Wicked Ink by Misty Simon Page B

some part of her had gone off the deep end. She could hear Garrett yelling at her, but couldn’t understand what he was saying in her blind need to get those bonds off him.
    Somewhere in the room another man stood in silence. She should be worried about him, her mind told her, but helping Garrett seemed so much more important than anything else at that precise moment.
    Finally the last piece of leather came free in her fumbling fingers, and Garrett shot out of the chair like a man possessed. He knocked her over because she couldn’t scramble out of the way fast enough, but when he looked down at her on the bare floor, she could feel hate and rage radiating from him like they were living things.
    She whispered his name, finally becoming aware of the fact that this space was even less furnished than the one downstairs. At least he had something to sit on in the other apartment. Here there was only that ugly, heinous chair, with its leather straps and wires hanging in disuse, and a table with a laptop in the corner.
    No matter what happened next, she would not regret saving him, even if only for the moment.
    His chest rising and falling, Garrett hovered over her like an avenging angel. His shirt was off and his hair was wild. He barely resembled the man who had eaten lunch with her this afternoon, but she knew the real Garrett resided in there somewhere. If only she could reach him.
    She caught movement out of the corner of her eye. She hoped to God her life wasn’t going to end this way after she’d struggled so hard to do the right thing and make something of herself over the past seven years. But if it did, then at least she’d had a good ride. And had come out a lot cleaner and happier than she’d ever thought possible when the cocaine had gripped her mind and body like a vice.
    “Ma’am. I’m going to need you to very slowly and very carefully back up. Just scoot away on your bottom if you can.”
    She lifted a hand to Garrett, but made no effort to move away from him.
    “No, don’t touch him, just move away. We’ll get him under control, and then we’ll all talk about this, okay? Can you please just move?”
    “You make him sound like an animal,” she murmured, making contact with the skin of his stomach. Moving her hand up past his abs, she smoothed her fingers along his rib cage and over his chest until his heart was beating hard against her palm.
    “Please,” the other man said.
    “Garrett, can you hear me?”
    He growled low in his throat, and she immediately started mouthing positive thoughts to keep herself sane.
    “It will be okay. You are not going to hurt me.” She knew deep down she was telling the truth as she recited the mantra her psychiatrist had given her when times were too tough to handle. “You will be okay. Let that light come through you and return you to peace. Let it cleanse you. Let it live in you. Let yourself go.”
    Something snapped through the air, clouding her vision and making her see colors where there were none. Her fingertips felt singed, but she didn’t move them from Garrett’s chest.
    And then he collapsed on the hardwood floor next to her and stopped breathing.
    “Oh, please, help me. Help him,” she cried to the man who still stood in the shadows in the corner of the room, not moving. He looked shocked. “Snap out of it! He’s not breathing.”
    Whoever the man was, he got right to work, turning Garrett onto his back, then placing his big hands on his chest to begin compressions. Before the first push, Garrett turned onto his side, curling up into a ball and coughing as if his lungs wanted to come up out of his throat.
    “He’ll be fine. He always is.” The man sat back on his haunches, shaking his head, and murmuring to himself as if she wasn’t sitting right there. “It’s always best to give him a moment. When he purges himself in the chair, he’s always sitting upright. I wonder if that makes a difference.”
    “You mean, you’ve done this