Wife for Hire

Chapter 23

(Karmen) 

    Jason had barely managed to put the car in park before he was swinging the door open and jumping out. I was shocked to see the sudden change in attitude. He had been quiet the entire ride home, even after I explained what had happened, he only seemed to get angrier. I watched as he walked over to a wall and began hitting it repeatedly. I quickly scrambled out of my seat belt and ran over to him, placing myself between him and the wall. He was mid swing when I jumped between his next punch and I closed my eyes, waiting for impact. When it didn’t come, I opened one eye to see what had happened. 
    Jason was staring at me with wide eyes, the anger clearly still evident, if not intensified at this point. 
    “What the hell do you think you’re doing?!” He yelled at me. I flinched, but didn’t shy away from him. 
    “What do you think I’m doing? I ‘m stopping you from hurting your hand.” I said. I reached for his hand to look at the damage that had already been done, but he pulled it away from me. I sighed, I understood that he was angry, there just had to be another way to let it out. 
    “Jason, I’m fine. There’s nothing to be angry about.” He scoffed and turned to face me, running a hand through his hair. 
    “There’s nothing to be angry about? Karmen, he locked you in a room... away from everyone and questioned you like you were doing something illegal. What if he had hurt you? What if he had put his hands on you? Anything could have happened.” I shook my head and moved towards him. 
    “But it didn’t Jason! He didn’t hurt me! He didn’t touch me, I’m totally fine!” His hands were still clenched at his side and I could tell by his flared nostrils that he was still angry. 
    “I don’t think you understand Karmen, if he had done anything to you tonight, if he ever does anything to you and I hadn’t been able to get there in time... I don’t even know what I would do.” I shook my head. Why was he acting like this? Why was he being like this? I was fine, shouldn’t that be all that mattered. 
    “He should be lucky I remembered where we were when you grabbed my arm and let him go.” He spit, I flinched again and took a step back. I didn’t know what to say, I understood why he was angry, I just didn’t know why he had to hurt himself to free himself of that anger. 
    “Jason, I’m fine. It’s not that big of a deal. It doesn’t matter.” He turned to me, his eyes flashing again. 
    “It doesn’t matter?” I had never heard Jason’s voice get that low before and even though I could tell this was a serious situation, my mind flickered back to that dream I had had about him the other morning, I shook the images from my head and focused on him again. He began moving towards me, I backed away from him until I bumped into a wall. He stopped right in front of me, our shoes touching. 
    “It’s not fine, It does matter.” He said in that same dangerously low tone. I tilted my chin up in defiance. 
    “Why does it matter Jason? I’m not hurt at all, I’m telling you it’s fine so why is it such a big deal?!” I yelled the last part, finally getting frustrated enough to yell back. 
    “Because I love you!” He yelled in return, he was panting from all the yelling and pacing. I stood there frozen. Had I heard him right? Did he say he loved me? 
    “W-what?” He took a deep breath and leaned his head against my shoulder. He was still trying to catch his breath, but I still stood there trying to make sure I had heard him correctly. 
    “Because, I couldn’t find you and then you yelled for me and I couldn’t get to you. I was worried that...that  something had happened and that you would be hurt or worse when I got in there. Then to find that he was the reason you were even locked in that room in the first place....” He looked at me again, his eyes had gone from angry to soft, to angry again. I placed a hand on his cheek and he closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. When he opened them again his anger had lessened considerably. 
    “I’m sorry.” He whispered, placing his forehead against mine. I closed my eyes and breathed him in. He had said it, he was so angry about all of it because he loved me. Did he mean it? Was he saying it because in a moment of passion? 
    “It’s okay.” I whispered back. Trying not to think too much of it. He hadn’t gone back and repeated anything and he didn’t seem like he was going to, so I would just pretend he never said it. 
    “It’s not okay, I shouldn’t have got this angry. I didn’t mean to scare you.” I shook my head. 
    “I knew you weren’t going to hurt me Jason, I was worried about you hurting yourself.” I said as I grabbed his hand to look at it. His knuckles were bloody and I winced. It had to hurt. 
    “C’mon, let’s get you cleaned up.” He nodded and we walked inside. I went upstairs to get the first aid kit from his room and brought it back downstairs and sat it on the table. I sat across from him on the couch and pulled his hand over to me and inspected the damage, just looked like he scratched his hand up a bit, there was probably going to be some bruising, but he should be fine. I’d watched Markus get in enough fights to know what a broken hand looked like. 
    I pulled the peroxide and a cotton ball out of the first aid kit and began to clean up the cuts. He winced when the peroxide made contact so I blew on it for a second before applying it to the rest of his hand. I pulled out some gauze to wrap his hand, since there were multiple cuts and one or two little band aids wouldn’t cover it all. I took my time and soon we were done. He had watched silently the entire time. 
    “There we go, all better.” I said as I began cleaning up the first aid kit. He started to help, but I shooed him away. 
    “Thanks.” He said, not managing to look at me. He was doing that thing he does when he feels awkward, scratching the back of his neck and avoiding eye contact. I smiled and stood to take the first aid kit back upstairs, when he grabbed my arm. 
    “Just leave it there for now, I have something I want to give you.” I nodded and let him pull me out of the living room. He stopped in the doorway and turned back to look at me. 
    “Oh and by the way, Merry Christmas.”