Page 59 of Sinners Keepers
I scanned my body, and when my eyes landed on my right hand, it was clasped tightly in Ijah's. His strong grip was familiar, and as he murmured quietly to Alec and Law, his thumb moved absently over the back of my knuckles.
I'd survived. Again.
Alec noticed I was awake first.
He stopped speaking mid-sentence and rushed to my side. “Hunny Bee,” he said, grinning like a fool.
Ijah wasted no time going from a seated position to laying down next to me and curling his body around mine. “Jesus fuck, I’m never letting you out of my sight again. What the fuck were you thinking?”
I looked sheepishly from him to Alec, to Law. “You knew I was leaving. I just… thought it might be easier if I didn’t give you a chance to change your mind about letting me.”
Ijah buried his head in my neck and sighed.
Alec scratched at his five o’clock shadow. “I mean. I was kind of having second thoughts about the whole situation and then realized you werealready gone,” he said, leaning over Ijah to pepper my face with kisses. At least he wasn’t too mad at me.
The movement of his head in such close proximity to my face made me dizzy and I swatted him away, giggling weakly.
“What the fuck did your dad do to you?” Ijah asked.
Tiny tremors wracked my body. Nothing around me dripped color now, but I continued to have difficulty focusing my eyes on anything in particular. A dull, heavy feeling lingered in my chest.
Every sound was too loud and each touch felt too intense, but I was just so fucking thankful to be here that I didn't have it in me to tell Ijah that his body being flush with mine was incredibly overwhelming.
“Fucking drugs,” I replied. “Too many drugs.”
He huffed. “Well, that much is obvious.”
I told them about how he’d acted when I showed up at the house, and recounted all the things he’d said during his fucking villain monologue. They all stared at me in complete and utter shock when I told them Ellis wasn’t even my real dad. “I’m relieved to know I didn’t actually share blood with the fucker.”
The three of them sighed in unison.
Law gave me a soft look, then took my hand and pulled me until I was sitting upright. “Mom juiced you up with all the good stuff to counteract the effects of the LSD.” My face twisted, wondering how they knew because I hadn’t specified that yet. “Labs,” he answered my unspoken question. “Your numbers came back in the upper range of what’s deemed safe for peak levels. The doctor said you’d be fine in 12 hours or so, to let you sleep it off because it didn’t appear that you were experiencing a bad trip, just super fucked up. Which is what we’ve been doing, but now that you’re awake you look like you’re about to crawl out of your skin.”
Ijah backed away from me immediately. He’d been so wrapped up in me, that he hadn’t recognized how I was responding to his touch. “I’m sorry, cupcake.”
I forced a smile. “It’s okay.”
“We were so fucking worried that this would mess with your memory again. It’s advised against for anyone with a brain injury like yours to even use any kind of psychiatric medication,” his hand twitched like he wanted to reach for me again, but thought better of it. “But you’re awake and not accusing any of us of attempted murder, so I think that’s a good sign.”
Again, what the fuck was my life?
“How can we best help you right now?” Alec asked.
I thought for a minute. “Make the room as dark as possible. Someone get me something to eat and drink. Someone get me an ice pack. And whoever is left, just… stay with me please.”
“My girl’s favorite noodles, coming right up,” Law said, heading for the door.
“Ourgirl,” Alec responded, smacking him on the shoulder as he walked by him and exited the room first. I guessed that meant he was getting the ice pack.
That left me and Ijah. “Would a shower help?” he asked.
“Hmm. Maybe later. I don’t know that I have the energy to exert for that and I kind of feel like the heat would just make things worse.”
“The good news is, it’s been long enough that it’s mostly out of your system. I think rest and food are both fantastic ideas.” He toyed with the ends of my hair. I appreciated that he was being careful not to touch me, but it warmed my heart that he still found a way to have contact with me.
Alec returned with an ice pack and laid it on the edge of the bed, allowing me the control over when and where I wanted it to make contact with me, which I appreciated. I laid the cold compress over my eyes, breathing a little easier as the chill of it seeped into my brain.Not really, but that's what it felt like.I let it rest there until Law returned with noodles for all of us.
As I chewed the last few bites of my meal and sat my chopsticks to the side, Nelia came in.
