The sincerity in his voice momentarily broke through my worry, making me realize that I'd been shaking. I'd just had the craziest night of my entire life with multiple close calls for both me and Jax. Was I overreacting? The blood on his head had looked so much worse than it turned out to be. Maybe he had a point.
I touched his side again as a sanity check.
He exhaled. "I didn't say it doesn't hurt. It does, but I'm saying it's not serious. At least it's not, unless you keep poking it."
"Okay," I said finally. "But if it gets worse—"
"I'll call a doctor." His eyes, no longer dull and glazed, had a renewed depth I realized I'd been missing. "I promise."
Looking into his warm gaze, I felt tense muscles I didn't even know I had starting to relax. My shoulders loosened, and I exhaled all at once. The relief was palpable. The crisis was over, at least for tonight.
"Let's go upstairs to rest," he said.
We made our way up the stairs one slow step at a time. As we entered his room and laid down, I shook my head, trying to make sense of everything. I still couldn't believe the night we'd had. It felt like a terrible dream.
Memories flashed across my skull like a slideshow. The flickering firelight, the street lit by a Molotov cocktail—one that I'd thrown. Darrel's gravelly voice calling me a little bitch, the Reapers kicking Jax with sounds that still echoed faintly in my mind . . . how long would it take me to get the images out of my head?
"You okay?" Jax said, a look of concern on his face as he laid next to me.
"Yeah," I replied, trying to smile. "I'm fine. Just a little tired, that's all."
He touched my cheek softly before flicking off the light. I nestled in against the warmth of his body, taking care not to press on his bruise.
Within minutes, he was snoring softly. I laid awake, listening to his breath. I'd almost lost Jax tonight . . . and in the end, we'd both been lucky to make it out as unscathed as we did. I shivered, unable to stop seeing Darrel's angry face every time I closed my eyes. He was Jax's dad—and he only wanted to hurt his son. The injustice of it struck me to my very core. And now, with Jax resting up in his bed, it was like there'd been no real consequences. He seemed unperturbed, at least for now, but I wasn't so sure. In my experience, life didn't work that way: when you did something that big, you couldn't just walk away without feeling the effects one way or another.
I curled my hand around Jax's hip. With time and rest, our aching bodies would recover. But I'd seen the pain in Jax's eyes—would time and rest be enough to heal that kind of hurt?
Chapter Three
THE MORNING AFTER
The next thing I knew, I was sitting up in bed, coughing.
Heavy smoke spread thickly throughout our room, choking me. The smell of burning rubber assaulted my nose.
Fire!
I flung out my hand to wake Jax—but my hand only brushed an empty spot. He was gone!
Panic raced through my body. Where was he? I knew he wouldn't leave me in danger unless . . . he was too hurt to help me.
I jolted out of bed, tortured by visions of Jax hurt and trapped by the fire that raged somewhere down below. He could be worse than hurt, he could be dead. My heart seized with terror. I had to find him, had to get to him somehow, no matter what. Even if that meant going into the fire myself.
I opened the door, and a heart-stopping BOOM twisted up from below. A heavy hot gust of air hit my face. I was falling . . . Jax!
My eyes shot open. I stared at the tapestry-lined ceiling of Jax's bedroom, panting. Sunlight poured into the room.
My heart thumped in my chest, and I took a moment to catch my breath.
It had just been a nightmare. The most horrible kind—the kind that felt real.
I'd thought the Reapers had come and torched the bus and that the worst had happened.
I thought I'd lost Jax.
I rested the back of my hand against my damp forehead and slowly closed my eyes again, allowing a smooth stream of air to escape from my lips. We weren't in danger. We were safe. No Reapers had come looking for us in the night. How could they? They didn't know where we were; they'd been too busy dealing with the fire on their bikes to follow us.
I reached over, searching for the comfort of Jax's body, but my hand brushed a cool emptiness on the mattress where his body should have been.
"Jax?" I turned over to find him gone. Confused, I sat up and clutched the sheet to my breast.
Scenes from my nightmare flashed before my eyes, and a terrible sense of foreboding swept through me. I was suddenly haunted by the thought of losing Jax, for real this time. Where is he?
I grabbed a pair of jeans off the floor and hopped into them, cursing loudly when I banged my shin against the open closet door. I shrugged a t-shirt over my head, paused to consider putting on shoes, decided against it, and flew out the door.
Out on the landing, I hesitated. Should I check upstairs first?
A harsh clang burst from below.
I started, then raced down the stairs, skipping the last few steps and landing with an impact that sent tremors through the bus's steel floor. Four heads snapped up to look at me.
Jax.
He was sitting on the couch next to Sky and Kev, while Chewie crouched on the floor, paused in the middle of wiping up a wet puddle with a rag. The awful-smelling liquid came from a two foot tall bong that glistened damply from being knocked over.
I heaved a sigh of relief at the unexpected normalcy. The flat screen TV was on, showing footage from what looked like the concert last night. A half empty pizza box lay on the table, surrounded by random piles of scribbled-up note paper.
The strong sunlight filtering through the windows meant it was at least noon already. I slept ten hours? It was little wonder: after the terrors of last night, I'd been exhausted. From the state of the living area, it looked like the rest of the band had been up for a while.
"Whoa," Chewie said, "You got here fast. It's like ringing a bell." He picked up the bong and righted it. "Give me a minute and I'll get this warmed up for you."
"Uh, no, thanks," I replied, feeling a little awkward about my grand entrance over what was apparently just some weed smoke.
Sky bounded up from her seat and grabbed my hands, pulling me down on the couch between her and Jax.
She touched my scraped cheek gently, her brown eyes wide. "Hey, Jax wasn't kidding. You did save him."
My heart skipped at her words. Had Jax told them what happened last night? My eyes darted over to him. He was holding an ice pack to the side of his face, but the bruising around his eyes was now minimal. His olive skin was a little paler than usual, but overall he looked far better than he did last night. A half smile even played across his lips.