A feeling of dread began to settle over me when I saw light peeking in around the curtains. The sun was coming up and Caleb still hadn’t returned. I wondered if Celia might come back, but I doubted it. Our bridge was well and truly burned. My only solace was in knowing she would keep Felipe from hurting me.
Suddenly, there was a hard thump on the door, then another. My heart felt like it had leapt up into my throat, but then I remembered Caleb had said he would knock twice. I reached for the gun, just in case.
I watched as the handle turned and when the door swung open I could barely process what I saw. Caleb stood in the doorway. He was covered in dirt. He was smeared with blood.
“Caleb?” I managed to whisper, but still couldn’t move.
He wouldn’t move from the doorway. He just stood there, his eyes fixed on some distant point. He looked like he’d been crying. His blue eyes were ringed with red and swollen. He had a cut on his forehead and blood dripped onto his eye. He didn’t blink.
Instantly, I was in tears. Something terrible had happened. Something awful! Slowly, I stood up. I grabbed the shirt Caleb had left and pulled it on over my head. We had to go and it was going to be up to me to get us out. I scrambled for a pair of pants and found a pair of Caleb’s boxers instead.
Caleb never moved.
“Caleb?” I whispered and came a little closer. His mouth turned down briefly, like he’d been about to cry, but then his face returned to a catatonic state. “You’re scaring me, Caleb. Please, say something,” I sobbed.
Tears fell from his open eyes.
It was more than I could bear to see him in so much pain and not know why. I rushed forward and wrapped my arms around him. “Please, Caleb! Wake the fuck up!”
His weight collapsed on top of me and we fell. As I lay flat on my back, Caleb pulled me close and released an agonized wail into my chest. The sound terrified me and I wrapped my arms around him, holding him as tight as he held me. It was all I could do. His entire body trembled and shook with the force of his gut wrenching sobs. I felt like a knife was buried in my intestines and someone kept turning the blade. The only thing I could do to keep from screaming was hold him.
My hand shook as I stroked his hair, “Shh, Caleb. Shh. It’s okay. Whatever it is, it’s okay.” I sobbed when he pulled me tighter and tried to bury himself deeper into my chest.
His hair was stiff and brittle – gritty with sand.
He’s been digging. He’s covered in blood.
“Shh, baby,” I whispered and kept stroking Caleb’s hair. He was barely allowing me to breathe, he gripped me so tightly. “Whose blood is this?”
I felt him shaking his head, fast, angry. He accidentally nudged my chin and I winced. “Okay. It’s okay. I don’t need to know.”
I was at a loss for how to reach him. The man in my arms wasn’t Caleb, he was a shell of a human being. Primal and stripped bare. I had my suspicions about whose blood Caleb wore, but I didn’t dare say it out loud.
He killed his only friend. For me.
My chest shook with the force of the sobs I kept trapped in my chest. Caleb needed me and I couldn’t help him by falling apart. “We have to go, Caleb,” I whispered. “It’s not safe for us here.”
Caleb moved fast. He lifted himself off my chest and caged me in with his body. He looked predatory and I knew instinctively, not to scream. His eyes raked over me, moving quickly from my eyes, to my mouth, to my neck, all the way down to my feet. I wasn’t sure he even knew who I was.
My fingers hurt after being ripped away from his hair so abruptly. There were several strands intertwined with my fingers. Without moving, I let my eyes cut to my hand. Caleb followed my eyes and when I slowly lifted my hand, he watched it intently. I put my fingers to the wound on his head, wiping away the blood. He needed stitches. Caleb closed his eyes and let me touch him.
“We have to go. Please…let’s go,” I repeated. Caleb’s eyes flew open and narrowed on my face. For several seconds all he did was stare.
“Mine,” he whispered.
“Yours,” I said.
Caleb brought his mouth down on mine with such ferocity I almost pushed him away. The timing was terrible. Our lives were in danger. But Caleb needed me. He needed to be close and I owed it to him to give him what he needed.
I put my fear aside and opened my mouth to him, letting his tongue invade my mouth. He groaned when I wrapped my arms around him and pulled him down on top of me. I pulled at the filth covered shirt he wore and broke our kiss just long enough to pull it over his head. Sand and, I was sure, blood, fell onto my face, but I brushed in away with the back of my hand and went back to kissing Caleb.
His hands seemed to be everywhere at once, touching my hair, pulling me close, squeezing my breasts. His knee planted itself between my knees, prying them apart. I opened my legs and let Caleb’s lower belly press against me. I could feel his cock, trapped inside his jeans, against my inner thigh.