Southern Comfort (Southern 2)

I rub her back and then hold out a handkerchief for her. She puts it to her mouth and then looks up at me. Tears well in her eyes. “I hope it was okay.”

“It was perfect.” I take her face in mine. “You were perfect.” I take her in my arms, and she wraps her arms around my waist.

“Olivia.” I hear Agent Duchene call her name. “You got it.” He smiled at her.

“Get the wire off her,” I say. “My car is waiting and so is my plane.” He nods, and they take her into the room, and the lady comes over and unclips all the wires from her.

When we walk out of the room the detectives are there. “If we need anything, where can we reach you?”

“She’s going to be with me,” I tell them. “You can reach her through me or through David,” I tell them. “You have my number and his also.” I put my arm around her and turn her around to walk out of the prison. I don’t even bother looking back, and when we get into the car, she puts her head back and closes her eyes.

“Are you okay?” She opens her eyes and shakes her head.

“No.” She blinks away tears. “I’m not okay. Nothing about this and today was okay and that sucks.” I’m about to say something. “It started so well and then this.” She turns to look out of the window, and I don’t say anything else. I watch her, and when we get on the plane, she takes a bite of her food and then goes to lie down. I sit next to her while she lies down on the couch that they turned into a bed. I watch her the whole time, my own thoughts going all over the place and when the wheels touch down, I pick her up and carry her to the truck. She mumbles and wakes up for just a minute and looks around.

“Did we land?” she asks, and I push the hair away from her face.

“We did,” I say. “Rest.” She puts her head back and closes her eyes. I make my way to the house and when we get there, I see the lights are off and I know that Jacob and Kallie left this afternoon when they arrested Dominic’s guy. I pull up and as delicately as I can I take her out of the truck. She is dead to the world, everything that she went through the past couple of months finally came full circle today. I tuck her into the bed, after I take off her shoes. I undress myself and grab a bottle of water going to the bed. The whole night I don’t sleep, instead I watch her, making sure she is okay.

When the sun comes up, she stirs next to me and she blinks open her eyes. “What time is it?” she mumbles, stretching out beside me.

“Six,” I say, just watching her and taking in everything thing about her.

“I guess I was really tired.” She laughs and then looks over at me. Her eyes are lighter this morning.

“Are you hungry?” I get out of the bed now, afraid to touch her, knowing that one touch would not be enough, knowing that with her one touch is never enough.

“I am just a bit,” she says, watching me grab a T-shirt and put it on. “Do you have to get going?”

“I have an appointment with Beau in an hour,” I say, avoiding her eyes. “I’ll go start the coffee.” Turning to walk out of the room my chest is so tight, it’s surprising I can breathe. I start the coffee and stand here, watching it drip. My head is telling me that it’s better this way, my heart yearning to go back into the room and declare my love for her.

The soft knock on the back door makes me look up, and I see Kallie standing there with Jacob behind her. I walk over, unlocking it, and the door opens.

“Hey,” Kallie says to me. “Is she up?” She looks over at the hallway, and I nod my head. She starts to walk down to the spare room, but I stop her.

“She’s in my bed,” I say, and when she turns to say something, I put my hand up, and she must see something else because she doesn’t say a word. She says nothing. All she does is turn and walk to my bedroom.

I wait until she is out of sight before I turn to Jacob, and he just looks at me. “Did you get the news?”

“I did,” he says. “I got a call from the detective early this morning. He was hanging in his cell.”

I shake my head. I want to say I’m surprised, but nothing about Dominic surprises me especially the way he took the coward’s way out. “Derek sent me an email at three forty-seven. He was revived on the scene but died on the way to the hospital.” I shake my head. “Fucking coward.”