"Then consider it my prison cell. Either way, I don't want you in here."
Rafe's head cocks to the side as he purses his lips in annoyance, but instead of leaving he moves closer, stalking barefoot across the floor until he's standing in front of me.
"I brought you tea," he says.
"I don't want it."
"You need to drink something. You've been shouting for hours."
"And whose fault is that?" I look up at him with the angriest stare I can muster, but somewhere inside me, the flame of rage is dying down. Being so close to him ruins me, and I hate it. I hate that he does this to me. I'm supposed to hate him for howhe behaves and instead, I'm staring up at him realizing I must've scared him in the middle of the night and set him off, and now he's come to offer an olive branch. The sweet, kindhearted man who brings me snacks and beverages while I work is back and the machine that demands perfect obedience is gone.
He exhales slowly and sets the mug on the nightstand. The porcelain clinks against the wood as he does something I don't expect. He kneels in front of me, his hands resting on his thighs, his eyes level with mine. It takes him from towering over me to being at eye level, which is unnerving.
I pull back instinctively and cross my arms over my chest. "What are you doing?" I ask.
"I was a fool," he says.
The words stop me cold. I stare at him, searching his face for some sign that he's mocking me, but his expression is serious. Almost contrite.
"Last night," he continues, his voice low. "The way I grabbed you. The things I said. I was wrong."
I don't know how to respond to him at all. That's not an apology, but it might be the closest thing I get to one today after the way I've been screaming at him all morning.
"When I heard that crash," he says, "when I thought someone had broken in, all I could think about was what would happen if they got to you. If they hurt you. And then I walked in and you were fine, but you were still working at two in the morning, running yourself into the ground, and all I could see was you making mistakes. Getting sloppy. Putting yourself at risk."
"So you locked me in a room."
"I panicked and my temper got the better of me."
"You don't panic, Rafe. I know you…" Rolling my eyes, I turn away so I don't have to look at him. But I keep him in my periphery so I can see what he's doing.
His jaw tightens, and he looks down at his hands. "You said you wanted to go home and I got angry. It reminded me that when this is over, you won't need to be here anymore. You'll want to leave…" I sigh hard because that should always have been obvious. "I can't let you leave, Riley."
"Why?" I ask quietly. "Why can't you let me go?"
His hand rests on my knee now, while behind his eyes his brain is spooling up some other lie. I feel too guarded to let him closer to me right now. He's still holding to the disgusting loyalty he has to the men who force him to be a monster he isn't. I've seen his kind heart. What they make him do… it's unholy.
"I took you with the intent to get rid of you," he says. "You'd seen the banker's body. You knew too much. I was going to use you to fix my problems and then eliminate the risk. That was the plan."
My stomach churns, but I force myself to stay still and listen.
"But something changed—" He stops, his throat working. "You know I care about you, Riley. I don't know when it happened but it's there, and I can't make it go away. And I can't let you go home because of it…"
My heart is pounding so hard I think he can probably hear it. I don't like anything he's saying except the part where he's admitting to having feelings for me, even if he won’t say aloud that he loves me. But it's not fair, that because he has feelings for me, I have to sacrifice my entire world.
Shouldn't it be the opposite? He gives up everything to see me be happy?
"Last night," he says, "when you said you wanted to go home, it hit me that I'm going to lose you. When this is over, when you don't need to be here anymore, you want to go home, not stay with me, and I don't know what to do about it."
"So you locked me in a room and told me I belong to you."
He closes his eyes, and I see the regret etched into the lines of his face. "I know. I was an idiot. I let my temper take over, and I said things I shouldn't have. But I meant what I said about the risk. If I let you go right now, my uncle will have you killed. And if he doesn't, the Feds will arrest you. You're in too deep, Riley. We both are."
I don't know what to say. My mind is spinning, trying to process everything he just told me, and I can't land on a single coherent thought. He has feelings for me. He's afraid of losing me. He locked me in here not because he wanted to control me, but because he didn't know what else to do.
It doesn't excuse what he did. It doesn't make it okay, either, but it reminds me that he's human, just like me.
"Say something," he says, and I hear the desperation in his voice. "Please."
