The only reason I even noticed the watch that Shelby always wears is because of the number of times I’d seen her run her fingers over the inside band. It was like a nervous tick whenever she was upset or scared or nervous. She did it the night we first saw each other again in the stables, she did it a bunch of times the night of the charity dinner, she did it when she first let me have it in her studio that same night, the first time I touched her leg, when she told me she kept my dog tags, and the entire time her mother unloaded all of that bullshit on her.
I think about all the times I’ve kissed her, all the times I’ve touched her, all the times I’ve held her in my arms, all the times I was chained to a wall and had nothing but memories of all those times to keep me going. I remember how it felt to see her again when I never thought I would get the chance. I remember how good it felt when she let down her walls and let me back in. I remember how good it felt to build her back up again, make her stronger, make her a fighter, remind her what it was like to be happy and loved. I remember how good it felt to let her heal me, let her distract me, and let me remember how to live again. All of it was good, every single second, every single moment, it was all good because of her. Because she was there making it all better. It was always Shelby. Only Shelby.
“It wasn’t your fault. Just let me go,” Rylan tells me again.
“I don’t know how,” I whisper back.
“Yes you do. She’s right on the other side of that door. Tell her to take off the watch. Just let me go.”
My head drops as I close my eyes.
I think about her laugh, I think about her smell, I think about dancing with her in the studio. I think about how fucking afraid I am that I’m not good enough for her. That my screwed-up head will ruin everything.
“Just let me go.”
Rolling over onto my hands and knees, I push myself up and reach for the door, knowing I have to stop living in fear. Knowing I have to do this if I want any chance at a future with her.
I think about her smile, I think about that little gasp she makes when I kiss her, I think about the silky feel of her hair when I run my fingers through it, and I think about how nothing in my life makes sense when I’m not thinking about her.
“You don’t need me anymore.”
My hand wraps around the doorknob and I reach my other hand up to turn the lock, knowing he’s right. Knowing Shelby is all I need.
“I don’t need you anymore,” I whisper back to him.
“Just let me go, just let me go, just let me go…”
His voice trails off until there’s nothing but silence in the room as I open the door and step out into the hallway.
Chapter 33
Shelby
I rush up the steps to Eli’s house, feeling guilty that I left, even if it was just for fifteen minutes. At three o’clock in the morning, something jerked me awake from my bed on the floor outside his room. I could have sworn I’d heard Eli shout, but after sitting perfectly still and listening quietly for a few seconds and not hearing another sound, I realized I must have been dreaming.
With my butt feeling numb and a stiff neck from falling asleep in such a bad position, still sitting up with my head pressed against the door, I had been too on edge and too sore to go back to sleep. I quietly slipped on my shoes and let myself out of the house to take a walk around the block.
Letting myself back into the house, I turn and close the door as gently as possible, closing my eyes and leaning my forehead against it after I engage the deadbolt. I breathe slow and deep, trying to calm my thoughts and come up with a new plan. Reading the letters obviously didn’t work. I got through every last one of them before I passed out. Reading them again, out loud, made me feel every emotion I did the first time I read them. Sad that we’d been torn apart and heartbroken that it took so long for me to finally have them in my hands and know what he’d been feeling. But most of all, and more important than anything else—loved. So incredibly loved and cared for, even when he was thousands of miles away and had no idea if I was reading his words or would ever forgive him. That love swallowed up the feelings of sadness and hurt, it made butterflies flap in my stomach, it made me happy, and it made me smile.
I just wanted him to feel the same. I wanted him to hear those words he wrote to me so many years ago and feel the love. Remember it and let it consume his own sadness and heartbreak, but it didn’t. I’m out of my element and I don’t know what I’m doing. I have no other plan and I have no other ideas short of kicking down the door and dragging him out of that room.
With a defeated sigh, I pull my head back from the door and slowly turn. A short, terrified scream rips from my throat when I get all the way around and see Eli standing silently a foot away from me.
“Oh, my God. You scared the hell out of me,” I tell him in between rapid breaths, pressing my hand against my chest to slow my heart down.
Even while I’m trying to calm myself down from the surprise of seeing someone standing behind me and the shock that it’s Eli and he’s out of his room, I can’t stop looking at him. I haven’t seen his face in ten days and it’s the most beautiful sight I’ve ever seen. His eyes are red-rimmed and bloodshot, his cheeks and jaw are covered in stubble, and he’s still wearing the same clothes from when he left the hospital, but he’s still the best thing I’ve ever laid eyes on.
It’s impossible to believe I made it through six years without looking at his face when after only ten days I was climbing the walls and ready to kick down his door.
“Are you hungry?”
It’s the dumbest question in the world but the only thing I can come up with to say to him right now. I’ve told him I was sorry, I’ve asked him what he needed and what I could do, I’ve begged him to stay with me and pleaded with him to let me help him. I’ve already said everything I could that was important. All that’s left is something stupid and trivial.
“Take off your watch,” he tells me softly.
I’m momentarily thrown from hearing the sound of his voice again, so deep and raspy and like music to my ears, that I didn’t even hear the words he said.
“Huh?”
His eyes hold mine for a few minutes until he looks away and down.
“Take off your watch,” he repeats, just as softly.
I finally process what he’s saying and realize he’s looking down at my hand, which I hold pressed against my stomach to calm my nerves. I swallow nervously, the fingers of my right hand automatically going to my inside left wrist.
“What?” I ask again lamely, pretending like I didn’t hear him just to buy myself some time.
With his eyes still down at my wrist, he closes the distance between us until we’re toe to toe. I can feel the heat from his body and I shiver, realizing just how cold I’ve been lately without it.
I stare up at his face in a daze until I feel his hand wrap around my fingers. He pulls them away and I realize I was just toying with my watchband without being aware of I was doing it.