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“It’s not lockdown. It’s—for God’s sake, can you give me a second to finish pissing?”
“I’m not stopping you from peeing.You’restoppingmefromleaving!” My voice is fishwife shrill, but I don’t care. It’s the same fear in my belly now that I felt when I woke up in the Bloodhound’s filthy warehouse.
He finishes and turns to the sink to wash his hands. The tendons on his neck stand out like iron cables from the tension humming in his body. “I don’t know how many times I’m going to have to say this, Sloan: you were kidnapped from our driveway. Do you remember that? You can’t ask me to protect you half-fucking-way. I’m an all-or-nothing kind of guy.”
“So I go from beinghisprisoner toyours?”
“I’m not stopping you from going anywhere, Sloan. This is for you and your protection. Because you’re important to me and Idon’t want to risk your safety. I’m sorry if you think this is too much, but you’re wrong.”
“Might as well wrap me in bubble tape, too. Maybe have a moat dug around the house and fill it with alligators.”
“Don’t be so dramatic. You can come and go as you please, but you have to take a security guy with you.”
He shrugs like having an armed babysitter is no big deal, but I seem to remember his being quite put out at the idea of me hanging around and watchinghisevery move.
“Absolutely not!”
“Then feel free to invite your friends here instead.”
He brushes past me. I follow him into the closet. “Beck, I swear, call off your watchdogs or…” I don’t have a good threat at the ready, so I fumble for the first thing that comes to mind: “Or you aren’t going to see another naked boob until you’re reincarnated as a newborn.”
He throws his head back and laughs. “Princess, if I never see another boob for as long as I live, the memory of yours will guide me through the rest of my days.”
I scowl, mostly so I don’t smile instead. “Could you just call off your watchdogs? Or tell one to get ready to hear about menstrual cramps and nipple cream?”
He grins viciously. “Oh, yeah? Maybe throw in some chitchat about hemorrhoids and I’ll drive you myself.”
Tell him,begs that pesky voice in my head.Tell him why you were taken, whose fault it is, who is the one pulling the strings. Tell him and he’ll make it stop. Just tell him.
But I don’t.
I won’t.
I can’t.
I might be drowning in a sea of darkness, but I’ll be damned if I take the one good thing that’s ever happened to me down with me.
9
BECK
It’s been three days since the blowout over the security “lockdown.” Sloan has taken to singing jail songs while she’s doing laundry and referring to herself by a made-up prisoner ID number. I don’t give a fuck what she calls herself as long as I know where she is and that she’s safe.
And as long as she still comes to my bed at night.
While she’s awake, she doesn’t want to even look at me, but at night, in her sleep, she wraps herself around me like I’m the last life raft left in the ocean.
Not that I mind. I like having her beside me.
When I leave the home gym and head to the kitchen for a drink, I catch Sloan eating at the counter. She gives me a wary glance as I enter, then goes back to her food.
“Dr. Ross will be by around two this afternoon,” I inform her as I start to blend together a protein shake.
“Dr. Ross?”
I nod. “I checked with the team doc, and he says Ross is the best obstetrician in the Seattle area. And this way, you don’t have to risk going out just to get checked. He’ll come here.”
Her jaw clenches. “I don’t need a doctor to come to the house. I have a doctor.”
