Total pages in book: 139
Estimated words: 128488 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 642(@200wpm)___ 514(@250wpm)___ 428(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 128488 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 642(@200wpm)___ 514(@250wpm)___ 428(@300wpm)
“Of course,” she said.
Evan turned on the shower, and they both dropped their towels. She supposed it was odd that they weren’t embarrassed by their nudity, but in some ways, she felt that she’d spent the last however long with him, completely stripped bare. What was naked flesh when a person had seen your soul?
They’d had sex, and yet it almost hadn’t been sexual, in a way she was too cloudy headed and close up to make sense of. Maybe later she’d be able to articulate the meaning of it, but now she neither wanted nor needed to.
They stepped beneath the hot spray, and Noelle used the bar of soap to wash his body. She poured a generous amount of shampoo into her hands and scrubbed his hair and the beard that had grown on his face, and then she repeated the process.
When she was done, she washed herself again, including her hair this time. A few hours ago, she’d wanted a shower more than anything in the world, but she had been too exhausted to do more than the minimum. Now she was thorough about it, leisurely.
She turned, and wordlessly Evan used his good hand to lather the entirety of her back. “I’m sorry,” he murmured as he rubbed the soap in circles on her skin. “I’m so damn sorry.”
She hung her head and closed her eyes. She knew what he was apologizing for, and she supposed she felt the same, or she should. Their sex had been necessary, but in some way, they’d used each other. They’d used each other’s bodies to relieve their pain. She wouldn’t take it back, and she didn’t think he would, either, but still. Surely the regret would come later, and she’d be glad she’d said the words. “No, I’m sorry,” she told him.
He put his forehead on her shoulder, and she felt his breath on her skin. “I’m sorrier,” he said. “Seriously, Noelle—”
“I’m the sorriest,” she said. She turned, taking him in her arms.
He released a breath, mixed with the smallest of laughs. “Stop. I’m—” He lifted his head, his eyes widening, and that’s when she heard it too. The approach of vehicles.
Evan turned off the water, jumping from the shower and grabbing a towel as he raced for the window. “It’s my dad,” he called, panic and elation and a hundred other emotions in his voice.
Noelle grabbed a towel and dried herself hastily and then reached for the only clothes she had—items that were now all but oily, bloody, disintegrating rags—and began to put them on as what sounded like a fleet of vehicles arrived outside their room.
Evan had pulled on his clothing and was now moving the items of furniture he’d piled in front of the door. How he’d done that with one hand and half dead from exhaustion, she wasn’t sure, but he had. She ran to him, beginning to help, when a loud knock came at the door.
“Evan!”
“Dad, hold on, I’m moving things. Hold on!”
“Jesus Christ, hurry, Evan!” There was the sound of heavy commotion outside, as though Evan’s father had brought a hundred men.
She and Evan huffed and puffed and pulled until there was room for the door to be wedged open, and then Evan turned the two locks and a man—his father—came pushing through the door. He let out a sob as he took his son in his arms, shaking as he held him. Then he stood back and took Evan’s face in his hands and searched it as though looking for the injuries he might have imagined. Where his cheek had been ripped open just above his patchy beard, there was the start of a nasty scar. Apart from that, and his terribly broken hand, Evan looked like Evan, though.
Skinnier, bearded, but still himself.
And so utterly, completely different. There were far too many scars beneath the surface that no one would ever see. Only she would fully know.
Her thoughts tripped clumsily over themselves. She felt out of it, unable to believe this was real. That they’d been rescued. They were going home.
“Thank God,” Evan’s father said. “Thank God.” Mr. Sinclair dropped his hands and stepped back, his eyes moving over Evan. “We’ll get your hand fixed,” he said. “I’ll find the best surgeons. For your face and for your hand.”
“It’s fine,” Evan said.
His father blew out a breath and nodded, his relief obvious. That’s when he noticed Noelle standing off to the side. For the briefest of moments, she swore she saw raw hatred on his face, but then it was gone, and he nodded at her. “You’ve both been through a lot. But you’re whole. You’re here. We’ll get you back to the US, and then you’ll receive the medical care you need. Let’s go.”
They exited the motel, and Noelle saw that, rather than one hundred men, there were only three other black SUVs. Mr. Sinclair said something to one of the men he passed, and that man stepped toward Noelle, touching her arm. “You can come with me, ma’am.”