Page 93 of Resist
“Text if you need anything.” Jagger is collecting all of the empty beer bottles while Archer has both pizza boxes in his hand.
I don’t answer. Instead, I carry my wife into the bedroom and place her on unsteady feet. “Hold on to me.” She grips my shirt with her right hand while I cradle her face.
“I’m going to get you undressed and into dry clothes, okay?”
She nods, and I get to work, peeling off her sweater, t-shirt, and sodden bra. Yoga pants are sticky enough without being wet. It’s like wrestling an octopus in Jell-O trying to get those things off.
Eventually, I towel her off and wrap her in it while I dig in my drawers for something warm for her to wear.
When she’s wearing sweats and an oversized tee, I pull open the quilt and haul her into bed with me. I sit her between my legs and pull up the blankets before curling my arms around her.
We sit like that for a long time. So long, in fact, she cries herself to sleep, then I fall asleep as well. Her quiet, body-shaking sobs wake me up, and I burrow my lips into her hair to kiss her head. “It’s okay. I’ve got you.”
She nods through her tears, but still says nothing.
That’s how we remain through most of the night. She still doesn’t talk, but she cries. A lot, and my heart breaks with each wave of grief that hits her.
I hold fast to her, still and strong, letting her work throughher emotions and being her silent support for as long as she needs me.
Golden threads of dawn tease through the cracks in my curtains. Her body rises and falls with measured breaths as she makes snuffly little snoring sounds in my arms. She looks peaceful, serene, and part of me wants her to keep sleeping so she doesn’t wake up and remember the horrors that made her cry all night.
“I feel you staring, Sterling.”
I chuckle. “You’re easy to stare at, Corabelle.” I brush my lips against her hair. I don’t want to overstep the line, but I also need her to feel my affection.
“Sleep okay?”
She arches a brow like she doesn’t want to out rightly call me an idiot. She’s slept at an angle, in my arms, while periodically crying herself in and out of sleep. “I’m sorry for my meltdown.” She frowns. “Meltdowns. I’m sorry for my nervous breakdown. I didn’t mean... I don’t know...”
She shakes her head as though she’s trying to unstick the words in her brain. “I didn’t come here to cry at you, it just happened.”
I grip her tighter against me. “Don’t apologize. Not for that. I’m here. I can’t imagine what you’re going through right now, but I’m here.”
She sighs, relaxing against my chest as her body sags. “I’m angry at you.”
“That’s valid.” My thumb starts sweeping circles on her arm under the edge of my t-shirt. “I deserve your anger.”
She yawns. “You wanted to destroy me.”
I shake my head, kissing her temple as I do. “I wanted to destroy your father. When I met you, I was intent on destroying your company. Then I fell in love with you, and the last thing I wanted to do was hurt you in any way.”
There’s a pregnant pause between us as the words sink in, and her eyes widen.
“But my father hurt your mom, and you wanted revenge.” She skips over the ‘I love you’ part and gets straight to the meat of the issue.
My eyes sting with unshed tears. “I did. I know that makes me a bad person. I married you under falser pretenses than I told you up front. I hate that I lied to you, that I kept that part of the truth from you. But I wasn’t...” I blow out a puff of air.
I’m not keeping the full truth from her any longer. “I wasn’t sure if you were part of his cover up at first. I wasn’t sure if you were friend or foe. I didn’t know you.”
She’s quiet again, for so long I think she’s maybe dozed off again but she sweeps at her cheek and my heart cinches tighter, threatening to crumble under the pressure.
“I’d never protect a man like that, not even if he’s my father.”
I nod. “I know that now.”
She pulls the blanket up under her chin, covering herself. She’s not cold, but maybe she needs the extra protection from the words lingering in the air between us. “I hate him. I hate what he did to those women, to your mom. I yelled at him pretty good yesterday.”
She bolts up in the bed, cracking my chin with the crown of her head as she does. “I need to tell the girls I’m okay. They know I’m here, I told them that much.”