Page 88 of Make No Mistake

No.

Someone was shaking me. My eyes shot open to the darkness. My lungs opened on their own and inhaled a shaky breath.

“Are you with me?”

I shook my head. Who was talking?

“Jay?”

“Yeah, Mac. It’s me.”

My lungs were on fire. “What …”

“You had a panic attack. You hyperventilated until you passed out.”

“No.”

“Yes, Mac. You did.” His arms pulled me to him until my face was pressed against his chest, crushing my nose.

“I’m tired.” So overwhelmingly exhausted.

“I bet. That was quite the performance.” His voice sounded lighter than before.

Before.

The note.

My body tensed.

“No, Mckayla. Don’t start again. I won’t let anything happen to you. There’s nothing we can do right now. The cops are outside watching. We need to rest.”

I nodded against him and allowed him to lean me back until we were lying down with his arms still wrapped around me.

“I want this to end.”

He began stroking my hair with one hand and pressing me to him with the other. “Me too.”

“I want to end it.”

It took a second for him to understand what I was saying. I wanted to catch this guy. I wanted to be able to relax again. I wanted justice for all of the other girls.

“Mac.” With one word he made me feel like a child. I wasn’t. He could tell me how he felt about it, but I was the one that would make the decision, and as of right now, I was going to do whatever it took for this to end.

“Don’t, Jay. I’ll do it if it’s what it takes.”

His chest lifted me as he took a deep breath.

Silence enveloped us. I thought he’d fallen asleep. Maybe he wasn’t going to argue about this with me.

“We’ll talk about this in the morning. Please just rest, Mckayla.”

He sounded so desperate. I didn’t know why though. I wasn’t going anywhere. We would talk about it, and I would make him see why I needed to do this. I could let it go until morning though. My mind and body needed the rest, so rather than arguing, I twisted until my head was resting on his chest and my arm was wrapped around his stomach. We were safe. For now.