Scythe & Sparrow: Chapter 27

Fionn

The sun is setting behind me, scattering orange and pink flashes of light on the ocean waves. The contract with Leander might be finished, at least for now, but the memories of it haunt me like a film over the world. I’ve been looking at the sea from morning to night for the past five days, and in some ways, I’m not sure how much I’ve really seen it. I’ve seen wounds I’ve sewn over the last several months. I’ve made unexpected friendships, and I’ve seen the faces of those same people twisted with pain and suffering. I’ve seen broken bones and gunshots and torn flesh. I’ve seen death. But I’ve also seen Rose. No matter how deep the darkness dragged me, memories of Rose have been there to warm the night. I’ve seen her face as I’ve watched the sea. I’ve heard her laugh. I’ve felt her kiss on my lips, the give of her flesh beneath my hands.

But they’ve only been memories. And the hope of seeing her again feels like it’s drifting out to sea.

I look at my watch and my heart drops, scraping bone on its way to the cold stone beneath my boots. She should have gotten my letter three days ago. I came early, just in case. But Lookout Rock is thirty minutes away from Ellsworth, maybe forty-five if she’s driving Dorothy. It’s close enough that she could have taken her motorcycle and made it here even faster, if she wanted.

My head drops as I take a deep breath of ocean air and pick up the backpack lying at my feet. With one last look at the sea, I turn. The backpack drops from my hand as my eyes land on a person who could be an apparition.

Rose.

She’s so beautiful that the breath flees from my lungs. Her dark hair shifts in the breeze. It’s just like the last time I saw her—fringe that skims her brows, waves that caress her jaw. Her mahogany eyes drill right into me, tearing back layers as though she can see every sin I’ve stacked up around my soul. She’s wearing her leather jacket and a low-cut tank top beneath it. Black jeans and motorcycle boots. She looks tough as hell. But it’s not just her clothes or the way she stands with her hands buried in the pockets of her jacket. There’s a hard edge to her expression. No teasing spark in her gaze, no laugh at the ready. No smile or warmth in her eyes.

I know I did what I had to do to keep her safe. But this is the first time I’ve really seen how badly I’ve broken her to do it.

“I’m so …” I nearly choke on my words. Take a deep breath. Start again. “I’m so happy you’re here. It’s good to see you.”

I feel like I’m unraveling from the inside out. But Rose? She’s unreadable. The woman who has always lived wide open with her emotions on display. “You look different,” she says.

I glance down at my clothes, run a hand through my hair. It’s still short, but a little longer than the last time we saw each other, a bit less refined. There’s more stubble on my face, probably some dark circles beneath my eyes from the sleepless nights I’ve had worrying that she wouldn’t come. I don’t know about the rest of me, but she must see something.

“You look the same. Beautiful,” I say. I take a single step closer. Rose doesn’t move. “I wasn’t sure you’d come.”

“Me neither,” she replies, shifting her gaze away from me toward the sea. For a long moment, she stays silent, her expression hard. “I needed some time to think.”

Rose is not the type to sit and stew on things. She’s the type to jump in and deal with the consequences later.

“I’m glad you came,” I say, and she nods but keeps her eyes from mine. A swallow shifts in her throat. Though her expression doesn’t change, I can see how much she’s struggling beneath a mask of indifference. I feel like my heart is left behind on the stone, my chest hollow, scraped clean. “I have something for you.”

When I reach down for my bag, I dart a glance her way. It’s a little bit of a relief to catch her watching with more interest than she wants to admit, judging by the way she stiffens when our eyes connect. My lips twitch with a smile that she doesn’t see as I rummage in my bag. When I straighten, I hold an envelope in my hand, but I don’t offer it to her. I open it instead.

“The last card of the deck,” I say as I withdraw only the card and hold it out for her to take, the envelope and a folded letter clutched in my other hand. There’s a question in her furrowed brow, but she takes the card and looks at the image. She knows tarot. She knew this would be the last one left. “The Lovers.”

She doesn’t say anything, just looks down at the card, letting her hair obscure as much of her face as it can. I unfold the letter.

“Dear Rose,” I say. “It’s so good to be able to finally use your name. Because that means I’m home now.”

Rose’s nose twitches and she sniffs but still doesn’t look up from the card.

“I’m sorry for everything I’ve put you through. I couldn’t tell you where I was or what I was doing because it was just too dangerous. I couldn’t bear the thought of someone finding their way to you. Even writing you these notes was a risk. I’ve never written letters to anyone before, but there were days when it felt like knowing you might be holding the same paper and reading the same words kept me alive.”

When I glance up from the letter, she’s watching me, a shine in her eyes. My fingers tremble as adrenaline floods my veins, my gaze lingering for a moment on the end of the line of a tattoo that runs the length of my left forearm, one of her heart’s rhythms, traced with precision from a photo I took of her EKG as she slept in the hospital.

“The Lovers card represents choices in relationships. And the choices I made nine months ago were the hardest ones I’ve ever had to make. I had to break your heart to save you. I had to leave to love you. And I want to spend the rest of my life making up for the time we lost. I’m asking you to choose us, Rose Evans. I promise to spend every day doing everything I can to make you happy. There’s no one else I’ll ever love but you. So no matter what you choose, I’m not letting you go. I never will.”

I lower my hand to my side. A tear breaches Rose’s dark lashes and slides down her cheek. She’s staring down at the card again as though it might tell her the future all on its own. Her lip trembles. I would give anything to touch her. To kiss her. But I’m just not sure if too much damage has been done and too much time has passed.

Rose wipes the tears away, but more follow. “I liked your letters,” she whispers. “That one was my favorite.”

Hope soars in my chest, so big it chokes me, yet so fragile I think a single breath could break it. “Mine too.”

“I … I’ve been …” Rose’s voice cracks. I take one small step closer, but she shakes her head and clears her throat. “You hurt me.”

“I know. I’m so sorry.”

“But I know it’s my fault too. I was the one who antagonized Matt Cranwell in the first place. None of this would have happened if I hadn’t done that.”

“No, Rose. I’m glad you did.” She meets my eyes, finally, and it feels like a relief when she does. “I never would have met you otherwise. I’d still be stuck trying to live in a box that I was never meant to be in. That’s one thing that being away has confirmed—that the idea of the life I thought I wanted was just that. An idea. And despite testing it out for a long time, it never fit. The only time anything started to feel right was when you came along.”

Though her expression is still troubled, Rose nods. She keeps nodding, as though it’s hard to stop, until finally she tilts her head and shrugs. She shuffles on her feet. Ruffles her hair. It takes her a minute to even glance at me, her damp lashes shining in the dim light.

“So, like … what does choosing you … what does that entail, exactly?”

I can’t help the stupid grin that erupts on my face, though I try my best to subdue it. “I think it’s whatever you want it to be.”

“Well … but …” She shakes her head and looks out to the sea, a crease notched between her brows. “I like cuddling. We’d have to permanently dissolve that rule.”

I take another step closer. She’s nearly within reach. My hand aches with the need to touch her, but I stop myself from moving closer. “I like cuddling.”

“I like PDA. Holding hands and shit.”

“I want to hold your hand.”

“Dorothy only has one bed. I’m not unfolding the sleeper sofa. It’s a pain in the ass.”

“Perfect. I don’t want separate beds.”

“And you can’t keep telling Barbara she has rabies. She doesn’t like that.”

“You have Barbara?” I ask, and she gives me a faint nod. “I thought she was performing with the poodles.”

“There were some …” Rose pauses, her gaze lifting to the sky as she considers her words. “… incidents. With churros. And maybe one or two with the hot dog stand.”

I sigh dramatically, but only to test out her reaction. Sure enough, her eyes slice to mine and narrow. “I won’t tell her she’s rabid,” I say, laying a palm across my heart. “I promise.”

Rose’s arms fold tight across her middle, the card still clutched in one hand. She juts her chin out and blows a puff of air into her fringe. I’ve imagined that exact quirk so many times over the last few months that it feels like a punch to the chest to see it happen right in front of me. “Dani and Renegade totally deserved to win Surviving Love.”

I bite down on a laugh. “I don’t know if I can cosign that one—” Rose levels me with a sharp glare through a film of tears. “Okay, okay. Dani and Renegade deserved their win, even though his made-up name sucked and his actual name is Brian and I’m also ninety-nine percent sure they cheated on that last challenge with the fish.”

“Fair,” she says with an eye roll.

We fall into a long silence as she fiddles with the card and weighs her thoughts. Part of me wants to crash into her and wrap her in a crushing embrace. But I can almost hear the war going on behind her eyes. The fear of being hurt a second time can be paralytic. My circumstances might have been different, but I know the power of heartbreak’s poison. I know that even if she does choose us, it’s going to take time, and maybe a little space to heal. So I don’t ask anything more from her. I don’t press. I just wait as long as it takes.

“I liked that time we kissed,” Rose finally says, and the first hint of doubt creeps into her expression as her gaze finally lands on me and sticks. “We’d have to dissolve that rule permanently too.”

“Thank God, because I fucking hate that rule. I’d like to break that one first, if you’d let me.”

Her mask comes undone as she nods, every emotion bursting through her broken facade. Tears blur my vision as I rush to close the distance between us. I’ve imagined this moment a thousand times over the last nine months, even when I tried to stop myself in case it never came true. The feeling of her damp cheeks beneath my palms. The taste of salt and sweetness on her lips. The warmth of her breath on my skin. Her scent, notes of spiced chocolate on the sea air. The reality of actually touching her is so far beyond what I’d truly let myself wish for. So I drown in her. I press my lips to hers and thank every god I can think of when her tongue caresses mine. Everything inside me that felt misplaced is realigned when she wraps her arms around my neck and her body molds to mine, like she was always meant to fit.

“I love you, Rose,” I say when we pull apart and I press my forehead to hers. “I’m sorry.”

She doesn’t have words, only emotion, just a shake of her head. We wrap each other in an embrace. I hold on. And she holds me back. It’s starting to get dark by the time we finally let go, with just enough light to see the path that leads back to the inn where fairy lights line a covered porch facing the sea. A storm of nerves circles my guts. All my medical training, and high-pressure situations, and now this time spent working with some seriously fucked-up people employed by Leander—all that cultivated calm seems to fly out the window when Rose looks at me with her dark, shining eyes. It’s as though the thought of anything to do with her has me reduced to a pit of anxiety.

I swallow and try not to tense as I point toward the inn just down the cliffs from where we stand. “Did you want to stay with me?”

Rose doesn’t answer. My heart folds in on itself.

“It’s … it’s got a nice view of the ocean …” She watches me, unmoving. “Umm … it has a pretty decent breakfast buffet. And waffles, you love waffles.” I grip a hand to the back of my neck when her brows raise like she’s expecting more. “It only has one bed though.”

Finally, her smile breaks free, as though she’d trapped it just to watch me squirm. “That was the selling point I was waiting for, Doc.”

We walk to the inn under the brightening stars, hand in hand. Every step we take makes me feel like I’m living someone else’s life. Like I could blink and learn this is all a dream, some delirium that will wear off, and then I’ll realize she was never here in the first place. And for a moment, I think it’s going to be an even worse fate when we get to the parking lot of the inn, and she looks toward Dorothy to slip her hand free of mine.

“Hold on a minute,” Rose says, taking a step back, and then another. “I’ll be right back.”

I nod. She gives me a flash of an unsure smile and then turns away, walking to the motor home with her hands shoved in her pockets. After a few brief moments inside, she returns with a backpack slung over one shoulder. “Just had to feed Barbara and get some stuff for the night.”

“Of course.” I hold out a hand and she takes it. Her touch is still hesitant, which seems unlike the Rose Evans I know, but I know it will take time to earn back the trust I tarnished. So I just stay steady, opening the door for her when we get to the inn, leading her to the room on the second floor that faces the sea. When we get inside, she goes to the windows and watches the ocean, sliding the backpack from her shoulder and onto one of the chairs.

“It’s a nice view,” she says, not turning away from the black waves that melt into the horizon.

“Yeah. It is,” I say, watching her. “Do you want something to drink? I’ve got tea. Bourbon.”

“Bourbon would be nice, thanks.”

I nod, but she doesn’t see, then turn to the small kitchenette to take the only two glasses from the shelf and fill them. I’m pouring the first drink when she speaks, her words turning my veins to crystals of ice.

“Dear Fionn,” she says, her voice barely more than a whisper.

I turn around, a slow pivot on my heel. She has a letter in her hands. The edges of it quiver in her grip.

“I got your letters. I keep opening them. I finally decided I should write back. I’ve never gotten letters like yours before. And I’ve never written to anyone. It’s almost ironic that they have nowhere to go.”

Rose’s eyes dart to mine, and I can’t move. I’m rooted to the floor. “I had a dream while I was in the hospital. That some broken hearts can’t be sewn back together. And I wondered if mine would be like that too. I thought so for a long time. And then your first letter came. I was angry. I felt empty. But getting that letter was like receiving the first stitch. It hurt. But it helped too. Every one since then has closed a little bit of the wound, even on the days when I didn’t want it to.

“The card you sent me today is the Three of Swords. You talked in your letter about how it represented heartbreak. There was pain and loss those last days we were together and in the ones since, you said. You worried about how I was feeling. But when I opened the letter and the card fell out, it was reversed. It means that the knives fall from the heart. Healing begins. That’s what your letter meant to me. Another stitch in a wound.

“So I hope you keep writing to me. And I’ll keep writing to you. I hope we heal ourselves and each other. I hope we’ll stitch back together. Because I love you, Fionn. I’m not letting you go. I never will. Love, Rose.”

She lifts her eyes to mine. And though I take a step in her direction, it’s Rose who closes the distance. When I have her in my arms, everything else in the world seems to fall away. “I meant it, Rose,” I whisper into her hair. “I’m not letting you go.”

She nods against my chest. “Me neither.”

For a long while, we stay that way, swaying to the music of heartbeats and breath. When we finally part, Rose takes off her jacket. I give her the bourbon and have my own. We sit on the bed, and she reads me her letters, one by one. We talk. We laugh. We fall asleep in each other’s arms. We start the slow process of stitching back together.

For once, I’m awake the next morning before Rose. I write her a letter. This one is about happiness. Relief. Gratitude. I end it the way I always do, with a promise. That I will never let her go. Then I leave it on the pillow before I slip from the room to get her a coffee and waffles from downstairs. When I get back to the room, she’s in the shower, her reply note already waiting on the little table next to the bed. Her letter isn’t just about happiness, or relief. It’s about want, and need. It’s an invitation. I leave the coffee and breakfast in the kitchen and then I join her in the shower, and we make love beneath the spray, savoring every kiss, every touch, every whispered word that was left unwritten.

Every day we write each other letters. Every evening we read them out loud. We talk through the way we feel. Sometimes we make love. Sometimes we fuck. Sometimes we fight. Or we laugh. Or we cry. But every day we heal.

We leave the inn after a few days, and then we hit the road with Dorothy and no real plan of where to go. We just stop at different campgrounds. Some evenings, we meet random travelers. Sit around a fire, Rose glowing in the flickering light. Her laugh gets easier as time passes, and so does mine. Other nights, we keep to ourselves and talk about the life we both left behind in Nebraska and the future that lies ahead. She’s ready to give Boston another try, she says, if I’m ready too. And I am. I know how much Leander would love to have me close as a physician on his payroll. He’s texted me five times since the Croatian contract finished to offer me a permanent job in Boston, even offering to help me set up a legitimate clinic of my own in the city so I can be there if he needs me. He could force me into it with the mountain of evidence he still holds in his gasp, of course. But truthfully? I’m ready to say yes. And though I think she’s trying not to let on, I know how much Rose wants to be closer to Lark and Sloane. I can hear it in her voice, see it in the way the idea lights up her eyes. “But maybe we could still take Dorothy out to stretch her legs in the summer,” she said last night when she climbed into bed.

“Yeah,” I’d said, pulling her against me. She laid her head against my chest and I pressed a kiss to her hair. “I really like that plan.”

And now, three weeks after our reunion in Ellsworth, it feels like we’re finally where we’re meant to be. On the same path. We’re walking side by side, our hands clasped, our shoes crunching on gravel as we draw closer to the cabin where Sloane’s BMW and Lachlan’s vintage Dodge Charger are parked. Barbara ambles along beside us on a leash and harness, sniffing the ground in her endless hunt for contraband snacks. The lights are on inside the cottage, illuminating the scrub grass that slopes toward a moonlit lake.

Rose squeezes my hand and I look down my shoulder at her. “You okay?” she asks.

“Yeah,” I reply, giving her the most relaxed smile I can manage. She’s not buying it, of course. Her eyes narrow on me as they sweep across every detail of my face. “It’s just been so long since I’ve seen Rowan and Lachlan. I’m excited. Maybe a bit nervous.”

My admission seems to appease her as she brings her other hand to circle my forearm. “They’re going to be so excited to see you.”

“Yeah, I just feel bad to have left it so long. I could have messaged them when I first got home.”

Rose considers this, her head tilting side to side. “Yeah, but it was okay to take some time too. You needed it.”

She’s right. I did. Maybe I still need time. Not just to get over the last nine months of repairing traumatic injuries, or crash-coursing cosmetic surgery on the job, or living a life in secret apart from my loved ones. I also need to figure out what it is that I want from the future. Who I really want to be. Because the truth is, after so many years of trying to out-perform expectations, I think I need a minute to stand back and simply exist.

And if I’m lucky, no matter what we do next in life, that’s the way it will be. Me and Rose.

We stop just behind the cars, watching the cottage, admiring its inviting glow. When Rose turns into me, I wrap my arms across her back.

“You ready?” she asks.

I lean down, pressing a kiss to her lips. She sighs against my mouth. How I ever lived so long without touching her, I don’t know. And now it feels like I’ll never get enough. When we pull away from each other, I sweep the hair back from her face, giving a final kiss to her forehead. “Probably not,” I say.

“It’s going to be great. A real ta-da! moment.” Rose squeezes my waist in a tight hug and then lets go, taking a few steps back. She smacks a bug on her bare leg and I catch sight of her scar on her calf. One I helped to mend. But when I meet her eyes, I know that even from that first moment we met, it was Rose who healed me. “I’ll go around to the deck and sneak in. You come in the main door,” she says, her smile soft and reassuring. “It’ll be great. I promise.”

I nod once, because it’s all I can manage. She picks up the squirming raccoon, then turns and jogs away to the front of the cabin. I’m left standing in the dark, watching her disappear into shadow.

When I’m sure she won’t see, I pull a box from my pocket. I flip open the lid. The ring catches the dim light. If I were to look close enough, maybe I could see the night sky reflected in polished gold and precious gems. When we look up to the stars, we’re looking back in time. But all I see is the future. And it’s richer and brighter than I ever thought it would be.

I close the lid. Slide it back in my pocket. I hike my bag higher on my shoulder and take a deep breath. I walk to the steps of the cabin, determination in my stride, love and hope alive in my chest.

I’m going to make up for lost time.