Savage Hearts

I almost wasn’t.

I don’t know how long I walked before I finally stopped and turned around, only that it was near morning and I had to take a cab back to the hotel because I was so lost. But as soon as I sat my ass down on this couch, I knew it was the right choice. My hurt and pain don’t matter. There will be time to mourn the death of what Sam and I had later after I make sure she doesn’t spend the rest of her life in prison.

I finish my coffee and sit staring at the peeling paint on the wall behind the lobby desk. The clerk lost interest in me an hour ago and is busy shuffling papers and typing numbers into a calculator with a printer attachment, the kind that makes a chugging sound every time he hits enter. The sound is oddly meditative, and by the time I hear familiar footsteps on the stairs, I’m as close to a Zen state as I’m ever going to achieve while I’m in the same room as Sam.

Leaning back against the mildewing cushions, I watch her descend the cracked marble stairs, by far the nicest feature of this run-down hotel. In a pair of khaki shorts and a white tank top, with her hair pulled back in a braid, she shouldn’t take my breath away, but she does.

She’s as beautiful as ever, more beautiful in some ways. She’s always been strong, but now she’s ripped, with toned arms and chiseled legs that leave no doubt she’s a force to be reckoned with. And the way she holds herself, with her muscled shoulders rolled back and her chin up, is the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen.

My girl is beautiful and strong and determined not to take any more shit from the world.

She will always be my girl.

I will always love her, even if her love for me is one of the things she’s had to burn away in order to rise from the ashes of what those animals did to her.

She shifts her gaze as she descends the stairs, not looking surprised when she spots me on the couch. She hesitates on the last step for a moment before stepping down and starting my way, but she doesn’t flinch or frown.

When she stops in front of me her face is smooth and expressionless and her eyes as empty as they were last night, bulbs with burned out filaments incapable of flickering to life.

“You shouldn’t be here,” she said. “You should go.”

“I’m here for the same reason you are.” I keep my voice soft and even, despite the way my heart is racing. “We’ll be better off if we work together.”

Sam shakes her head. “I don’t need or want your help.”

“You may not want it, but you need it.” I stand, looking down into her tanned face, gut churning harder as I fight the urge to reach out and touch her. It feels so wrong to be so close but still held at a distance. “I’ve been following you since you got here. I can guess what your plan is and it’s not going to work.”

“It’s going to work just fine,” she says with calm assurance. “I know what I’m doing. I’m not the person I was before. I know how to handle myself.”

“I don’t doubt it, but we can find a better way. You don’t have to put yourself at risk. We can get the job done and still be free to walk away.”

She tilts her chin to one side as her eyebrows pinch closer together. “What do you want?”

“The same thing you want,” I say, then add in a whisper, “And I want to make sure you don’t get killed or sent to prison for the rest of your life doing it. I swear I’m not here to make any demands. I just want to help.”

Her frown deepens as she casts a glance over her shoulder at the clerk, whose calculator is still clicking and whirring, before turning back to me. “We can’t talk about this here. I was heading out of town for the day. You can come if you want.”

I nod and my shoulders relax a little for the first time since she pulled the curtain last night. “All right.”

“But I’m not making any promises,” she warns, hitching her backpack higher on her shoulder. “And after we’ve talked, if I ask you to leave again, I need you to listen and do as I ask.”

I hesitate, but finally nod again.

I’m not leaving until I know she’s safe, no matter what she says, but there’s no sense in having that fight right now. I learned to choose my battles when we were a couple and I sense that’s an even more important skill now that we’re…whatever we are now.