I'm not leaving her alone. Not after that nightmare. Not when she's this shaken.
But I'm not getting in that bed either.
This is the compromise. The hallway floor, outside her room where I can hear if she screams again, where I can get to her in seconds if she needs me.
Where I can keep my distance.
I lean my head back against the door and close my eyes, listening to her moving on the other side, the bed creaking, her settling in.
After a few minutes, silence.
I stay awake, counting her breaths, making sure they stay even, making sure the nightmare doesn't come back.
Somewhere around three in the morning, exhaustion wins.
I drift off right there, on the hallway floor, with my back against her door like a guard dog.
Keeping watch.
Keeping my distance.
Same as always.
I wake to the sound of movement.
The door behind me creaks just slightly and my hand is on my gun before my eyes are fully open.
Then I see her.
Isabella is standing in the doorway looking down at me with an expression I can't immediately read. Something soft and vulnerable moves across her face just a second before she realizes I'm awake and looking back at her. I don't know how long she's been standing there, how long she's been watching me on this floor before the door gave her away.
The second our eyes meet, her expression closes like a door shutting.
"I can’t believe you actually slept out here."
"I said I would."
She crosses her arms and her oversized shirt slips off her shoulder, her hair is loose and tangled from sleep and she looks like she got about as much rest as I did, which is to say barely any at all.
"That's ridiculous," she says.
"It's fine."
"The floor can't be comfortable."
"I've slept in worse places."
We look at each other and the silence stretches between us and gets heavy with everything that happened last night, with her crying in my arms and asking me to stay. I watch the memory move across her face in the few seconds before she looks away.
"I'm making breakfast," she grumbles.
She's embarrassed. About crying. About letting me hold her. About asking for comfort from the man she's supposed to hate and has very good reasons to.
And now I feel like even more of an ass.
"You don't have to?—"
"I'm hungry," she says, and she's already heading down the hallway without looking back, her footsteps quick on the stairs.
