“What?” she asked.
“I was hopin’ they hadn’t figured out where you live, but we’re clearly past that now. I’ma get someone to fix your window, but you’re not staying here.”
Her phone rang, and she frowned when she looked at the screen.
“What?” he asked.
“Someone’s calling me from a restricted line.”
Cannon grabbed her phone and answered on speaker.
“Yo?”
Nahla froze as she listened for the caller’s voice. There was nothing on the line but heavy breathing.
Kissing his teeth, Cannon hung up and handed her the phone back.
“If another blocked number calls you, don’t answer. I’ma look into that. Now, go ’head; we’re leaving in twenty.”
Her mouth opened and closed a few times, but no words came out. She wanted to protest but had a feeling it was pointless. This was confirmed when he glanced at her with a hardened expression.
“Nahla. Go pack a bag,” he repeated in the same tone.
Her feet finally started moving, and she rushed to pack a bag with her mind racing the entire time. Not only had they come to Jasona, but they had tracked her down—two things she was sure the Lyle police force wasn’t capable of doing. The reality that she was wrong shook her.
Fifteen minutes later, she had everything of value and what she thought she would need packed into two bags. Once shemade it back to the front of the house, Cannon silently grabbed both bags and led her outside and to his vehicle.
Once they were inside the car, he said, “Let me see your phone.”
She frowned. “Why?”
“Nahla,” he said evenly.
Exhaling loudly, Nahla handed him her cell phone.
As he tapped her screen, he said, “I’m turning your location sharing off in case the people after you try to access it.”
She stared at him, feeling overwhelmed and confused. “Oh.”
As they drove away from her home, a lone tear ran down her cheek. She felt violated, angry, and—for the first time since she’d started this story—truly scared.
As she wiped her tears, though, she had to admit that underneath all that, she felt something else too.
Safe.
Cannon foundthe home security app on his phone and pressed the button that lifted the garage door. Once he drove in and lowered the door behind them, he glanced toward his passenger seat.
They had just arrived at his safe house on the outskirts of Jasona. Nahla had dozed off about thirty minutes into their forty-five-minute drive. Cannon was happy she had settled, but annoyed that someone had gotten close to her. If she hadn’t ducked in time, she would have been hit, and that would have been his fault.
Cannon had a feeling the Lyle Police Department knew where Nahla stayed, and his first thought was to take her to another location. Because Nahla wasn’t adjusting well to theboundaries he’d set for her, he went against his own judgment and let her stay at her house. That was a dumb move, and he knew it.
He was glad she wasn’t harmed, and felt determined to keep it that way, no matter what. Nahla was a journalist, so while it was probably normal for her to go into the office every day, he knew she could work from home.
Cannon sighed as he thought about the argument they were likely to have about this new rule. He hadn’t known her long, but he had already discerned that Nahla wasn’t the type to be told what to do. She was used to calling the shots in her own life, and that clashed significantly with the way Cannon handled things.
He was also a shot caller, and he hated feeling like he had lost control of a situation. Whenever he felt control slipping from his grasp, he tended to overcorrect a problem so that there was no room for error. That was what was happening here.
The people against Nahla had gotten close, and because Cannon had no idea—yet—how far they were willing to go, he was keeping Nahla close until further notice.
