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"Let's get her upstairs. " Chase's arm came around her again as he led them to the elevator that she knew was rarely used.
Not that the drink helped. Kia drank the wine Chase poured for her, then as the men gathered in the living room to discuss her, she escaped to the bedroom, Chase's bedroom, where Chase had directed the chauffeur with her luggage.
"Kia, come home. "
Her mother didn't waste time. The moment Kia stepped into the bedroom to unpack her bags, her mother was there, worried, her face still damp with tears.
Kia shook her head before setting her wineglass on the dresser and moving to the bags.
"I can't do that, Mom. " She wasn't going to do it. Whoever had destroyed her home had done her a favor in one way. It had forced her to stay exactly where she had wanted to be in the first place. With Chase.
She had opened the first case when her mother laid a hand on her arm.
Kia turned her head, staring into eyes similar to her own, into a face that was merely an older version of her own.
"You're in love with him, aren't you?" her mother asked softly.
Chase paused by the door, freezing as he heard Cecilia ask that question.
"I've always loved him, Mom," she said softly, and the admission tore through him with a slash of emotion.
Her voice was thick, filled with emotion, and it had his heart clenching in his chest.
"Kia, do you know what you're doing?" her mother asked. "Moving in with him? Has he told you he loves you?"
"He doesn't have to love me. "
Chase could almost see her expression. That stubborn tilt to her chin, the way her sapphire eyes brightened with determination.
"If it's all over tomorrow and he asks me to leave, then it will have been worth it, Mom. I hid all this time, not because of Drew, but partly because I can't stay the hell away from Chase any longer. "
"He's going to break your heart. " Cecilia sighed.
"Probably. " Kia's voice was soft. "But at least I'll know, Mom. It won't torment me any longer. "
"Knowing could torment you worse. "
Kia shook her head at her mother's sympathetic look.
"I don't think it could," she told her. "He's tormented me for years, Mom. Now, I just have to deal with it. "
She saw the understanding in her mother's face then, the elemental woman-to-woman communion; she understood that Kia could do nothing other than reach out for what completed her. If she managed to live long enough, because it sure as hell looked like someone wanted her dead.
Chase wasn't certain how the hell he managed to survive the hours, too many fucking hours, with an apartment full of people keeping him away from Kia.
He watched her as she helped her mother put together sandwich trays from the food that was delivered. She was still too pale, too fucking wounded.
He would never forget, as long as he lived, the feelings that had swept over him as he realized she was more worried about him than she was about herself.
She had been brutalized in that apartment. Her very existence ripped to shreds and threats sprayed in blood-red letters on her walls, and she had been worried about him.
And then later, hearing her admit she loved him, that she fully expected him to ask her to leave when this was over. Equal parts anger and lust had filled him.
She was wrapping herself around him in ways he knew he was never going to recover from. Because he couldn't imagine letting her out of his life now.
When her parents finally left, leaving them alone in the silence of his home, he turned to her, watching as she stacked the dishwasher, her movements graceful, though she appeared tired.
Hell, she was exhausted. It was nearly midnight. The detective had arrived for her statement, and that had worn her down. Her parents' worry and concern hadn't helped much. Her mother's pleas that she return with them to their home had been even harder on her, Chase thought.
