When Hunter showed up hours later, I was still awake in bed, reflecting on Abram, and then asshole Miles. It didn’t surprise me how quickly I fell into normalcy, like meeting Abram was nothing but a passing occurrence.
What the fuck was wrong with me?
I watched Hunter in the dark as he came through the door, kicking off his boots and heading straight for the bathroom. The light went on and I turned in time to see the back of him.
He wasn’t wearing his jacket, just a black hoodie, and it was covered in dried mud. The door closed and I heard his slow movements as he undressed quietly. I quickly remembered how filthy Miles looked and immediately wondered what the hell these men had been up to tonight. Too curious to ignore it, I slipped out of bed and tapped on the door gently. “Hunt?”
When he didn’t answer, I opened the door slowly. His clothes lay on the floor, a sopping muddy mess, and Hunt was sitting naked on the lid of the toilet seat, running his fingers through his dishevelled, dirty hair. He peered down at the floor, breathing quietly as I approached him tentatively.
“Are you okay?” I asked carefully.
He looked up at me. His face was covered in mud, his dark eyes sad, his lips turned down. “Sometimes I think we should just fuck back off to that cabin,” he said. “Anything—I’d do anything to get away from having to see some shit, Skye—” Suddenly his shoulders shook, and he buried his face in his hands, breathing raggedly into them.
Startled, I quickly wrapped my arms around him, shaken to the core. “What happened?” I whispered. “Hunt?”
He wrapped his arms around me, burying his face into my stomach. “I just want to run away with you—”
“I’ll go anywhere with you.”
“Or go back. I’d go back to us throwing rocks in the ocean, Skye. Just you and me. We were still innocent, weren’t we? I was still good, wasn’t I?” He pulled away to look up at me, those broken eyes disarming me.
I nodded, fighting back tears. “You were good. We were innocent.”
“It was just us.”
“Yeah.”
“Us, Skye.”
I caught his meaning, and I nodded slowly, that lump in my throat growing bigger.
“Do you think…” He paused to suck a breath in, steadying his voice. “Do you think it’ll ever be like that again?”
I climbed into his lap, brushing the tears from his face. I kissed him all over the face, uncaring of the mud and filth. “Yes, I do.”
He held me tightly, and I knew—I knew I was bringing him back down again. That Roy was right. I was Hunter’s anchor, and it frightened me to think I might not be around when he fell apart.
I wanted to ask him what happened, but it didn’t seem right in the moment to prod. I didn’t want him to relive whatever he had seen while holding me. Like Roy had said, I was his safe place, and I wouldn’t be all that safe if I was drudging it up.
“Let’s get you cleaned up,” I said next, understanding my role now as I took his hand and led him into the shower stall.
Hunter needed someone to aid him, keep him whole, offer light when he was drowning in the darkness.
I took that role with startling ease, further entrenching myself in his world.