Page 26 of Protecting Olivia

I was safe.

Chapter Eleven

Leo

I waited for Olivia’s breathing to even out before I closed my eyes. This was the second time she had awoken screaming from a nightmare. Each time she did it burned my gut and made me wish I could go back and kill the fuckers who hurt Olivia all over again.

I’d been trying to distance myself from her over the last sixteen plus hours. Reminding myself over and over again not to get close. She needed my full attention to be on the op – keeping her safe. If you allow emotions to dictate your decisions, you fail. And if I failed, people got hurt. Olivia deserved better than that. She was scared and confused. I wouldn’t take advantage of her vulnerability. I wasn’t that man. Even if it killed me to do so. I had to keep her at arm’s length. I was being a dick, but there was no other way but to push her away. She was cute as hell when she got annoyed with my one-word answers, which wasn’t helping my cause, but I had continued trying my hardest not to engage in conversation.

I must’ve been a closet masochist wrapping Olivia in my arms to sleep. I didn’t need to pull her so close, and I certainly didn’t need to breathe in her scent. Funny, she hadn’t put on any sort of perfume after our shower, but her hair still smelled sweet, like berries. I told myself I was holding her so she wouldn’t have another nightmare and I could get a few more winks of sleep. But that was total bullshit; I wanted to know what it felt like to have her in my arms. And now that I knew, I was fucked, completely and totally FUBAR.

I willed myself to sleep. The sooner this was over, the faster Olivia could go back to her life, and I could forget what beauty felt like.

***

“Yeah,” I answered my phone on the steering wheel, allowing the call to connect through the truck’s stereo.

We’d been on the road nearly seven hours and were almost out of Oklahoma approaching the Texas border. I made sure to be out of Olivia’s bed and dressed before she woke up. Neither of us spoke about her nightmare, or about me holding her all night. She whispered a thank you after I cleaned her wrist and rewrapped it but other than that, radio silence.

It had to be this way.

“Arabella has been calling your personal cell and is on hold on the office line,” Rena informed me. “She said it was an emergency.”

Emergency to my sister could mean anything from her losing her keys to someone being dead.

“Put her through.”

A second later my sister’s voice boomed through the speakers causing Olivia to wake up. “Where have you been?”

“What’s the emergency, Arabella?” I cut to the chase.

“I couldn’t find you,” she lowered her voice.

“You couldn’t find me? That’s the emergency? Jesus Christ.”

“I texted and called. You didn’t answer. It had been twenty-four hours. I got scared. The last time…the last time that happened…” Thankfully she didn’t finish her thought. Olivia was now wide awake listening to our conversation, and I didn’t want her to know what Bella was referring to.

“I’m fine, Bella,” I answered.

“Where are you?” she asked.

“Bella! I’m busy, I’ll call you later this week.”

“Be safe. I love you,” she whispered.

As much as I wanted to strangle her most of the time, there were times like these when I could hear the care and concern in her tone that I was reminded how much I loved my sister.

“Ditto.”

Without giving her a chance to ask any more questions, I hung up.

“Do you need me to stop?” I asked Olivia.

“No, thank you,” she replied and continued to stare out the passenger window.

I didn’t like hearing the sadness in her voice, but there was no other way.

She drifted back to sleep, and I called Zane. I pulled my secured cell out of the center console and dialed his number.