Page 84 of Sol
“Yeah, well, itisme. But then things changed. He had no patience whatsoever. He’d lose his temper at everything. Anything. And take it out onme.”
His arms came around me and gripped me tohim.
“On the outside, Brian was all peace and love. But he started getting paranoid. He’d check my phone, wanting to know who texted me. He wanted my ATM card and the password. He told me to cancel my credit cards. I don’t know what got into him. Maybe he smoked some bad weed orsomething.”
Trent kissed the top of my head, stroking my hair. “He sounds like anass.”
“He was. I got sick in Peru. He wouldn’t let me stay in bed, said I’d brought it on myself by being out of touch with the Universe, and that we had to keep going. So we got on the bus and went to the next town in the Andes. I had a fever for five days. I couldn’t eat. I just had chills and sweats. He didn’t believe in doctors, thought modern medicine was a racket. So I got sicker and sicker. Only when I started coughing up blood did he take me to a clinic in Lima. We found out I had pneumonia and needed antibiotics. Because of him, I almostdied.”
“Motherfucker,” he muttered through his teeth as his hand tensed behind my head. He let out a breath and relaxed hisfingers.
“When I got better, I realized how fucked up that all was and how I’d rearranged my life for him, and he didn’t deserve it. He didn’t need to be in my business like that. It wasn’t a partnership, it was a dictatorship, and he was in charge. I wasn’t gonna do that anymore. I wanted out. So when I got better, I left the hospital, signed my own discharge papers, got on a bus, got on a plane, and went to Japan. I never said goodbye to him. I justleft.”
“Holyfuck.”
“I figured he wouldn’t follow me there, because he’d said before it was too expensive. So by then I’d deleted all of my social media accounts. I just kept the one email to get in touch with Degan, Lulu, you, and a few others, but even that I didn’t check very much. I withdrew. I needed to get better. And I needed to be as far away from him as I could. So I stayed with an artist I met in Japan. She helped me recover, fed me all kinds of soups and teas, and when I felt better, I helped her build an art studio to thankher.”
“Did he ever try to findyou?”
“I have no idea. I just kept running. And I neverstopped.”
He held me tenderly, cradled in his arms. After a while, he murmured, “He’s never gonna find you. I’ll make sure ofthat.”
“I don’t know if you can promise that. But I think he got the message. Towards the end, I wasn’t sure if he even liked me. Because what kind of person does that to someone you love? You don’t. You take care of people youlove.”
“Right.”
The sounds of the night came in through the open window. We were so close to the water we could hear the constant crash of the sea. The moonlight made a narrow beam on the floor by the window. He stroked the top of my head, and asked, “Are you scared ofme?”
I wiggled to look at him. “What do youmean?”
“I mean, do you think I’d do that? That I’d take over your life like that? That I’d not take care ofyou?”
Letting out a long breath, I considered my words. “I think, intellectually, I know that you’re sweeter than him. I mean, you are very much so. But you do scare me. You’re a soldier. You’re used to action. Ordering peoplearound—”
“Actually as a soldier, you get told what to do more than you tell people what todo.”
“Well, as a bossy type, I can see you doing those things. And yeah, that kind of makes me holdback.”
He didn’t say anything for a moment. Then, in the dark, Trent’s fervent eyes locked on mine. “I swear to you, Danika Anderson, that I would care for you when you’re sick. That I’d let you be fully you. Don’t you understand? I like you just the way you are. I like all your zany sayings and your hippie-girl style. I like how you’re like an elfin princess, doing your thing. I just want to watch you live.” He paused. “I’ll be your base, babe. I wanna see youfly.”
Heat spread from my heart to my fingertips and toes. No one on the planet made me feel better than Trent Milner. “Thanks,” I whispered, and snuggled into him and went tosleep.
