The security perimeter disengaged as his biometric signature registered, allowing them to pass safely over the border into his territory. Sloane pulled up to the disguised entrance and idled there for a handful of seconds to wait for the sensors to confirm his identity. The ground rumbled faintly beneath the SUV’s tires as the entrance in front of him, draped in vines and partially obscured by scrub, pulled to one side. A long concrete tunnel leading to a garage appeared behind it.
Sloane pulled inside, cool overhead lights flickering on as he passed beneath them, and parked the vehicle next to several unmarked motorcycles and another, smaller car. There was a small amount of relief at being in his territory at last, but it vanished as soon as he opened the trunk.
Cecilia lay on her side, her dark hair draped over her face and her long-limbed body lax. The sedative he’d given her would last several hours, but he still handled her gingerly as he pulled her out, afraid that even small movements would disturb her.
His breath wheezed through the helmet’s filter as he stared down at her in his arms. He’d watched her sleep countless times. The shape of her lips and the fan of her lashes were intimately familiar to him. But he’d neverheldher. He never touched her at all.
Holding her in his arms while she slept was… different.
Sloane tucked her into his chest, mindful of her head, and hurried up the spiral staircase that ran up through the cliff and connected the garage to the watchtower. Most of the small fort was built within the cliffside, making it extremely defensible. It would take a small army to get through all the security he painstakingly laid down, and another one to actually break through the three foot thick concrete walls. Despite its closeness to the city, it was by far the most secure hideout he possessed — and therefore the only one he felt comfortable bringing Cecilia to.
The living quarters were undecorated, but he’d done his best to make them comfortable in the ways he understood. The bed he deposited Cecilia on was plush, and he’d gotten her favorite brands of body wash and shampoo for the shower. He’d even found her exact toothbrush and placed it by the sink. It sat there, unwrapped and ready for her, since he bought it six months prior.
There were no windows in the bedroom, but he’d placed string lights like the ones he observed in her apartment over the doorway, and a soft pink rug in the center of the floor. It was a weak imitation of her colorful world, but he was proud of what he’d managed to cobble together, all things considered.
And she looked damn good in his bed.
Sloane’s chest rose and fell with increasingly labored breaths as he slid his arms out from beneath her. Her head tilted to one side, revealing the perfect shapes of her profile and the nasty bruise left by the prick who pistol-whipped her.
A rumbling growl passed through the modulator. “Fucker,” he hissed, daring to curve his gloved fingers below her chin. “I’d kill him for you twice if I could.”
Cecilia didn’t respond. Her breathing remained even, undisturbed by his voice or his touch. The temptation to indulge his curiosity about the texture of her skin and hair, the scent of her and the feeling of her breath on his face was almost too much.
Sloane pulled himself back immediately.
Protecting her was his priority. It was the only thing that mattered. That included protecting her from himself.
Hissing at his own lack of self-control, he strode to the bathroom, where he kept an advanced med kit. He’d patch her up first, then see to everything else. Sloane ran through how much time they’d have before he was missed as he expertly extracted and organized the medical supplies he’d need.
It was a lucky thing that he’d just gotten off a week of local assignments. The members of Fracture had recently been forced into takingweekends,something none of them knew what to do with at first. That meant he had two days before anyone reported his disappearance to the captain.
Sloane grimaced. He wasn’t afraid of Kazimier. Realistically, he knew they were evenly matched. But he didn’t like his odds if the rest of Fracture hunted him, too.
And they would, if they thought he’d gone AWOL. They hadn’t just been trained to be threats to the populace. They were trained to kill each other, too.
Doesn’t matter,he decided as he began the painstaking process of plucking glass from the cuts in her knees, hands, and feet. Each shard reminded him of just how fragile she was, and every one of them was a recrimination of his failure.
If something as simple asglasscould hurt her, how could he expect her to survive in the world without his protection? Evena momentary lapse had put her at the mercy of three vampires. Only the gods knew what could happen if he left on an extended assignment. The thought of leaving her alone for months at a time sent chills down his spine.
Keeping her locked away in the Battery was the only choice.
Sloane used only the tips of his metal claw-caps to grip the rubbery bandages as he carefully placed them on her body. By the time he was done, she appeared to have more bandages than skin, but he wasn’t about to be too cautious with her.
Easing the blankets out from under and then over her sleeping form, he sat on the edge of the bed for a moment, his hands braced on his knees.
Sloane had gone days without sleep. He’d run hundreds of miles and scaled buildings with his bare hands. Nothing, in his extensive experience, left him as out of breath as tending to his doe.
His gaze was drawn back to her magnetically as he tried to find his normal rhythm.Beautifulwas the word to describe her.Perfectwas another.
The only beautiful, perfect thing in his entire fucked up existence. The only person who looked at him with doe eyes. The only person who asked him for his name. The only person whosmiled.
The only person he’d die to protect.
Sloane’s exhale shook as he surrendered to the urge to strip off one glove. Her right hand lay on top of the sheets, fingers curled loosely in sleep. Unsuspecting and breakable andthere.
His skin was a purple so pale it could be mistaken for white. It seemed like a painfully alien color against the warmth of her skin tone when he hovered his fingers over her knuckles. The tips of his real claws, diamond-hard and razor-sharp, touched the back of her hand first.
A flashing warning appeared in his peripheral vision. It was the heart rate alarm wired into the screen of his visor.
