Page 40 of Vows & Violence
“I’ll burn the world before I lose you,” I tell him again, voice steady, strong.
“I’m not going anywhere,” he says, pulling me into him.
And for once, I let him hold me while the fire finishes its song.
Later, Ghost and I ride to the safe house. It’s quiet. Not silent. The Non Cras MC moves like ghosts through the hall. Wendigo is checking the perimeter, and Poison is talking with Kitty in thenext room. But here, in this little pocket of dark, it feels like the world narrowed down to a heartbeat. One steady, stubborn beat.
Mine and his.
I sit on the edge of the bathtub, shirt peeled halfway off, the fabric stuck where blood has dried into the seams. My ribs ache. My shoulder’s a mess of bruises from where I took that hit near the altar. There's a clean towel under me, a half-bottle of whiskey on the sink that I haven't touched.
Ghost kneels in front of me with his sleeves rolled up, hands gentler than they should be for a man who can break bones without blinking.
He wets the cloth again and wrings it out. His jaw’s tight, like he’s chewing on something he doesn’t know how to spit out. I could tell him I’m fine, but I already know he won’t believe it.
The cloth touches my skin gently, but I still flinch and hiss.
“Tell me where it hurts,” Ghost says.
I huff. “You’ll run out of time before I run out of answers.”
His eyes flip up, locking on mine. “I’ve got time.”
I don’t look away. I let him clean the blood from my side, my shoulder, the cut across my ribs that’s still seeping. His hands are steady. Patient. He doesn’t flinch at the scars, old or new.
“Thought you were gonna bleed out in that circle,” he mutters after a while.
“Thought you were gonna let that asshole chant me into the afterlife.”
He gives me a look. “Please. You’d have punched Death in the throat.”
I barely smile. “Damn right I would.”
The smile fades. He’s cleaning the deeper wound now. One I didn’t even feel until the heat wore off. My breath hitches.
“You okay?” he asks.
I nod. “Yeah. Just…don’t stop.”
He doesn’t. If anything, his touch gets softer. More reverent.
“I meant what I said,” I murmur. “Back there.”
“I know.”
“No,” I say, reaching out, curling my fingers in the front of his shirt to make him look up. “Ichoseyou, Ghost. Not just because you needed me. Not because I needed to win. But because I’m done pretending I don’t care. I’ve been running since before you ever touched me, and tonight, I finally stopped.”
He’s quiet for a second, just watching me. “You know what I saw when you kicked that door open?”
I raise an eyebrow. “Smoke and murder?”
He smiles, but it's soft. Honest. “I saw the rest of my life.”
My chest tightens. Not from pain this time. He leans in, forehead to mine, hands resting gently on my thighs.
“You saved me, Phoenix.”
I shake my head. “Nah. We saved each other.”
