shifts—just slightly—but it’s enough.

A flicker of pain, barely restrained. His jaw clenches. Something in his eyes fractures.

“Of course I fucking did,” he says, low and rough, like it offends him that I’d even wonder. Like it breaks something in him that I had to ask at all.

It knocks something loose in my chest. Something I thought was long dead.

I shift, the movement sending sparks of pain down my side. I wince, biting back the sound.

He doesn’t move to touch me, but I feel him tense. Like he wants to, like it’s killing him not to.

“I pressed the tracker,” I murmur, voice shaking. “… didn’t think you’d make it in time.”

He leans forward, his forearms braced on his knees, every inch of him brimming with frustration. “I almost didn’t.”

I stare at him. At the man who feels more like a storm than a person. “I almost died.”

I died a thousand quiet deaths under that overpass, waiting for someone—for him—to find me.

I draw in a shaky breath, lungs struggling against the weight pressing down on my ribs. My throat is raw, like I’ve been screaming in my sleep, even if I don’t remember the sound.

“Mason…” I whisper.

He’s sitting at the edge of the chair beside my hospital bed, elbows on his knees, head bowed like he’s praying. At the sound of my voice, he lifts his head—slow, like it takes effort.

His eyes lock on mine.

Dark. Devastated.Desperate.

“Why?” I ask, voice trembling.

His brow creases. “Why what?”

“Why do you care?”

The room goes still.

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