Dante (Hell's Ankhor #6) - Aiden Bates Page 0,91

Tru gripped my shoulder. “We’ll get through this.”

I nodded, but I wasn’t sure if I believed him. Even if we got through it, I’d never get Stella’s back. Not the way it was.

Tru pressed his lips together. “Is Heath gonna come back?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I just told him to go home.”

“Why?” Tru asked carefully.

My stomach turned slightly. It’d been the right thing to do, but now, standing behind the firetruck with the reality of what recovering would entail slowly becoming clear, regret itched at me.

“Fuck. I don’t know.” I sighed. “I just—I couldn’t let him see me like this. It was all just too much, and his presence made it too real. I need to apologize.”

“Don’t worry about that now,” Tru said. “Just call him. I’m sure he’ll understand. One thing at a time, okay?”

One thing at a time. Tru made it sound so easy. But there were a hell of a lot of things to do—and I couldn’t help but think I might have been wrong when I’d decided it’d be easier if Heath wasn’t around.

28

Heath

My alarm went off for the fourth—fifth?—time. I finally gave up on snoozing it and shut it off. This was supposed to be just a short afternoon nap, but I just couldn’t seem to get the energy to crawl out of bed.

It’d been a week since the fire. Six days since Dante had left me a short voicemail hours after I’d left—a brusque apology.

“I just need to take care of things here,” he’d said, his voice a low rumble through the speaker. “I’m sorry.”

I’d listened to it dozens of times if only to hear his voice again. But I still didn’t understand what he meant by it. What was he sorry for?

For pushing me away the morning of the fire? Or was that his way of saying goodbye?

I didn’t know what I’d do if that was the case. I hadn’t realized just how much I’d come to rely on Dante, his presence and his strength and his stupid humor and the way he believed in me so fiercely. I wanted—no, I needed—those moments where I could just lean on him for guidance. Those little reprieves where all I had to do was follow his instructions.

To have lost him so suddenly was a shock, and I craved his presence—his hands, his gaze, his warm voice.

But he apparently didn’t need me the same way. He’d made that clear when he sent me away. God, I wished he would’ve just talked to me. Was it that he didn’t think I could help him? That seemed most likely. But part of me couldn’t help but wonder—had he pushed me away because he didn’t think he should ask for my help?

In the ambulance he’d looked so different from the confident, handsome man I’d become so reliant on. He’d been pale, trembling, his eyes wide and bloodshot from the smoke. I’d never seen him like that—like he was the one who needed to be taken care of. But it didn’t intimidate me, or change the way I felt about him. I wanted to be there for him, the same way he’d been taken care of me. It didn’t make me love him any less.

Because I loved him—I knew it now with a surety that went down to my bones. And I wanted to help him. I didn’t want him to carry the weight alone.

But if that wasn’t the case—if he really did just want me out of his hair—that made a horrible sort of sense to me, too. Handling the aftermath of this fire was going to consume his life—and it was going to be fucking painful. Had he realized that being with me was going to take up too much of his time? Was I just a project that needed to be shelved so he could handle what really mattered?

I hated this—hated living in this nebulous purgatory, where I didn’t know if Dante needed me closer, or wanted me gone.

“Heath, are you still sleeping?” Raven rapped his knuckles on my door. “Seriously?”

“Ugh.” I pulled my bedspread up and over my head. “What do you want?”

“We’re coming in.”

“Who’s we?” I poked my head out just enough to see the door.

Raven shoved the door open and flopped immediately onto the foot of my bed. Logan and Jonah were behind him—Jonah dropped into my desk chair, and Logan leaned against the door with his arms crossed over his chest.

“They’re setting up for church downstairs,” Raven said. “You’re gonna be late.”

“I

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