Page 198 of Carrick
And then—soft. So soft I almost didn’t hear it. “…Carrick.”
My name. Rasped. Raw. Sandpaper and salt and something half-shattered trying to re-form into sound.
I stilled. Not because I was afraid. But because I knew—whatever came next, it mattered. It cost her something just to say it.
“I’m here,” I murmured, brushing my lips against her temple. No urgency. No pressure. Just a place to land.
She swallowed, and I felt it—tight and thick and painful beneath her skin. “I know…” Her voice faltered, cracked. “I know it wasn’t your fault.”
She didn’t look at me. The words weren’t for comfort. They were for truth. “I know what happened to him,” she whispered. “I know it wasn’t because of you. Or me.”
A pause. The kind that lives between heartbeats and heartbreak. “I know what Rayden did. I know he made choices. I knew it before we found him, I think. Maybe even before he did.”
The water shifted with a tremble in her body. She curled her arms a little tighter around her stomach, like she was holding in something too big to name.
“But if I say that out loud,” she breathed, “if I admit that he did this to himself… then I have to admit I couldn’t stop him. That nothing I did was ever enough. That I loved him, and it didn’t save him.”
God. Her words hit harder than any scream ever could. They were quiet. Uneven. But they were honest. And honesty always comes at a price.
Her voice dropped to almost nothing. “I don’t think I can hold that yet. Not on top of everything else. It’s too much. It’s just… too fucking much.”
I closed my eyes and let her words sink deep. I pressed my palm gently to her chest, fingers splayed over her heart, and whispered into the curve of her neck, “You don’t have to hold both tonight. You don’t have to hold anything. I’ve got you. Let that be enough for now.”
She didn’t answer. But she didn’t pull away. And slowly—so slowly I barely noticed—it felt like she gave in. Just a little. Just enough to let me carry the moment. To let the weight shift off her spine and into the water, into my arms, into something shared.
My fingers found hers beneath the surface, linking loosely. “You loved him,” I said. “That doesn’t vanish just because the ending broke you.”
Her breath caught. Not quite a sob. Not quite a sigh. Just… breath. And for the first time since I carried her from that cross, I felt her let go.
Not of Rayden. Not of grief. But of the need to hold it all alone.
She leaned back further, resting more of herself against me, and I stayed exactly where I was—steady and present, wrapped around her like I’d never leave.
Because I wouldn’t leave.
Not now. Not ever.
Her body had softened against mine, but I could still feel the echo of everything she hadn’t said yet. It pulsed beneath her skin like a second heartbeat—quiet, insistent, waiting. The water had cooled slightly, no longer steaming, just warm enough tokeep the shivers at bay. But I could feel it in her. The tremble. The hesitation. The thing she was holding behind her teeth like it might be safer kept inside.
I didn’t press. I stayed. Arms wrapped around her chest, breath even and quiet against the shell of her ear, my hand resting over her heart like it was the only language I had left. The bathroom was silent but for the subtle ripple of water when we shifted and the slow, measured rhythm of our breaths trying to find each other.
She stirred slightly. Just enough to change the angle of her head, enough that her cheek brushed the line of my jaw. And then, with a voice still gravel-soft and frayed around the edges, she said, “I’m scared. I’m scared that this… whatever this is… it’s temporary. That it only feels safe because it’s new. Because it’s built on adrenaline and survival and proximity. That once the danger’s over, it’ll disappear. That you will.”
Her voice cracked at the end, and that was what broke me.
Because I could hear it—how much it cost her to admit that. This wasn’t about lust. This wasn’t about need. This wasn’t even about Rayden anymore. This was about the tiny, fragile hope she had begun to believe in. The thread of safety she’d let herself hold. And how deeply it would shatter her if that thread snapped.
I tightened my hold, pulling her back fully into my chest, and kissed her hair like it was the only answer I had. “I know it doesn’t feel real,” I said into the silence, my voice low, steady, aching. “But it is.”
She didn’t answer. So I kept going.
“I’m not here because it’s easy. I’m not here because of adrenaline, or the job, or whatever the hell this situation looks like from the outside. I’m here because I want to be. Because when you screamed and sobbed and shattered, I didn’t want to run—I wanted to be closer.”
She let out a sound that was almost a whimper, but it caught in her throat and disappeared before it could finish.
I moved my hand from her ribs to her cheek, gently turning her face so I could see her. Her eyes opened slowly, glassy but dry now, lashes clumped from earlier tears. She didn’t look afraid. She looked raw. Like every part of her had been scraped down to the nerve and was just barely breathing again.
“I’m scared too,” I admitted. “But not of this. Not of you. I’m scared of not having this. Of waking up tomorrow and you pulling away because you think I don’t mean it when I say I’m not going anywhere.”
