Until Alex - J. Nathan Page 0,74

down, but my head flew up. Remy stood with the dead guy’s shotgun pointed at the man behind me. I hadn’t seen him yet. But his deep voice had me conjuring a hundred different monstrous images.

“Now why would your buddy go and put a bullet through your head?” Remy asked him, so calm, so cool, so devious.

Another loud blast crackled the air.

I dropped back down, my arms shielding my head. And even though Remy had fired the shotgun, my body shook like a thing unnatural.

“Twice.” Remy fired another shot, leaving no doubt my attacker was dead.

ALEX

The flow of rain outside provided a calming peace in my aunt’s otherwise silent living room. The pumpkin-scented candles I’d set out provided just enough light to study by. Most girls would’ve been afraid to be home alone during a late-night storm, especially with the thunder and lightning claiming their place in the sky and knocking out the electricity. But not me. I enjoyed the darkness and the solace created by the storm.

Soft tapping came from the front door. I snatched my cell from the end table and checked the time. Just after midnight. No wonder why I could barely keep my eyes opened. I grabbed a candle and stood from the sofa, feeling a little hesitant to approach the door, especially with my aunt away at my parents’ vineyard. But once I checked the peephole, my fears subsided.

I pulled open the door. Hayden stood drenched with his head hanging down.

“Hey,” I smiled, not having seen him since our heart to heart the previous night.

When he looked up with bloodshot eyes and damp flushed cheeks, the smile slipped from my face.

Tears?

Shit.

I placed the candle down on the small table beside the door and launched myself into him, wrapping my arms around his soaked body and tucking my head under his chin. “What’s wrong? Are you all right?”

He clutched his arms around my shoulders, gripping me as if he needed me for support. His entire body trembled. His choppy breaths caught in his throat.

Were his wet clothes causing the reaction or something else?

I moved us away from the doorway and into the living room, closing the door with my foot to separate us from the outside world. Since Hayden wouldn’t relinquish his grasp on me, I maneuvered us to the sofa. When the backs of my knees touched it, I eased us down and just held him. Feeling the tremors tearing through his body, I held him tighter.

After a long moment passed, I pulled back slightly so I could see his face. His distant tortured face. “Hayden?”

His usually gorgeous eyes stared blankly at me, like he wasn’t seeing me at all. Like everything except his body was somewhere else. His teeth chattered wildly. I cupped his frigid stubbly cheeks between my hands and searched his eyes for a sign of life behind the darkness. Sadly, the darkness prevailed. “I need to get you out of these wet clothes.”

The Hayden I’d come to know would’ve made some smartass comment, egging me on, calling my bluff. But that wasn’t the same Hayden seated with me. The one lost somewhere deep inside his own head. And I had no freaking clue how to reach him.

I tugged down the zipper on his sweatshirt and slipped the sleeves down his arms. His eyes followed my movements, but he didn’t stop me.

I discarded his soaked sweatshirt on the hardwood floor, and grasped the hem of his red T-shirt. I lifted it slowly, cautious of his broken ribs. He bore it like the pillar of strength he normally was, never even wincing. I wondered if his ribs had healed, or if the pain in his ribs paled in comparison to whatever troubled him.

I dropped his shirt onto the growing pile, noticing faint bruises covering both his sides. His eyes followed my hands as I gently trailed them over his naked chest. My fingertips skated over the deep ridges in his torso and abs, made more prominent by the flickering of the candles. It wasn’t at all how I imagined this experience happening. “Tell me where you’re hurt.”

His eyes locked on mine, but he didn’t speak. He reached his hand behind his head, wincing as he touched it. I ran my fingers under his in his dripping hair, finding the huge egg-shaped lump he’d indicated.

I jumped to my feet, retrieving an ice pack from my aunt’s freezer. I scooted in behind him and held the pack to his head. What wasn’t he telling me?