Page 122 of Uprising

Maybe.

It’s her whimpers that make me move, that make me get up.

I lean over, seeing her face screwed up in what looks like pain. Lara is still out for the count so thankfully she hasn’t heard it.

I brush her hair back before I can stop myself and her eyes snap open. For a second I see it, her fear, her terror, and then she’s blinking, registering who I am, where she is.

She shifts, moving Lara enough to be able to sit up.

I don’t speak. I don’t say a word. In truth what the hell could I say? What words would help right now?

“Where have you been?” She murmurs.

“I had to see the Governor.” I reply just as quietly. She flinches at the word I know is a trigger. “He’s a stand in.” I add. “The state issued a state of emergency.”

She nods. Not blinking. Not taking her eyes from me.

“Rose…”

“Why did you have to see him?” She asks cutting across my words. Her voice sounds flat. Devoid of anything that makes herher.

I chew my lip for a second. “They want to know where you are. They have questions for you.”

“Did you tell them?”

“No.” I reply. “But when you’re better, when you’re recovered…”

“What do they want to know?”

She sounds so serious. So harsh. As if she’s locked all her pain and sorrow up and her heart is no longer there. That she’s just a cold, hard creature now.

It makes my own heart twist. It makes me want to grab her and not let her go until I feel the old her, the soft her, return.

“They want to know where he is.” I say. I won’t say his name. She’s not stupid. She knows exactly who I’m talking about.

“I don’t know.” She says dropping her eyes.

“You jumped from the helicopter.”

She sighs. “I couldn’t, I wasn’t going to…” She stares at Lara for a moment. “They killed Ty.”

“I know. We found his body.”

“They tortured me to get him to tell them where you were.”

“What?”

My growl makes Lara stir. Only for a second but it’s enough to kick my ass into getting control of myself.

Rose’s lip trembles, her eyes seems to glisten as she meets mine and then she swallows it down. Swallows all of that trauma. “He didn’t tell them. He kept it secret.”

“Rose…”

“You’ve looked after her.” She says dropping her gaze again, stroking Lara’s hair. “You took good care of her.”

I nod. “I did the best I could. But she wanted you. She never stopped asking for you.”

She looks way, shuts her eyes, lets out such a sigh that I can feel the pain inside her. “I couldn’t protect her.”

---