Hannah

I’m not naked but feel bare. Pulling the covers up to my neck, I can’t cover up enough not to feel exposed. Like I see the real Jet Crow, he sees the real me. Alcohol reveals my fears and weakens my strength, but when I feel vulnerable, I don’t mind feeling it with him.

The bedroom door opens, and he says, “I checked on Alfie. He’s still sound asleep.”

“I envy his ability to fall asleep so fast.”

Coming to the side of the bed, Jet flops down next to me. “I’m so tired.”

Looking over at me, he squints his eyes. “You know what I think, Hannah?”

Rolling to my side to face him, I say, “I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”

He laughs, and I love the sound, always finding comfort in his happiness. He says, “I think you’re hiding under all these covers.”

“From what?”

“Me. The conversation we started out there.” He tugs the covers down just enough to expose my shoulder. “The future.”

“That’s a lot of hiding.”

“Sure is, but I don’t want you to hide.” Reaching out, he opens his arms to me, offering himself. I move into the crook of his arm, a place that feels as if he were made for me.

Draping my arm over his middle, I snuggle close, safe in his arms. “Everything you tell me, you mean, don’t you?”

“I do.” The tips of his callused fingers scrape against my upper arm, causing goose bumps to form in their wake. “You don’t trust easily. What happened?”

“I think we’ve had enough heavy tonight, don’t you?” I close my eyes, hoping to hide some more.

“I think our heads are swimming with stories and pain, happiness and fears. I think if you really want to know that, you should talk about what happened because I don’t think you have yet. I think whatever you went through, you’ve tucked deep inside, so tightly bound that when someone gets too close you explode.”

He’s too close. I want to pull away. I want to hide again. I don’t want to talk to him about it . . . but I’ll lose him if I don’t. I’ll scare him away because I’m scared to share. Screw it. “I’m not special, Jet. If I tell you all my secrets, you’ll realize how not special I am, and you’ll have no reason to stay.”

“It’s not your secrets that keep me here.” He sits up and hovers over me. Looking right into my eyes, he says, “It’s your secrets that are pushing me away.”

The way his palm cups my cheeks—possessive but tender—matches his eyes and how they’re set on mine. I’m tempted to open up, but I still struggle. “If I say it out loud, I have to relive it.”

“If you tell your darkest secrets, you release them from your soul.”

“My story is not extraordinary.” I wiggle, trying to find the comfort I felt when I climbed into bed, but I can’t. Suddenly, the sheets are too itchy, the pillow is too lumpy, and his dark eyes too intense. I was cold when I came into the bedroom, but now I’m sweating.

I push him away, needing air, needing a reprieve. My breath comes out harsh, and my throat is dry. The window. I need fresh air. It’s too stifling in here. Too hot. Too damaging to my protective walls. Brick by brick, I built them up. Each day, I laid a new brick on top of a cracked foundation in hopes of making myself stronger.

Jet’s right. I’m not making myself stronger. I’m hiding from the rest of the world, hoping to protect myself from the pain that was trapped inside all along.

It was only a matter of time before my walls came tumbling down. Leave it to this dark-haired knight to destroy them in an effort to save me from myself.

I climb out of bed and open the window. Jet is watching me, taking me in, but not in the way I like. He’s analyzing me, watching me fall apart.

Because I have nothing left to hide, I stand in my panties ready to give him the rest of me. I take a deep breath, ready to give him this last part of me, not because I’m strong, but because I’m tired of being weak.

Holding up the pack of cigarettes on the windowsill, I whisper, “Will you smoke?”

The beauty of Jet Crow is more than skin-deep. He doesn’t ask me why, though I know it’s a strange request I’ve made of him. He just comes to the window, stands next to me, tugs his T-shirt over his head, and then pulls it over mine. I slip my arms through the sleeves and let the shirt swallow me, finding safety in the way it engulfs me.

How did he know? How does he know I need his comfort? Covering me, protecting me with the shirt off his back.

He takes off his jeans and toes off his socks until he’s standing in his boxers. Sitting down in the chair by the window, he pulls the pane back down but leaves it cracked open. A cigarette is pulled from the pack and lit while his eyes stay on mine. Exhaling, he takes my hand and pulls me to his lap.

“Talk to me, Hannah.”

“I fell in love with the boy across the street.”

His chest rumbles with a growl. “He’s a fucker.”

He’s right. He fucked me and then tossed me away when he found someone else to fuck. “We went to prom together, lost our virginity to each other, and when he landed his first tour, I left college to follow him. I thought we were in love. I thought we were forever.”

Somehow, my breath doesn’t feel as heavy in my chest. I angle around so I can see him, so I can watch him smoke one last time since he’ll want no part of me tomorrow. “We lasted seven cities. Seven. After four years of dating, we lasted less than three weeks on the road.”

“What happened?”

“He hi—” I stop cold in the tracks of where I was headed. Jet would never hit me like my ex, but what if . . . what if he blames me as my father did. Looking into Jet’s soulful eyes, I don’t believe he would. Maybe these things come out in time, releasing them bit by bit so they don’t drag me down with them.

I know one thing for sure. I don’t want this to be the last cigarette I see him smoke. Health wise, yes, but I don’t want this to be the end of us. I don’t want him to realize I’m too much trouble. I like Jet too much for us to end whatever this is between us.

“He what, Hannah?”

Next time, maybe I’ll be ready to tell him the uglier parts. “At first, he cheated. Not shocking. I found him fucking a groupie in Oklahoma City.”

“And that’s when he hit you?”

“Can we not talk about that part tonight? Please.”

He nods.

Shame for letting myself down coats my stomach. Now I have to confess how weak I was to Jet. Will he see me as weak now too? I hope not. I have to trust him. “I let him convince me I was the problem, that I drove him to cheat.” I watch him smoke; a sad distraction I needed so he wouldn’t focus on me.

He sighs. “So he threw stones in a bad attempt to break you. He’s an asshole. You realize that, right?”

“I realized two tour stops later in Dallas that it wasn’t just groupies I needed to watch out for. He was having sex with Dave’s girlfriend the entire tour. She confessed to Dave who confronted Hunter. But Hunter didn’t take it well, and he didn’t take his anger out on Dave, he took it out on me.”

“I want to fucking kill him,” he mumbles. His body is tense, though his arms still hold me loosely. “He’s a complete asshole, Hannah. How he disrespected you . . . used you . . . hurt you . . . Fuck, it makes me so angry.”

I like that it makes him mad to hear how I was hurt. I like that he looks at me like he believes me. I like this . . . this sharing stuff. He doesn’t need to hear the other side. He just needs to hear my side of the story. He has my back.

But there’s so much more I like about him. I like how even when Jet shaves, he’s got stubble by the time night rolls around. I like the hair on his chest—not thick but dark and masculine. I like how small I feel in his arms, but he makes me feel worthy and confident, not a shrinking violet. I can tell him how I truly feel without judgment. “He finally broke me.”

“No, he didn’t, Hannah. You’re right here, all in one piece. He didn’t win. You did. You got out. You’re the hero of your own story, and you didn’t even know it.”

“I’m at the mercy of my own pen.”

“You’re not a character in your story, but the author that creates your life. You’re not at the mercy of your pen, but the one who decides how it all plays out.”

“How does this story end?”

“You write the ending to your fairy tale.”

“You should write music,” I tease, feeling better in his arms while taking in his emotional wisdom.

That makes him smile. As the cigarette burns out, the hate I’ve carried inside me for so long lightens, but the shame that burdens my soul remains. “He let me leave. After all those years together, he let me walk away, and he’s never looked back.”

Jet’s arms hold me a little tighter as if he can tell I want to run away. “He didn’t fight for me. To him, to everyone, I’m not worthy of keeping.”

My body is maneuvered to face him when he sits straight up. His eyes are firm on mine when he says, “You were never meant to be kept. You were meant to be free until you found something more, something worth staying for.”

Running my fingers over his chest, I ask, “Are you my more?”

“I’m whatever you need me to be, but you have to promise to always be honest with me.” Honesty. I haven’t seen a lot of that from my family, but it is what I’ve craved the most.

“Such a simple request in exchange for so much. Why are you so good to me?”

“Because what we have between these four walls is more than I’ve had in years. Selfishly, I hope it can go beyond this bedroom. I just need you to trust me. I’m not him. Although you might think I sleep with different women all the time, I don’t. You were my wild night, a wild thing that I gave into. You were the wildflower demanding to be seen. And then you were gone.”

“I’m here,” I say, leaning my forehead to his. “I’m here. I’m here as long as you want me.”

“I don’t want you to stay for me. I want you to stay for you.” Pushing my hair back from my face, he holds my head in his hands and looks at me. My lips. My nose. My forehead. My freckles. My chin. My eyes that can’t lie to him ever again. Satisfied with what he finds, he smiles and it’s just for me. “If you stay, I won’t hurt you, wildflower.”

Wildflower.

I hate it.

As he said, they’re weeds, but it fits me better than a flower more pristine.

With a quirk of my lips, I ask, “So what you’re saying is that you want me?”

“Finally. You see the light.”

“It wasn’t the light that drew me to you.” I kiss the edge of his mouth.

“What drew you to me, baby?”

“Do you have all night?”

His smile broadens, and I kiss the gentle lines beside his eyes. “And all day.”

I laugh. God, it feels good to feel good again. He’s done that for me. He’s taken my heat, my ire, and turned it into embers. I feel lighter. “The way you hold the microphone when you sing and there is no music. Just your voice haunting me. When you play your guitar, you don’t think about the notes, only the melody. That’s how you treat me. As if I’m a song, you hear me. Listening to make sure I’m on key.”

“You should write music,” he whispers, not teasing.

“Careful or I might fall in love.”

He dips me into his arms, and I’m reliant on his strength. This predicament is not lost on me. With my head resting firmly in his hand and my body tilted to the side, he leans over me and says, “There’s no being careful when it comes to love. You’re either willing to fall in the moment or the opportunity passes you by. What will you do, wildflower?”

With my arms secured around his neck, I ask, “Will you fall with me?”

“I’ve already fallen. I’m just waiting to catch you.”

I pull him to me, wanting all this man as much as he wants me. We kiss, exchanging our hearts and uniting our souls. I’ve been burned before, but something tells me he’s a risk worth taking. Something tells me that he will catch me when I fall. Knowing he’s already there . . . He thinks I’m worth catching . . . “I love you, Jet.”

“I love you, too, baby.”