Page 59 of A Breath of Life
“It’s okay, D.”
“No. It isn’t. Things are bad right now inside my head. I’m feeling out of control. If I put you in a box and make unreasonable demands, it’s because I don’t know how to handle what’s going on.”
I wanted to ask,What is going on?But I kept my mouth shut.
“I have this fierce urge to protect you. I’m scared of anyone hurting you. The thought is so goddamn terrifying that it takes over, and I say things and do things… It pisses you off. I see it, but I can’t stop myself. I want to put you in a fucking box and never let you out, but that’s unreasonable. I know that. I feel like I’m one breath away from ruining the best thing that has ever happened to me.”
I burrowed into his arms and rested my cheek and ear against his chest. His breathing hitched, and his heart pounded.
He wrapped his arms around me and squeezed. “If something happened to you, I wouldn’t survive it.”
“Nothing’s going to happen to me.” But the tingle of apprehension returned. Diem’s worries over my safety weren’t abating. In fact, he seemed more agitated now than earlier.
Red flags waved. Alarm bells rang.
Ominous dread blanketed me. Danger seemed to lurk on the horizon, but I didn’t know what that danger was because Diem wouldn’t tell me.
After a long, comforting embrace, I pulled back. It was on the tip of my tongue to ask again what had happened to make him so jumpy and paranoid, but I clamped my mouth shut.
That was when the goddamn leather pouch on his wrist drew my attention. It was still there.
Frowning, I stared at it. Something about its presence bothered me to my core. When did Diem start wearing it as a bracelet? Why?
I worked through his odd behavior, trying to pinpoint the elusive piece that made up this frustrating puzzle.
Diem drawing all the curtains in the apartment.
Peering out at the street below as though we were being watched. Stalked.Hunted.
Concealing weapons under his pant leg.
Barking orders for me to stay inside and not go anywhere alone.
Paranoia.
Raw confessions.
Wrong numbers in the middle of the night.
Vague explanations about his supposed encounter withmenwho had attacked him.
Demands that he stay and watch me work.
But of all the weirdness, the leather pouch around his wrist didn’t seem to fit. What did any of it have to do with the card? Nothing, so far as I understood. The card had come before the attack.
Yeah, I got that he didn’t trust me not to steal it and sell it behind his back, but before he’d randomly disappeared and arrived home bloodied, he’d carried it in a pocket like a normal fucking person.
I’d first noticed it around his wrist last night when he’d joined me for cereal. I’d puzzled it on our drive to headquarters that morning.
There it remained, physically tied to his wrist like he feared parting with it.
“We should go.” Diem’s rasping tone cut into my thoughts. “We’re meeting my hospital contact at six. If we don’t get moving, we’ll be late. He should be able to get us Clarence’s last name and address.”
I blinked out of the daze surrounding the pouch and card and narrowed my eyes at his words. “Clarence?”
Diem blinked and opened his mouth to respond, but no words followed.
“Who’s Clarence?”
