I blink. "Every single one?"
“Yes, little one.”
“What about your work?”
“I have six brothers for a reason,”he assures softly. “That’s what family is for.”
His arms pull me closer,his warmth enveloping me.
“You trust me?”he asks quietly.
“With everything,”I whisper.
“Good.”His lips touch my forehead. “Then let me keep you safe.”
My eyes drift shut.For the first time that day, I feel calmer and protected in his loving arms.
ERIK
She falls asleep with her head on my chest, breathing slow and steady. Her body is warm, relaxed from the release I helped her find, and safe in a way I swear I’ll spend the rest of my life protecting.
But I don’t sleep.
I slideher gently onto her side and sit up, pulling the laptop from under the bed where I hid it.
The camera feedfrom the street outside her shop loads instantly.
Camera 3, Alley, Offline → reconnecting…
Camera 3, Reconnected
Camera 3, Frame drop detected (0.7 seconds)
Camera 3, Attempted packet capture
My blood runs cold.Someone is watching. I close the laptop.
I slide deeperinto bed and wrap myself around her. “I’ve got you, little one,” I whisper into her hair. “No one will touch you.”
She sighs softlyin her sleep, leaning back into me. And I make a promise:They want access, but they’re going to learn what happens when they threaten what’s mine.
CHAPTER NINE
ERIK
One week later…
The air is charged when I pull into the garage, the kind that sets instincts on edge, the kind built out of too many years of reading danger before it had the courtesy to announce itself.
Inside, Claire’s curled on the couch under a blanket, laptop open beside her, chamomile half-finished. She looks soft. She looks safe. She looks like everything that storms try to break.
She looks like mine. “Power keeps blinking,” she murmurs.
“I already checked the grid twice today,” I say, pressing a kiss to the crown of her head. “I’ll run diagnostics again.”
“You always do.” She thinks it’s a quirk. It’s not. It’s survival.
The monitors show nothing obvious, but the third camera at her store, Camera3 reports -the alley feed logged another 1.4-second blackout at 15:02.
