Pike (The Pawn Duet #1) - T.M. Frazier Page 0,79

ever see you the way I do. And because of this curse and this memory, I can’t ever unsee you.” She sniffles, yet it’s me who feels my chest tightening and my throat closing. She blinks and a tear spills down her cheek, traveling the same path as the stains of tears that came before it. “Even if I wanted to. Even if I try really hard. You’ll be here.” She presses my hand to her temple. “Reflecting a different kind of light than anyone else.”

“You don’t ever have to unsee me,” I tell her. “I’ll be right here. With you.”

I grab her wrist and press her palm against my chest so she can feel the beating of my heart. Her wet lashes flutter against her cheeks as she looks up at me with uncertainty in her eyes. I have no words of comfort to offer her. No words of encouragement or meaning. Nothing that can make her feel better because I have no idea what the future holds for either of us. I tug her into my chest and wrap my arms around her, resting my chin on the top of her head. She fits so perfectly against me, in this room, and in my life.

I lift her up and carry her back to bed, where I lay down with her on top of me, keeping her soft body pressed against mine as she sobs against my skin. Her tears spilling down the side of my chest in a warm stream of contagious poison that pricks at my eyes, threatening tears I never knew I was capable of producing.

She clutches at my chest, nails digging into my skin. I grit my teeth and take it because it’s the least I can do after she comforted me last night. After a few moments, she stills. The crying stops, and the rhythm of her breathing evens out and slows. She’s asleep.

My chest constricts, and it’s not because of Mickey’s weight. She’s not heavy enough to bruise, never mind crush my chest.

With my lips pressed into Mickey’s hair, I inhale the smell of her girly shampoo as her little exhales heat the skin at the crook of my neck. I watch over her head through the window as the rain comes down harder and harder. I squint and try to discern one raindrop from the next as it falls down in sheets, blurring the sky. Of course, I can’t do what she can. It all looks like water to me.

You’re not just water falling from the sky. You’re so unique and so special and no one will ever see you the way I do.

No one has ever said anything like that to me and more, I never would have cared if anyone said that to me before. But I care now and only because of her.

I might not be able to see one rain drop from the next, but I don’t need to tell the difference in the rain to feel a difference taking place in my heart. To be able to see special and unique in something others might otherwise look over as one of the masses.

She sees me, and I see her.

And right now, my own little rain drop is fast asleep on my chest. I can’t offer her anything other than a warm body. A chest to cry on. It’s all I have, and it’s hers for the taking.

The tears that had threatened to spill make their presence known and flow past my lips into Mickey’s hair. For her and her family and what they’ve gone through. For Gutter.

All I have to give her is me.

And I know it’s not enough.

After a while, I place her beside me and dress to finish making my plans that got interrupted when Gutter was murdered on my fucking doorstep. I check in on Mickey a few times throughout the day, and each time, she’s sleeping with new tear stains lining her cheeks and I can feel them as if her sadness and mine are one in the same.

When the day is over and the plans have been made, I trudge back to my apartment, ready to tell Mickey that I’m not going to risk her life and that I’ll help her get her revenge as if it’s my own, but this time, she isn’t crying or sleeping.

Mickey’s gone.

And so is my gun.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Mickey

“I thought you left me there to die,” I say angrily.

“I thought you were dead,” Darius replies just as enraged.

The