Jack wouldn’t even look me in the eye. He was angry. His turbulent emotion visible in his rigidness body language.

“Thanks,” he muttered to Dallas under his breath before taking my hand roughly into his and dragging back to where I had run from. His grip firm not painful.

The look of relief that had momentarily superseded his anger when he had arrived to his childhood home to confront me kept me from pulling free. I hurried to try to keep up with him.

He didn’t release me until we neared his car.

“Get in,” he ordered stiffly as he swung open the passenger door and held it.

I did as he instructed, grabbing the seatbelt with my shaking hands to secure it.

He got in and started the car before pulling into the street.

I held the seatbelt tightly unsure of how to handle this Jack. His jaw twitched. Tight and anxious, I focused on the road ahead.

He drove faster than usually, I held onto my seatbelt refusing to make a sound, bracing myself as he took a sharp corner. His anger radiated in the cramped space of Gus car.

A couple of times after stealing a look in his direction I had opened my mouth, intent on saying something but all words had evaporated and I had shut it.

Unsure of how to handle him I was relieved when we got back to his apartment and he shut the door.

I sat down on the sofa, waiting for him to say something. Anything. His silence was torture.

He leaned against the door and studied me for a few intense moments before pushing away from it to stand across from me. His eyes dark and stormy. I held my breath. He had never looked more intimidating or strikingly handsome.

“Why?”

His tight question hung in the air.

I took a breath steeling myself for the conversation.

“Did you really think it was a good idea?” My eyes held his. “Did you think it was going to be one …big..happy family reunion?”

He shrugged.

“It seems so simple. Just lunch. Let them see you’re still alive and kicking. Is that it? Give them hope that somehow I’m going to be the same daughter they nearly lost all those years ago. But we both know that girl died with Alice. She is never coming back.” I exhaled deep and emotionally. “Why give them hope when there isn’t any?”

He remained watchful and silent.

“Like when you say everything will be all right but it will never be.” Our eyes held.

“It’s cruel.” I straightened shifting my shoulders back slightly. “And then you sprung your parents on me as well. What were you trying to accomplish with that?”

I paused.

“You ambushed me.” I crossed my arms.

“So instead of talking and having an adult conversation, you climbed out a window and just disappeared?” He began to pace. “You ran away. Have you any idea what you put me through?”

My actions had felt so justified at the time but now looking back I saw them as irrational.

“I didn’t know how to deal with it so I did the only thing I know how to do. I ran.” My shoulders sagged. I hated how weak I felt.

It wasn’t like I was proud of my actions even if given the same situation I would make the same irrational choice.

He dropped his gaze from mine.

The thought of seeing his parents again physically was what had really sent me over the edge.

After everything that happened, all they had lost. I could not face them knowing how they really felt about me.

I trembled. “The way they look at me. They don’t see me. They see Alice, their dead daughter, and nothing is ever going to change that. I’ll always be a reminder of what they lost.”

His tense features began to ease.

“I can’t do it,” I whispered. My throat burned. I swallowed. “I don’t know why I survived and Alice didn’t. It kills me every time someone looks at me like that. The silent judging, even if they don’t mean to. It’s there.”

It was called survivors guilt. The guilt that I carried that I had survived when Alice hadn’t. And I had no idea why.

Not that knowing it would ease it. It probably wouldn’t.

“I miss Alice so much…but I have never looked at you that way,” he felt compelled to say when the silence dragged on.

“You’re about the only one,” I muttered softly.

“Today wasn’t easy.” His shoulders sagged. “But I’m just trying to keep you safe Had. You can’t go climbing out of windows and disappearing on me. Do you understand?”

I nodded slowly, fully understanding his motives.

“Something could have happened to you.”

He made it sound like the moment I was on my own I was unsafe. It only stoked the fear I had been trying to keep at bay. He was still out there somewhere, waiting for the right moment to finish what he failed to do three years ago.

“Do you really think he will come for me?” I asked the question softly, not sure I could handle his response.

“I don’t know but I can’t the chance. Besides you’re the only one who has survived an encounter with him.”

I frowned. “I can’t even remember anything.” I was useless in apprehending him.

“I can’t let anything happen to you.” His voice had an edge of pain.

I studied his features, hating that I had made him suffer, even a moment.

“I won’t do it again,” I assured him, intent of keep the promise I was making to him.

One moment of silence become two.

He studied me for a bit. “I’m probably lucky you didn’t run the first day.”

“I only run from situations that scare me,” I explained, softly.

“I don’t scare you?” he asked, offhandedly.

I shook my head as I swallowed, hating the vulnerability he made me feel. “I have always felt safe with you. Always.”

My chest still felt so raw from the emotional roller coaster I had been on earlier. I inhaled deeply.

“You’re my hero…” It was simply putting it into words what he had done for me. Simple words that carried the more complex

His eyes held mine.

“You were the light in the darkness.” I hated to think back to that night, the feeling of being so terrified I would not survive.

For my own survival I suppressed so much from that night. The only moments I would allow myself to feel was how he had me feel. Safe.

I swallowed. “You are the only person I feel I can let my guard down with.”

“Even when I let you down? Like I did today?”

I searched his features.

“I shouldn’t have put you in that situation to start off with,” he admitted heavily.

I wanted to soothe the hard lines in his face but I kept my hands tightly intertwined to stop myself from reaching to touch him. It was an impulse I don’t think I had ever experienced, it was disconcerting. I was out of my depth.

“You scared me today,” he said softly.

Was it because he truly cared about me or was it because I was a substitute for the sister he couldn’t save? I never voiced the question, not wanting to know the answer.

“I don’t have it in me to appease others Jack, no matter how heartless or selfish that makes me look.” I released a heavy sigh. “I’m just trying to survive, one day at a time. That’s all the matters.”

My words

I shrugged softly as he studied me. “I’m in survival mode Jack. I don’t know if I’m going to make it through the day and into the next.” I paused. “Some days I’m convinced it’s going to be my last and then by some miracle I make it to the next day. I don’t know how much longer I’ll be able to do it.”

There had been many times I had wanted to give up, yet I hadn’t.

His eyes held mine.

“God I’m such an asshole,” he muttered and strode over to engulf me in a tight hug.

Had it been anyone I would have shrunk away from the physical contact, but with him I seemed to crave it.

I let him sigh into my hair before I found myself awkwardly hugging him back. Closing my eyes as I rested my head against his shoulder.

He was my safety, my life line.