Page 121 of The Space Between
I help her inside my cabin her, wrap her in the thickest blanket I can find, and made her tea she doesn’t touch. She’s just sitting, griping the blanket with white knuckles, and staring straight ahead while she shakes.
Carefully, I sit next to her on the couch. I don’t touch her, just close enough to say “I’m here.”
She still stares straight ahead. Her eyes are blank. She’s in my cabin, but she’s not here. She’s somewhere else, watching whatever storm this is roll in.
Finally, softly, she whispers, still clutching the blanket like a lifeline, “He texted me. Earlier. At school.”
Tyler…
My jaw clenches and I ask, “Tyler?”
I already know the answer.
She nods. Still not looking at me, but she flatly says, “He found my number. And he has a new one. It was blocked. I don’t know how he got it. I changed everything before I left. My phone. My accounts. He knew where I was. You know that. He showed up. But he left. You made him leave. But he didn’t stay gone. He’s back… and he said—” Her voice cracks and she swallows.
My chest tightens and my stomach flips. It feels like someone just gutted me and poured acid in the wound.
“What did it say?” I ask, trying to stay calm… for her.
Her voice is barely audible as she says. “I’ll always be his. He doesn’t need to see me toownme. And he’ll see me soon. He called me sweetheart, but I felt the rage and the hate like he was standing in front of me. I left and didn’t go back with him when he found me before. So, he’s coming back… and he will kill me. He will. I know it. I can’t be here. I—I have to leave. I can’t be here. I have to go. Now.”
He threatened her. She thinks he’s going to kill her.
He won’t. I will fucking kill him if he so much as shows his fucking face around her.
Stop. Calm down.
Breathe. Focus on Blakelyn.
I breathe through the white-hot rage that pulses behind my ribs. “Show me.” Somehow, my voice is calm.
She hands me the phone. I read it. Every sick, possessive word. That smug fucking tone, like she’s a thing and not a person. Like shebelongsto him… like he has any claim on her.
My vision goes dark as I read it a second time. The growl that rips from my chest surprises even me. “I’ll kill him.”
Her head snaps toward me and her eyes clear slightly. “No,” she says sharply. “You won’t, Gruene. That’s what he wants. To pull me back in. To control me even from far away. He’dloveit if you made a scene. He wants to hurt me. He’ll use you against me. No! I’ll just leave. I should leave. If I leave, he’ll follow me, and you’ll be safe. I need you to be safe.”
She’s not fucking leaving.
I stare at her, rage vibrating in every muscle but I shake my head. “No. You’re not leaving, Blakelyn. You have a life here. A job. He’s not taking that from you.”
And me… you have me.
She stares back—worn, but fierce. She heard what I didn’t say. I see it on her face. Her eyes clear and some of the fearleaves them. The panic recedes and she once again looks like the woman who showed up here and wrecked my whole fucking world. The woman who left her abuser in the middle of the night and started a life, a life she deserves, and didn’t look back.
Don’t look back now, Blakelyn.
I breathe through my mouth, and she exhales, too. She nods, just once and says, “Okay.”
I breathe again and mutter, “We need to call the sheriff.”
She doesn’t leave,not even to go next door. She showers in my bathroom and pulls on one of my t-shirts.
I lock every window and check the doors, three times. She lays in my bed, and I lie beside her but keep my gun on the nightstand. Her head is on my shoulder and her fingers tangle in the hem of my shirt. I pull her tighter, so her body is flush against my side. She doesn’t speak but she doesn’t move or let go either.
She’s not leaving. That’s enough.
The sun is alreadyhigh above the trees when I open my eyes. We both slept.
