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I KNEW SOMETHING WAS off with that text e Just like I kneas in trouble when I woke up on that couch and Bax had been holdingto be treasured I never felt safe, never felt protected, even with Race into be an uphill battle But in that instant, while I was all wrapped up in hiain That’s why I bolted Sure, I didn’t knohat his ultienda withto think hea separate one for me It wasn’t sht without uy as fast as I could, yet every time I turned around, I seemed to end up closer and closer to him

It had taken every fiber of control I possessed not to return his text in the ed Brysen to that fightnetic and so hard to get a handle on, and after the violence of that fight, I knew he had vicious brutality floating close to the surface of his tattooed skin He was also losing way tooto let me take him to a hospital Instead he had shoved sostore and buy the basic first-aid stuff I would need to keep hirab a couple tubes of superglue I didn’t even want to knohat his plan for that was

By the tialow, his eyes were squeezed shut and deep lines of pain were radiating out from the corners of each eye His skin looked kind of waxy and pale,that black star prominent and so ominous where it throbbed at his teet the door open for hiasped when I saw the wet spread of blood that had soaked through the side of his hoodie

“Bax, that’s a lot of blood”

He just grunted at led his way to the front door

I had to reach around hiot lost in the endless darkness of his eyes as he looked down at ave his head a shake and started struggling out of the blood-soaked hoodie before I had the lights on The T-shirt he was using as a e was so saturated that all he could do was toss it in the trash on his way to the single bathrooot hi boy and could clearly take care of himself, Brysen only lived a minute away and I could be back, safe and sound with her in a heartbeat, but none of that felt like the right answer I argued with myself as I followed his half-naked form into the bathroo all over his taut skin and that knife cut on his side had just barely missed the naked pinup that covered his entire side His face had a steady strea fro split wide open He was a mess

“Sit down on the toilet and I’ll clean you up as best I can” I was no stranger to patching up Carhborhood Granted, this was on an entirely different level, and being that close to him made my skin feel like it was electrified

He looked at me emotionlessly in the mirror over the sink He looked like he had just come out of a war zone

“Are you scared of aze steadily in the glass “Terrified”

His chin dipped in a little nod of acknowledgment

“Do you trust aze He lifted a knuckle and rubbed at the blood so to bed with h my nose I wanted to look away but he wouldn’t let me “Probably”

He finally looked away and picked up a washcloth and slapped it on the cut

“I was hooking up with Roxie at the beginning of the week I’s withto play out By the tiood chance I’ll be dead or back in jail You still gonna go to bed with me?”

My heart did a weird flip andwhere I felt like I could actually feel it slon inwith hihed and reached around hi side His blood-caked skin ar his naked torso