Page 29 of Run to Me
Nate
Jace wakes up screaming multiple times throughout the night, and at one point he holds me in place, squeezing me so tight my bones ache under the weight. I can’t push him off no matter how hard I try, eventually giving up the fight and going slack in his hands.
“You need to go back,” he says. “You can’t be here.” Tears glisten below his eyes as the sun starts to pour into the room.
“Jace,” I say, stroking his cheek. “It’s okay. You’re dreaming.”
“Don’t,” he screams. “We’ll both get in trouble if you fight. Do you want that?”
My heart hurts. I wish I could do more for him at this moment, and eventually my attempts to wake him up have his eyes flying open. Fear is etched in his expression, his body tensing and features strained.
“Jace,” I say in a soft voice, kissing his lips as his arms fall away from me. “Are you here with me?”
“I . . .” His bottom lip trembles. “Did I hurt you again?”
Letting out a soft breath, I shake away the pain in my arms that will no doubt spout bruises tomorrow. “No,” I lie. He doesn’t need more reason to punish himself and he can’t control what he does in his sleep. I know what happens when he has nightmares and I stayed anyway. I stayed because he needs me, and because I need him—to feel him breathing and fighting to be here.
“You should go back to sleeping in your own bed. You’re not safe in mine.” His voice wavers.
“I don’t want to. I already told you I’m fine,” I exclaim.
He shakes his head, flipping to his back. “I don’t like hurting you. I don’t like knowing it was me who gave you a black eye or left fingerprint bruises on your neck. I don’t—”
I pull his face toward mine. “Look at me. I’m fine. You’ll only hurt me if you push me away, so please don’t.”
His eyes hold on to mine, his throat bobbing. “I don’t want to, but I will if it keeps you safe from me.”
A heavy weight settles on my chest, a twisting sensation making it hard to breathe. So many people failed him—so damn many—but I won’t be another person on that list. “I don’t need to be kept safe from you.”
He shuts his eyes, takes a breath, and opens them again. Big, brown, and soft. No danger or maliciousness to be found, only worry and sorrow. “I’m not so sure.”
“I am.” I rub my nose over his, kissing his slanting lips, needing the corners to lift for me again. “Want to tell me what they were about? Maybe talking about what happened will help you feel better.”
Muscles jump in his throat as he swallows hard. “It’s my dad. I see him and then I become him. I’m the one making someone else drag those people into the basement. I’m the one everyone hides from.”
A lump lodges in my throat. “You’re not him and he’s not you. You were a victim too. He hurt you just as much as he hurt them. If you can come to terms with that while you’re awake, then maybe you won’t see yourself as anything else in your dreams either.”
“He didn’t, though. I wasn’t sold off like some shiny toy for someone to do what they pleased with. I got a second chance at life, in a good home and a safe environment. What do they get? More torture? Nightmares they can’t wake up from? He died, you know.”
My eyes widen, heart stopping in my chest. “Who did?”
“The man everyone thought I saved.” He sniffs. “He was in a coma for weeks before his family decided to let him go. “He suffered too much head trauma and it was my fault. Our tumble down the stairs. I killed him. I looked it up a few years ago, not sure I wanted to know what happened to him. I needed to know, though.”
“Oh, Jace.” My heart wrenches, unable to let up when I look deeper into his eyes. So much pain and torment takes over. I never knew the man died. I thought Jace saved him that day too.
“I only saved myself. And for what?”
“No, Jace. You saved the others who would have come after him. Your dad would have kept taking more men home, and now he can’t thanks to what you did.”
“But what about the men he worked for? They’ll keep doing it. They’ll hire others. They’ll replace my dad and it’ll never end. So did I really help anyone? The guy had a family. He . . .” A sob escapes him. “He was supposed to attend prom a month after he was taken. He was younger than I am now.”
“You can’t keep thinking about all that. You can’t. You’ll only drive yourself mad.”
“I haven’t thought about it in a while. Not until I saw him again last night. I . . . I forgot about what I’d done. I forgot like it wasnothing. I went on like it was nothing while his parents had to bury him in the ground. I got to be happy and graduate when that was all taken from him by me.”
“Tell me what I can do to help you. Tell me what you need.”
He shuts his eyes, pulling away. “I don’t know. Just sit here with me and talk about something else.”
