Page 74 of Lose Me In The Shadows

So he tried again. Maybe for the last time. “Please trust us with this.”

Could she trust them with it? Even thinking about what had happened with the professor…it made her breathing speed up, it made her want to run. It made her want to hit something, someone.

“How do I trust you with something so huge, when I can’t trust myself to be able to handle it?”

She hadn’t even realized she’d asked out loud, until Conor said, “Because you’re strong enough to be vulnerable. You’re the strongest person I know, Kara.”

“We know,” Micah added.

Strong. She didn’t feel strong. But maybe it was time to be.

“I can still smell it, you know? How wet and rotten that cell was. How shocked and terrified I was when Chris showed up. How convinced I was that I could beat him at his own mind games. But you can only do so much, mentally, when you’ve been destroyed physically. He had his men beat me. I don’t know how I survived, it hurt so badly I couldn’t breathe. I almost didn’t want to breathe—I wanted to die, was sure I was going to. And when Chris told me he’d gone after the three of you for sleeping with me—it was like I’d never actually escaped him, or New York. Like I was still living out my mistakes, years later.”

She inhaled. This didn’t feel strong. This felt like an avalanche. “The worst part? I thought no one was coming for me. I thoughtyouweren’t coming for me. And it was my fault.”

She glanced around at the three of them. Conor looked thunderous. Luke, devastated. And Micah? That usual thoughtful expression was gone. Guilt ravaged his features.

“Oh, sweetheart, thank you for telling us. I am so, so sorry,” Luke said.

“I’ll kill them again,” Conor said. “I don’t know how, but I will. And we’ll killhim, too. Make it last. Make it—”

“Stop.” Micah interrupted. “The people who deserve the pain? It’sus.That’s who you’re angry at, Conor. Baby, this is my fault. Not yours. I pushed you to run away. If it weren’t for me…”

God, this was a never-ending cycle with them, wasn’t it? Kara was glad she’d told them, though. It felt like she’d climbed a mountain, run twenty miles. Her whole body was shaking, but a weight had lifted off of her. She wasn’t healed, but maybe you were never fully healed. Maybe you did the best with the broken pieces you were left with, made them into something new.

“I think,” she said, “we should stop blaming ourselves for everything, accept we all fucked up, and move on.”

“Do you mean that?” Luke’s green eyes were … intense.

She raised a hand, aware that it was trembling. “I don’t know what move on means yet. I’ve only barely forgiven you for the…” She became aware that there were people in the other seats around them, potentially nosy, potentially listening. “…involuntary relocation thing. And I don’t know how I fit in this polycule. Everyone seems to have a role, except me. I know that I have to be here by choice, or I can’t be here at all.”

Luke cleared his throat. “What would it take, for you to stay?”

Her heart pounded so loud in her ears, it was almost all she could hear.

“What?”

“You heard him.” It was Conor this time. “What would it take?”

Before she could answer, Micah tensed.

“Behind us. One in a blue baseball cap, one in a red sweater. Kara, donotturn around.”

It was good he’d said something, because her instincts had told her to look.

“Fuck.” Conor stared out the window. No, not out—at. There was a blurry reflection in it of the two men Micah had mentioned.

“They found us,” Luke said.

“They?”

“Chris or his brothers’ men,” Micah responded.

This time, her heart didn’t pound in her ears—it roared.

“The fact that there are only two of them…worrisome,” Conor said.

Luke nodded. “Means they’re top of their game, or the professor would’ve sent more.”

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