Page 215 of Romeo

“And no stopping for milk or bread or anything else between the driveway and the front door.”

I laughed softly. “I think I can manage the distance.”

“Good.”

I rested my forehead against the steering wheel for a second, no longer fighting the fact that hearing him had helped.

“Goodnight, Jasper.”

“Goodnight, Ma Belle.”

The call ended and I stayed in the car for another minute while the engine idled, looking at my reflection in the dark phone screen. My hands had finally stopped shaking, but fear remained somewhere beneath everything else, familiar enough that I knew better than to expect it to disappear because one man had driven away.

Fear had followed me for years.

It had slept beside me when I was fifteen, pregnant and living on the street. It had curled around me on nights when I had nowhere safe to sleep and every noise in the darkness made me wonder who might be coming. Even after Granny gave me a room and a key and a home nobody could throw me out of, some part of me had kept waiting for safety to disappear.

Tonight had found that old place easily.

I looked toward the porch.

The light Granny always left on for me glowed beside the front door.

Jasper’s voice still lingered in my head too.

I’m here.

He wasn’t physically here. Frank had been the one who pulled into that gas station. Granny was waiting inside. Georgie was probably already planning to assign half the Sons of Hell to follow me around town.

I wasn’t alone.

Maybe that was the part fear always tried hardest to make me forget.

I turned off the car, picked up my phone, and sent the text I’d promised Frank.

Me: I’m home.

His response arrived almost immediately.

Frank: Good. Lock your doors. I mean it, Fiona.

Me: I will.

Frank: Georgie wants you to call him. He’s worried.

Me: Tell him I’m okay.

Frank: Tell him yourself. You know how he gets.

I smiled as I climbed out of the car.

Yes.

I knew exactly how he got.

CHAPTER FORTY

Romeo