Page 6 of Silent Truths

3

Salem

The door creaked open, and I lowered my phone, squinting through the darkness, hoping it was Tor. I’d been laying here all fucking day, trying to figure out a way to ambush him. I knew chasing him would only make shit worse. He’d been angry enough to hit me—my jaw still fucking hurt—and he’d never done that.

Tor hated violence. After the abuse all of us but Dalton had suffered, it made Tor sick to his stomach to see anyone using violence. Yet, he’d swung on me.

Honestly, I was still a bit shocked that he’d punched me in the face. And with so much force, at that.

Spike entered the room, Tor slumped in his arms. Immediately, I lurched from the bed, reaching for him, concern throbbing deep in my chest. It fucking hurt to see Tor like that. Something was wrong, and I desperately needed to find out so I could fix it. What the fuck was wrong with him? Why was he unconscious?

“No,” Spike grunted, making me scowl at him and drop my hands before he moved past me and gently laid Tor on the bed. Immediately, I eased Tor’s shoes off his feet, and then Spike covered him up, tucking the blanket in around Tor’s slim body to cocoon him and make him feel safe. My Adam’s apple bobbed when I swallowed, my throat clicking. Even from the foot of Tor’s bed, I could smell the alcohol fucking wafting off him.

Tor never drank like this. Not unless we were in a group setting or at a club. He preferred keeping a level head, especially when I wasn’t around to protect him.

Had he even recovered from his hangover this morning before drowning himself in another bottle?

Spike turned to face me and crossed his thick arms over his chest, the muscles of his biceps bulging and straining against his black, short-sleeve shirt. His hair was a mess, like he’d run his fingers through it, and the strands brushed his broad shoulders instead of being up in a bun like they usually were.

“You two need to fix this shit,” he growled at me, his voice low so he wouldn’t disturb Tor. Though, I didn’t think Tor was going to be waking up anytime soon. He was obviously too damn drunk for that. “Tor is fucking spiraling, Salem.”

I gritted my teeth. Spike knew I hated it when people shoved their fucking noses in my business. What I did was on me. It had nothing to do with the rest of the band, even if they were my closest friends.

“Fuck right off,” I growled at him before walking over to my bed and snatching up my phone.

“Keep your fucking little toys out of the house,” Spike snapped at me, his voice only marginally raising before he forced it to lower again. Anger rolled through me so hotly, it burned. Scorched my insides. Spike was overstepping his boundaries.

I spun around to face him, dropping my phone back on the mattress. “Don’t fucking tell me what the fuck to do in a house I pay goddamn rent on, too, asshole,” I sneered at him. His nostrils flared, anger sparking in his gaze. We all pulled our fucking weight and contributed. Always goddamn had. He had no fucking right to tell me what I could and couldn’t do and who I could and couldn’t bring into this fucking house and into my bed.

Spike stepped up close to me, narrowing his dark eyes at me. “When what the fuck you do sends Tor into a goddamn drunken stupor, I damn well will tell you what the fuck you can and can’t do, Salem,” he snarled at me. “You’ve turned the kindest one out of all of us—the fucking most level-headed one—into a mere shell of himself.” Spike jabbed his finger hard into my chest. I knocked it away hard enough to make my palm sting. “Fix it, Salem,” he snarled.

I clenched my jaw. “It’s been too goddamn long to try to fix anything.” I knew I was looking for an excuse. I didn’t know how to admit I was wrong. I didn’t know how to fix the damage I’d caused, even if I had to stare at Tor and see the agony ripping him to shreds every fucking day.

I was a dick. And even though I’d sworn I’d never let the darker parts of me touch the most important person in the world to me…

Well, I fucking had.

I’d even managed to destroy the one thing in this world that’d always been so full of light.

Now…

Well, now I was just standing in pure darkness. There was no light. There was no beacon to lead me out of the pain and misery.

Instead, I was now forcing Tor to drown with me just so I wouldn’t be alone. It was selfish of me, but I was terrified if I did try to fix things, he’d prove to me I’d waited too long. He’d run away. Finally leave once he got his closure.

I couldn’t let him go, even if I was making him bleed out.

“It’s never too late,” Spike told me, his tone softening. I looked away from him. “Pull your head out of your ass before we all lose him, Salem.”

With that, he walked out of the bedroom, the door shutting behind him with a quiet shnick that sounded as loud as a bomb dropping.

I slowly took a seat on the edge of my bed and stared across the room at Tor, watching the blanket slowly rise and fall with his deep, even breaths. How did he still breathe so easily when every bit of air I pulled into my lungs was heavy with heartache and pain?

“I don’t know how to fix this, Tor,” I whispered. “I’m scared to fucking fix this.”

I got nothing in response, though I hadn’t been expecting anything anyway. Still, it would have been nice if he’d woken up and shown me what the hell to do. Because Spike was right…

We were all on the verge of losing Tor.

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