“Ridiculous,” he mumbled.
I stood up and moved toward him then, stepping around the small campfire that had burned out; my hands were clenched into fists at my sides.
Atticus stood firm, his features hard.
“There’s still good in those people,” I argued. “You’re right—they could’ve slit our throats while we slept; they could’ve taken everything we have; they could’ve done a lot of things.” I closed most of the space between us, looking up at him as he towered over me.
Then I sighed, abandoning my argument, and changing the topic to the deeper-rooted matter.
“Why are you so angry, Atticus?” My voice was soft and concerned now.
He blinked, but offered no response.
“I’ve seen men fight before,” I went on, “but I’ve never seen a man as angry at the world as you are. The way you beat that man in your room”—I shook my head with despondency—“the one just now; Atticus, you’re just so full of rage and hate. Why?”
He snorted, as if he’d found my question ridiculous.
“Why?” he mocked incredulously, holding out his hands, palms up. “I’ll tell you why, Thais: at every turn, someone wants to rob or maim or kill us; we can’t sleep, night or day, without the thought in our heads as we close our fucking eyes that we might not wake up.” He gestured his arms wildly, his features constricted with indignation. “We’re covering our shit up like animals, sleeping in ditches, watching over our shoulder every second of every day for the chaos to grab us by the ankles and pull us down with it—and you ask why?”
I sat against my quilt, unable to stand to hear this truth. And as if his movements depended on mine, Atticus fell into a crouch in front of me, bouncing on the toes of his boots. I never looked away from the pull of his gaze, trapped by the intensity of it.
“I haven’t slept since you arrived in Lexington City,” he went on. “When I saw you that day, clutching your sister as she was ripped away from you; when you lay on the sidewalk, begging me to help you—it did two things to me, Thais”—he held up two fingers, and then dropped them between his legs—“it fucking killed me; the things I had to do, the part I had to play in not only your fate, but the fate of every girl in those ropes—it fucking killed me! It killed what little was left of my humanity!” His voice had risen with his heated words, his memories, but then he calmed himself, lowering his head but for a moment.
I remained motionless, speechless, but my heart ached and filled up simultaneously. I listened raptly to every word, my heart breaking as he spoke them.
“It killed me,” he repeated. “But then something reached into Hell, grabbed me by the throat and pulled me back. I died that day in the street, Thais Fenwick; I died and then there I was, looking down at you with the eyes of the man I used to be, and I wanted to help you. I still fought with myself after that, but I wasn’t going to let you die or be raped or forced to marry a man you didn’t love—I didn’t know what to do, but I was going to do something, goddammit.”
I sighed. I wanted to hold him, but all I could do was sigh.
ATTICUS
A knot moved down the center of my throat; my gaze veered to capture the dark trees behind Thais, rather than the gentle beauty of her face.
“If it’s the last thing I do,” I said, “I will get you to a safe place, and I don’t care how many men—or women—I have to kill or beat like the fucking scum of the earth they are, to make that happen.”
I rose into a stand.
“Yes, I’m angry,” I said at last, looking down at the top of her head, “and yes, my anger burns deep in my blood like a raging infection, but I won’t let it happen to you, not like…” I broke off as I thought of my sisters and my mother.
I couldn’t finish.
“Are you afraid of me?” I asked her instead.
When she didn’t answer right away, I sank to my knees in front of her again.
“Thais, I do the things I do to protect you,” I said, and she looked right at me, unflinching. “I…I’m sorry”—I lowered my head—“I know I’m the worst at expressing myself, but I would never hurt you.” I reached out carefully, in case she might retreat from me, and I fitted my hands around her upper arms. “I’d never raise a hand to you, not even out of anger—you have to believe that.”
“I’m not afraid of you,” she said, her words composed, her voice level. “I’m not afraid of you, Atticus, but sometimes I’m afraid for you.”
She reached out a hand and touched my prickly face under her smooth fingertips.
“Whatever that guilt is you feel,” she continued, “whatever your regrets—for the things you couldn’t change, the things you had no control over—you need to let it go.” Her fingers fell away from my face; the feeling they left behind made me ache inside as if I’d just lost a friend.
“And just like you want me to trust you when it comes to my safety, I need you to trust me when it comes to telling apart the good from the bad—I couldn’t live with myself if I let those people starve, and you need to understand that. It’s all I ask.”
How was it true there were any good people left in the world at all? But how was it possible there was good left as pure as it was in the one who sat right in front of me? In front of me, of all people. To combat the urge to get choked up over the revelation, I nodded and forced it out of my mind.
“Okay,” I agreed.
“Promise me,” she said, and a soft smile appeared in her eyes, “that you’ll ask me from now on before you start swinging.”
I snorted.
“You’re kidding, right?”
“Do I look like I’m kidding?”
She may not have looked like she was kidding, but I still had a difficult time taking her seriously—her smile had a lot to do with it.
I fell onto my bottom, then drew my knees up, resting my arms atop them at the wrists. “Now,” I said, “there has to be some compromise in there somewhere. If someone attacks us first, I’m not going to stop and ask for your permission to retaliate—not gonna happen.”
THAIS
“That sounds fair,” I agreed with a nod.
He smiled, and although it was a simple smile that just barely tugged the corners of his mouth, I was beguiled by it; his blue eyes enriched the color of his rugged face behind all the dirt and tiny growing hairs. His lips, I thought, I rather liked to look at them.
After a moment, I glanced down shyly at my hands in my lap, felt a sea of timidity in my stomach.
“Is something wrong?” he asked.
I looked up slowly, but it was becoming more difficult to face him. I shook my head and took a deep breath.
“There’s something else I…want to ask of you.” I could hardly get the words out; I almost changed my mind. Almost. I will not be afraid. I will not be afraid.