Page 86 of Thorns from the Fall

She starts nodding. Her chin wobbles, and then tears spill down her cheeks. But they aren’t happy or joyful. She heaves a sob and can’t seem to stop crying. Her reaction isn’t one I expect, as if my confession hasn’t answered a question plaguing us since we met. I cup her face in my hands and tilt her head up.

“What is it, ma petite cafarde?”

Her eyes are closed, and she chokes on another sob. Finally, after a moment, she wipes her face and lets me see those beautiful, golden eyes.

“Agnarr tried to kill me. Showed up at the penthouse. I-I jumped to escape.”

I exhale a breath. “You weren’t trying to hurt yourself?”

“No,” she frowns, nose wrinkling. “I mean, given my track record, I can see why you’d think that, but no. I was trying to get away. Which, I’ll admit, jumping was a mind fuck of a way to do it.”

“Wait,” I say, realization dawning. “Nico and Hale are looking for you, but Nico’s phone is dead. Are they in danger?”

“Fuck. Yes. Give me your phone,” she demands, but I’m already handing it over. I should have thought to ask Margot to get me Hale’s number, but it doesn’t matter. As Gwyn dials a number she clearly has memorized, I take a moment to look her over. Her bare feet are blood-speckled, and there are dark spots on her leggings that I suspect are blood. She turns, and thebacks of them are torn the fuck up, revealing bloodstained skin in some places. But she’s intact. Whole. Here.

“Yeah, come back,” she says. “To Roman’s. Hale, stop. No, I couldn’t—what do you mean I should have—you know what, just get here. I’ll explain.”

She hangs up and hands me the phone with one hand and begins gesturing with the other.

While holding her goddamn gun.

She’s pacing around my small living room, Zuul following behind her, and she’s clearly fucking irritated.

“He said I should have just come back into the compound to find him. And lead Agnarr to someone I love? Jesus Christ.” She came here instead. I try not to read into it because I just told her I loved her and she hasn’t said anything about it. She shakes her head in aggravation before closing her eyes and continuing her story. “Okay, so he showed up somehow. Through the elevator, but the elevator didn’t come up? I don’t know. Then Nico came up to get a charger, and I didn’t want him or Zuul to die, and Agnarr let me—well, and then, I went out onto the balcony, you know, because there would be a mess? And then?—”

“Give it to me,” I demand as she starts playing with the safety of her gun. She stops, staring at me for a moment.

“Promise not to shoot me?” she finally asks, fighting a smile.

I hold out my hand, and she doesn’t hesitate like she might have before. Gently, she places it in my palm. I don’t break eye contact as I drop the magazine out and pocket it before setting the gun down on the coffee table beside us. She huffs a laugh before shaking her head.

“Sorry. It’s a bad habit. I’m nervous.”

“I know.”

“Anyway, I landed in some guy’s pickup truck. I don’t want to hear you complain about me shooting you ever again,” shesays, giving me a sheepish smile. She’s different. Exuberant but twitchy. Almost radiant, which makes no fucking sense at all.

“Hurt like a bitch, didn’t it?”

“Yeah,” she says, grimacing. “I think Agnarr followed the truck—or at least I hope so. I drove here, as soon as I was able. To you.”

“To me.”

“Where else?” she asks.

Looking up at me through her lashes, blood staining her body and hair a tangled mess, she’s gorgeous. She might appear innocent, with her soft jaw and rounded cheeks, but her sharp-toothed smile and that cunning ability to deceive tell another story. Her vengeance and her rage and her sadness haven’t undone the goodness inside of her. The parts of her that made me think I was capable of more aren’t gone just because the rest of her has been revealed. I want all of her, no matter the cost.

Gwyn takes one step toward me, and I match her. Then, she’s closing the distance in a heartbeat, and throwing her arms around my neck. I close my eyes, grateful for her warmth and her soft curves and her living, breathing presence. When she presses a warm, messy kiss to my mouth, I can’t control the satisfied growl that escapes me. I haul her closer, wrapping my arms around her waist and lifting her to the tips of her toes. She tugs at my lower lip, sucking on it, before pressing her mouth against mine once more.

“I thought you jumped because?—”

“I know,” she whispers. Her forehead rests against mine, and her eyes are closed. “I expected it to be weightless. Peaceful.”

“It’s not?”

“It’s fucking terrifying.” She laughs, then grows silent for a moment. “Thisis fucking terrifying.”

“Yeah. Yeah, it is.”

---