“Thank you, Rainier. It means a lot that you would say that to me. I loved her. I miss her every day. I always ask myself what she would say or do in each situation when someone is being nasty to me in the café.”
His fingers ceased motion, tightening on her shoulders. “What do you mean by that? Do you have customers who get ugly with you?”
Shabina couldn’t help herself; his reaction made her want to laugh. She tilted her head back to look up at him. “Rainier, be serious. Anytime you’re in a business dealing with the public you’re going to have to expect to run into people with bad attitudes.”
Some dark emotion moved through his eyes. “Perhaps that business isn’t one you should be in,Qadri.”
“I love my café.”
He stood up, and immediately tendrils of panic began to unfold in the pit of her stomach. She pressed her fist against her churning abdomen resisting the urge to bring her knees up. Shewouldnotbe so pitiful that she couldn’t trust that he would return in a few minutes.
“Get warmed up. It won’t take me long to settle the animals and ensure security is tight.”
She nodded, wishing she could muster up the strength to tease him about his commanding tone. He always used it. He always would. She knew it irritated her friends, but she didn’t mind; in fact, she found the way he spoke reassuring.
Rainier wasn’t arrogant, although he came off that way to most people. She knew her father thought he was arrogant. She had always found it funny when her father accused Rainier of arrogance because the majority of people dealing with her father considered him extremely arrogant. Her father had always gotten his way in negotiations—until he tried to pay the ransom for her.
Shabina couldn’t help herself, she drew her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around her legs, contemplating the things Rainier had revealed to her about the night he’d rescued her. He claimed that she hadn’t been the reason he’d killed the men in the camp that night, that he’d been sent there for that purpose.
Her mind turned that information over and over. Rainier was Deadly Storms, the assassin so often whispered about, and he told her he was there to dispose of Scorpion. If that was true, had it been a bonus that he’d rescued her? She’d always thought he had come to the camp specifically for the purpose of retrieving her. He knew she was there. That hadn’t been a surprise to him.
Assassins didn’t allow others to know their identities. Never once had she felt threatened by him. She was dying when he’d found her. He easily could have left her there to die after he’d killed the mercenaries. The direction her mind was taking her made no sense at all. Paranoia was once more creeping in.
“You’re crying again.”
His voice was low. Gentle. So much so that he didn’t startle her. He reached down to open the drain plug and lifted her, uncaring that she was soaked and would get him wet.
“Am I?” She hadn’t realized. “I don’t really cry. I think somehow the faucet turned on and I don’t know how to turn it off.”
He was being impersonal again as he dried her off. That was enough to make her cry.
“Now you’re beginning to laugh. Don’t get hysterical on me.” His tone turned grim.
He’d already pulled pajamas from one of the drawers in her closet. He dragged the top over her head. It was a short camisole in a dark rose made from soft cotton fabric. The matching long drawstring pants were very comfortable. He hadn’t retrieved the little jacket that went with it. Instead, he just took her through to the bedroom and, after yanking back the covers, put her in the bed.
She couldn’t look at him. “I’m not a child, Rainier. I know it may seem like I’m acting that way now, but I’m all grown up.”
“I’ve never treated you like a child, Shabina. I don’t view you as one. I didn’t even when I first rescued you. How could I after what you’d gone through? Your childhood was ripped away from you.” He sat on the edge of the mattress. “I’d had experience with that and knew what it was like.”
“It feels like you do.”
“Am I too bossy with you?” He sounded a little sad. “I’m serious about your security because I don’t lie to you and pretend you aren’t still in danger. You are. You’re going to be in danger until that bastard Scorpion is dead. Not captured and put in prison but dead. I don’t play games with your safety. I never have and I never will.”
“I’m aware of that, Rainier. I appreciate that you look out for me. It isn’t that.”
“I’m never going to be able to change who I am. I wanted to, for you, but I’ll always be that man talking to you like this. I’ll take charge when I think it’s necessary to protect you and anyone else we care about. That’s who I am.”
“I’m well aware of that.” She looked down at her hands. “You make me feel safe. The only time I ever feel safe is when you’re with me. I shouldn’t admit that to you, but I don’t want you to think it bothers me that you take charge. It doesn’t. It makes me feel safe.”
There was a long silence, and then Rainier caught her chin and forced her head up. “You’ve said that before. You don’t feel safe without me around.”
She felt the color creeping under her skin. What difference would it make if he knew how she felt about him? He probably already did. “I never have. I detest it when you leave. I feel alone and can’t sleep.” She moved her chin from his hand with a little shake of the head. “I don’t have PTSD episodes all the time, Rainier, but I don’t like being away from you. That has nothing to do with PTSD. And please don’t be like everyone else and try to convince me it’s because you rescued me and I’m dependent on you, that I’ll get over it. I’m not ever going to get over it.”
Rainier pushed a stray strand of hair behind her ear, his fingers gentle as they traced her earlobe. “I wish you would have felt confident enough to tell me this months ago. Why didn’t you?”
She sighed again. “I overheard you say you lost the one woman you loved. I believed it was because of me. I also feared you ruined your chances of moving up the ladder in your career. You rescued me and went a little insane when you saw what those men had done to me. I blamed myself.”
“I had no idea all this time you felt guilt for something you didn’t do. First, let me set the record straight once and for all. I was called in to try to find the camp where you were held. I watched the videos and figured out you used birds to send the location of the camp, but I also knew you were moved as soon as the videos were sent. Sadly, it took time to work out your code. Once I had it, I moved fast.”
