Page 71 of The Silent Princess

“So you do not run away from me because we went too fast.” A small frown settles on her face.

“How many?” she signs abruptly.

“What?”

“How many women before…me?”

“You really want to know?” She shakes her head. Honesty. We need honesty, but telling her could hurt her, and that is the last thing I want to do. Still, I have lived ten more years of experience, which is a fact I cannot undo. Do not be stupid. Think.

“There have been other women. But it was never serious. In a way, we are both equal now, as in, this is the first time in my life that I feel this way for someone.”

“What do you mean?”

“Like the sun will not rise tomorrow if you do not talk to me anymore, kind of way.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah,” I shrug nonchalantly, whereas my heart pounds under my ribs at the admission, “I have never felt like this. Never brought a woman here, never had a proper date or tried to make anyone laugh. Does my past matter so much to you? If it does, I will tell you everything you want to know, truly, just shoot.”

“What if my pace isn’t fast enough for you? What if you get tired of being patient and leave me to fend for myself?”

“Never. Never,” I assure her. “It would be the opposite: you wanting to leave when you understand how obsessed I am with you.”

“How?”

“Promise not to run?”

“Tell me.” I sigh, jumping from the cliff.

“I have been watching you through the building cameras all evening. Ordered a complete report on your family situation, banking assets, medical records, and day-to-day habits. I have been putting into place a new security system around your dad and you for when it is safe to go out, and I opened bank accounts in your name to deposit money for your studies and your father’s care.” Her lips part, speechless.

“And I have been wanting to put a tracker in your phone, but I was debating the ethics of it. I mean, no, not really; I just did not have time to do so. See? Obsessed does not even cover it.”

“Have you ever heard of the word, um…”

“Boundaries?”

“Uh-huh.”

“It is a concept I am aware of.”

“Tristan.”

“Ella.” She looks away as I eat the inside of my cheek, like I am about to sign the biggest contract of my career. “How mad are you, from one to ten?” I wasn’t about to start a relationship based on lies. Hence, if we are to go for the long run, she would discover that side of me soon enough.

“I have two requests.”

“Shoot.”

“Put the tracker in my phone,” she signs fast.

“And the second?” I swallow, bracing for impact.

“Kiss me.”

Ella

Have I lost my mind? Maybe. Then if I have, at least I can pinpoint the exact moment it happened. When the man who encapsulated my prayers in human form admitted to crossing every moral line to get to me. Not in the traditional romantic way I read about. Nor the buying roses and texting goodnight kind of way. In the obsessed, consumed, sliding-under-your-skin, stalker way. And why my stomach churned with butterflies at his admission instead of telling me to throw up is, I gather, the proof that perhaps Tristan and I, as much as we try to say the opposite, are way more alike.