Faith, still on all fours, looked up at me with wine-bright eyes. “Those are the abs in question, yes.”
“I thought you said he was emotionally unavailable!”
“He is!” Faith tried to stand again, grabbed my leg for support, and nearly pulled my jeans down in the process. “Very, very emotionally constipated.”
“I’m standing right here,” I said, hitching my pants back up while trying to keep an eye on the lamp.
“We know,” both women said in unison, then burst into fresh giggles.
Harper finally lowered the lamp, squinting at me suspiciously. “You made her think you didn’t want her.”
“That’s not?—”
“And then you show up here, all”—she waved the lamp vaguely at my entire person—“tall and brooding and door-bursting.”
“Someone could have been hurting her,” I argued. Why was I arguing? And who the hell was this woman?
“The only one getting hurt here is you, buddy.” Harper hefted the lamp again. “Should I hit him one more time, Faith?”
“Maybe?” Faith was using the back of the couch to keep herself upright, swaying like a boat in rough seas. “Just a little one? For the emotional constipation?”
I glared at Faith. “Tell your lamp-wielding bodyguard to stand down.”
Faith doubled over laughing. Not a polite chuckle. Full-body, tears-streaming-down-her-face, gasping-for-air laughter that made her whole frame shake.
I pressed a hand to my shoulder, checking for blood. “This is funny to you?”
“She—” Faith could barely get the words out. “She hit you with a lamp!”
The lamp-wielding woman looked simultaneously horrified and proud, the ceramic base still clutched in her hands. But she seemed to process what had just happened, her face falling into regret. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know you werehim. I thought you were?—”
“An intruder?” I rubbed my shoulder, my ribs, my stomach, and what was definitely going to be a bruise on my back.
“Yes.”
Faith waved her hand dismissively, still giggling. “He’s fine. Ryker has a very hard body.”
I quickly surveyed the scene: two empty wine bottles on the coffee table, two glasses, soft rock playing from her speaker, and Faith in yoga pants and an oversize sweater that kept sliding off one shoulder. Her hair was messy, her cheeks flushed, her eyes bright with laughter.
“Tell me what’s going on.” I shut and locked the door behind me. I’d retrieve the spilled takeout food later. “Now.”
“Girls’ night!” Faith announced, stumbling toward me on unsteady legs. She pressed both palms against my chest, looking up at me with watery eyes. “You’re interrupting girls’ night, Ryker.”
I stared down at her upturned face, and something in my chest cracked open. Despite the frustration simmering beneath my skin at how reckless this was, I couldn’t bring myself to scold her. Not when she looked like this. Flushed. Laughing. Light in a way I’d never seen her.
God, she was beautiful when she wasn’t drowning. This was Faith without the murder charge hanging over her head. Without the constant fear shadowing her eyes. Without the weight of a world determined to crush her. This was the woman she might have been if life hadn’t carved her hollow with its cruelty.
And I ached for her. For this version of her that existed only in stolen moments and wine-soaked evenings.
I wanted to bottle this. Keep it. Give it back to her every single day for the rest of her life.
What would it be like to come home to this? To her laughter ringing through my penthouse, a friend on the couch, an empty wine bottle, evidence of nothing more sinister than a good time? The thought wrapped around my ribs and squeezed until I couldn’t breathe. It was so gloriously, painfully ordinary. The kind of life other people took for granted.
I wanted to give her that. Mundane Tuesday nights. Lazy Sunday mornings. A thousand unremarkable moments strung together like pearls, each one precious because she was finally, finally safe.
If I won this case … no,whenI won this case, I would build that life around her. I would tear down every threat, silence every storm, and hand her a world where the only thing she had to worry about was whether we had enough wine for the next girls’ night.
And if she let me, I’d spend the rest of my days just existing in her orbit. Watching her joy. Guarding her peace.
