My body was stiff as I set my hand on his thigh to push myself up to standing. Figuring I already owed this family enough, I made my way into the kitchen and plucked a small knife I’d had my eye on from a butcher block. I found a clean-looking rag under the sink and wrapped it around the blade for protection. Then I slipped it into the pocket of the pajama pants I’d permanently borrowed, hoping I wouldn’t forget it was there and cut myself later. But it instantly made me feel better.
A snicker came from the living room.
I looked over.
“What’s that for?” he asked almost casually.
I patted my pocket. “I don’t know where we’re going. I don’t know who’s coming.” And I’d already told him I was scared. I shrugged. He could figure it out.
Alexander’s head tipped to the side.
“I know you said you’d protect me, but you can’t be too safe, you know?”
His eyes got squinty, and his tone was still low as he said, “You don’t have anything to be worried about.”
That was really easy for him to say. “I almost had a panic attack yesterday while I showered. I thought about asking you to come and sit on the toilet. That whole incident could have been a lot worse, and I know that, but that doesn’t really help me much.” I shrugged. “It makes me feel better to know I could jab someone in the eye if I had to.”
Because I would.
I’d lost almost everything. I’d been sicker than every other time in my life combined and multiplied times one hundred. Never in a million years would I have imagined sleeping out in the woods with almost no supplies, but I’d survived that too.
With Alex.
And if I could get through all this shit, I could get through just about anything else.
And maybe that was the best thing I’d learned from all of this. I wanted to live, and I wouldn’t go back on my morals. Regardless of what happened, I had that.
Alexander patted the cushion beside him on the couch with a put-out sigh. “Come here.”
Okay…. I didn’t drag my feet on the way back, but I almost did. I sat down right on the edge of the seat and raised my eyebrows at him. “Yes?”
He raised his right back. “I don’t need you fainting again.”
“I faintedonetime.”
“You still did it,” he replied, the corners of his mouth twitching.
I swear….
“Gracie.”
I focused on him, on that serious face and tone.
“You understand what’s happened, right?”
I didn’t like the sound of that or his grave, nonsarcastic tone. “What do you mean?”
His eyes glowed as he tilted his head a little, that gaze of his intent. “Your situation.”
My face must have expressed just how fucking confused I was by his comment and by his expression because he said, “That’s what I thought.” The muscles beneath his clean sweatshirt bunched. “The cartel might not figure out how you got out of there, but they might.”
I blinked.
“I disabled the cameras in the facility, but the guards might remember they shot me and there was no blood left behind. If anything, you might be in more danger now than you were before. You understand that? Because I don’t feel like you do, and we might as well get all this out on the table so there aren’t surprises later on.”
I swallowed. There was a lot we’d already put out on the table, and I wasn’t sure how strong the legs were in the first place.
“You’ll be fine,” he told me, sounding so confident, so absolutely serious I wanted to believe him.
