The gun slips from my fingers. Clatters to the floor.
Always here. Always watching. All those days. Those nights. Crying until I couldn't breathe. Drinking until I couldn't feel. Crashing my car into a wall at seventy miles an hour. Bleeding on my floor. Breaking apart piece by piece. And he knew? He was watching?
My heart starts skipping beats. The rhythm all wrong. Too fast. Then too slow. Then—
The temperature drops. Fast. Brutal. Ice spreads through my veins like poison. My breath fogs in the air between us.
The lights flicker. Once. Twice. The shadows in the corners thicken, press closer, angry on my behalf— Then darkness. Complete. Total.
My legs give out. I'm falling—
Two strong arms close around me before I hit the floor.
"I've got you," he whispers into the dark. "I've always got you."
His arms tighten around me. Possessive. Unbreakable.
"And I'm never letting go again."
And then nothing. Just black. And the feeling of being carried. Home.
39
DROGO
She's limp in my arms. Unconscious. Breathing steady but shallow.
The ghosts did this—her ghosts, protecting her the only way they know how. Shutting her down before the shock could break something vital inside her chest.
I carry her through the dark house, my eyes adjusting fast. Years of practice moving through shadows. Her body fits against my chest like it always did—perfectly, inevitably, like two pieces of the same broken thing finally pressed back together. The soft weight of her head rests against my shoulder, hair spilling over my arm. I can smell her—roses and vanilla from the perfume she wore for him, but underneath, the scent that's just Alena. The one I've been starving for. Warm skin and something darker, something only I know.
The bedroom is closer, easier. Those Egyptian cotton sheets she loves—the ones she spent twenty minutes touching in the store while I watched through security feeds, testing the softness against her cheek like a child.
But she hasn't showered yet. And I'll burn myself alive before I let any trace of that fucker touch her sheets.
The couch it is.
I lay her down gently. The black dress is bunched around her waist—elegant and destroyed all at once. I pull it down, cover her properly, make her decent even though there's no one here to see but me. Then I crouch beside her. Press a softkiss to her temple. Linger there, breathing her in, memorizing the feel of her skin under my lips after two years of screens and surveillance and distance.
My hand moves to her hair. Pushes a strand behind her ear. Traces the shell of it with my thumb.
"Rest, babe," I whisper against her skin. "All will be okay."
Lie. Maybe. Maybe not. Depends on how the next few hours go.
I stand. Button my shirt properly. Roll my shoulders back. There's work to do, and not much time to do it.
As I walk away from her a small smile forms at my lips. Ha! She shot at me!
• • •
The dining room looks like a crime scene. Candles still burning, wax pooling onto the table. Indian food cold on the plates. Her blindfold on the floor where she tore it off. The chair where he sat. The table where he spread her legs.
I grab her phone from where it's sitting face-down near a wine glass. Swipe it open—no passcode, never has been, trusts the world too much. Scroll through recent calls. Messages. Oliver's contact info stares back at me.
I delete his number. Block it. Delete the entire text thread. Every digital trace of him in her life—gone.
Then I walk to the wall. Grab the router. Rip it clean off—wires sparking, plastic cracking, the whole unit coming away in my hands. No internet means no way for her to contact Lucy, Marcus, anyone. No way to put herself in danger before I've had time to explain. Before I've had time to settle things between us.
