Page 29 of Under His Watch

“No.” I’d told her that plain and simple answer three times now.

“I’m just saying. You’re so tall and… and…” She frowned, gesturing at me. “Big. I’m petite and short. I’d fit better on the couch, whereas you’d fit well on the bed.”

I shook my head. The only way I’d compromise on those assigned sleeping arrangements was if I shared the bed with her.

Pushing her would be wrong. Until I could better gauge how she was feeling and coping, I couldn’t insist on anything from her. It had to be her reaching out to me. It had to be her signal that she wanted to be held again—or anything else.

For the next few days, we settled into a routine. I stayed busy on my laptop, searching through all the intel that came in from our spies. I spent a significant amount of time on the phone with Andy. Then my father. Then Franco. Plus other spies. After the Devil’s Brothers dared to set foot on my land, the stakes were higher. Tensions were raised. It was still a waiting game of wondering who’d strike next. We wouldn’t until we were ready, because nothing good came from being rash with enemies like those biker bastards and the devious Giovannis.

Trying to give all my attention to preparing to fight our enemies had become my project, and every moment I spent working was one more method of trying to rise above the pressure building between me and Tessa.

She wasn’t idle either, on the phone—a new one my father sent here—with Nina. Or she read the e-reader app on the device. When she wasn’t doing that, she set herself to giving this dated, dusty cabin a very thorough, deep clean.

“You don’t have to,” I scolded her the first time she set up to clean.

“Iwantto.” She shrugged. “It’s how I was raised.”

I scoffed. “To be an obedient, good girl?”

She sighed. “Basically. But I like things tidy, too. It’s rewarding to clean something up and see it sparkle.”

Her hangup with being an “obedient, good girl” was something I intended to revisit later, but I left her to it. Whatever made her happy, and if dusting and mopping satisfied her, I wouldn’t stand in her way.

Before long, I realized we’d fallen into a roommate sort of situation. While I wouldn’t say she grew more distant, she seemed less likely to strike up a conversation or look my way. At first, I thought she was nervous about interrupting my calls. I told her that she was my priority too, and she waved that comment off.

I was stuck between not wanting to push but desperate to reach her and know that she was coping and recovering, not hiding how much she still suffered. I Had no idea how to achieve that fundamental closeness I'd felt when sitting on the bed with her at the other place.

On the fourth night, I finally got a hint of how poorly she was coping. It came in the middle of the night, when the rain from the evening’s storm passed through with a steadier pattern on the roof.

Earlier, the deluge pounded the cabin so hard that the thrum of precipitation cut out all other noises. I got up to check on Tessa, making sure she could sleep through it. And she was fine, dozing deeply. I returned to the small couch, hating that I was stuck with this distance between us.

Why won’t she reach out to me again?Ever since she learned that I was in the Mafia, she was staying away. She seemed so determined to appear strong, not needing anything from me, but I refused to be duped that easily.

The cry that came from her room suggested otherwise, that she was scared and feeling hopeless. If she was scared of storms, I’d comfort her. I was over the top, smitten and obsessed with this woman, but it didn’t stop me from checking on her.

“Tess?” I loved the nickname she preferred. “Tess?”

I entered the only bedroom where she slept. In the darkness, I made out the shape of her alone on the bed. Crying. Whimpering.

Fuck.I hated to see her distraught.

“Tessa?”

Shit. It looked like she was dreaming. A nightmare, judging by the tight features of her strained face and the tears on her cheeks.

Tess.I swallowed past the emotions clogging my throat. This woman, still so much a stranger, moved me to struggle with myself. Her happiness would make mine possible.

“Tess, it’s me. It’s okay. Wake up.” I sat on the edge of the bed, brushing her hair from her face.

“No. Don’t. No! don’t let them…” She sobbed harder, and it broke me.

“Tess!” I had to snap her out of this night terror. If she was reliving the rape, I had to break the memories and spare her more pain.

“Tess. It’s me. Romeo. Wake up.” I shook her harder, digging my thumbs into the smooth skin of her upper arms as I lifted her slightly off the bed. It killed me to witness her distress, trapped in her mind.

“They’re coming for me,” she mumbled in her sleep.

Fuck that. No one would come after her for the sake of malice ever again.

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