Page 127 of I Promise You
I start sniffling into my arms, hugging myself.
He’s dead because of me and my stupidity.
I shouldn’t have ended things with him. I shouldn’t have told him those horrible things when we were in the rain. All he’s wanted to do since we met was protect me, and I threw it in his face while telling him ithurt metolove him.
How could I have let my selfishness reach me like that?
I sob even harder.
And now he’s gone?
Maybe I should let them kill me. I don’t want to live without him.
Even if I make it out of this, I can’t live without feeling his strong arms hold me like a safehaven. It’ll hurt me to wake up every day knowing he won’t walk through that door in his uniform after he gets home from work. I don’t want to fall asleep again if I can’t do it in his arms.
I won’t be able to sleep knowing I’ll turn around in the bed, and it’d be empty and cold.
I’ll never love another man again. Danny Rider will always have my heart.
I lost my brother, my baby, and now Danny?
I’ll join him in hell if it means I get to be with him forever. Our bodies will perish, but I love him so fucking much that I’m praying it’s enough to have our spirits forever intertwined in the afterlife.
The thought of him in a casket like my brother makes me shrink into myself, and my stomach turns and my world goes dizzy for a minute. And I feel like I’m about to explode and scream. I feel like I’m already going crazy without him.
I don’t want to see my beautiful, sinful man dead in a casket.
Even in his last moments, he sacrificed his life for me. He pushed me out of the way and shielded me at the last second when it meant his own life.
I hate myself.
My face is wet and flushed from the constant grief, and I’m not sure I can do this anymore.
I shift in the corner of the horse stable, my whole body sore, and I try my hardest to free myself from the rope. It’s burned against my skin, and I’ve been bleeding slowly.
It’s dark again, the night consuming me, and I feel myself going out again. My blood pressure is dropping to dangerous limits, and my muscles and eyes are fragile.
I’m no longer hungry. I’m no longer thirsty. I no longer crave these fundamentals to survive. That’s how I know I’m in trouble.
“She’s pale. Her lips are turning blue. She’s dying,” one of the kidnappers warns Ms. Salem.
I’m drifting in and out of sleep, my breathing slowing down, and all I want to do is go to sleep entirely and dream of Danny.
Maybe if I’ll fall asleep, I’ll get to see him. Maybe he’ll talk to me. I dream of Paul even though he’s dead…
Maybe I’ll dream of the man I fell hopelessly in love with.
“Good. She can join her brother.” She laughs wickedly.
I blink slowly, and Ms. Salem drinks her water in front of me. Then she throws the bottle to the floor by my feet. Watersplatters everywhere, and my eyes widen. I gather the last fraction of energy I have stored and crawl to the water bottle.
My knees scrape against the cold ground. It’s still freezing, and I’m the only one in this barn with hardly anything to keep warm.
Everyone else wears jackets, coats, and beanies.
I grab the water bottle and drink one gulp down. A few drops hit my tongue, and I’m shaking it desperately into my mouth.
“Hungry, too?” one of the kidnappers asks me in an evil tone.
