Page 131 of Single Mom's Daddies
But at night?
At night, the silence is honest.
No one needs me to plan. To defend. To decide.
I can breathe out the weight I carry all day and let my shoulders drop for a few rare, stolen minutes.
It’s not about checking the perimeter. Not anymore. It started that way, back when Roman used to worry about car bombs and Victor double-checked every window latch. I took the two a.m. shift like it was my birthright. Not because I liked it—because Ineededit.
But over time, it stopped being duty.
It became ritual.
The gravel path around the outer fence crunches under my boots in the same rhythm every night. I pass the rose arbor, the gazebo, the north greenhouse with the too-expensive orchids Aunt Olenna swears she didn’t smuggle in from Belarus. The ritual of it gives me peace.
Sometimes I cut through the woods, let the branches catch my coat, the underbrush scrape my boots. It’s mostly been cut down to make room for more outbuildings, but there are enough trees to get lost in for a little while. There’s something about the way the forest wraps around the back of the property that feels like protection. Like the trees themselves are on our payroll.
I like the dark. I like how it narrows the world down to what I can hear and feel. I like that the moonlight shows just enough to keep me from walking into a bench, but not enough to distract me. I like the cold.
It reminds me I’m alive.
The gravel paths are still dusted with blood at the edges. The marble threshold still bears the faint ghost of a boot scuff that wasn’t ours. Or maybe it doesn’t, but I still see it. Feelit. But those things are shadows now—lingering reminders of something we survived.
The kids are safe. Ivy is healing. Saffron is glowing in a way I didn’t think was possible for someone who used to sleep with one eye open. It’s funny—how quickly things change.
Just months ago, I didn’t think about trust funds or prenatal vitamins or what kind of bedtime story a kid would want after a gunfight. I thought about perimeter defenses and routes out of the country. I thought about how many bullets were left in a clip.
Now I wonder if Ivy will like the new piano piece I’ve been working on. If the baby will have her mother’s laugh. If I’ll ever be able to hold all this goodness in my hands without dropping it.
I stop near the back fence, take a deep breath, and stare out at the dark tree line. It’s peaceful. Not the brittle peace we used to chase with blood and threats. Real peace.
It took us years to build this life. To turn the estate from a fortress into a home. To turn bloodstained money into clean inheritance. To turn fear into bedtime stories and late-night cuddles with Ivy and Alex and Mila.
And still, I walk. I walk because there’s still a part of me that doesn’t believe we made it. That part of me expects something in the dark. Something sinister?—
“You always did this, you know.” The voice comes from behind me, low and gravel-worn.
I stiffen. Then glance over my shoulder.
Uncle Max stands a few feet back on the path, hands in the pockets of his coat, shoulders hunched against the wind. Helooks older than he used to. Softer in the middle, rougher around the edges. It’s hard to see in the dark, but the old bastard has one hell of a sunburn.
“I didn’t hear you coming.”
He shrugs. “Didn’t try to be heard.”
Which is what makes him our best assassin, even at his age. “Didn’t think anyone noticed I was out here.”
He snorts. “You think I wouldn’t notice a little kid wandering the perimeter alone at midnight?”
“Little kid?” I blink. “You…saw me? Back then?”
“First time I saw you, you were ten,” he says, stepping closer. “Wearing your brother’s boots. Too big. You kept tripping on the gravel.”
My mouth twitches. Roman’s boots are still too big for me to fill. I hope to never need to.
“I figured if I stopped you, you’d feel like you’d done something wrong. You hadn’t. So, I let you go.” He shrugs. “Watched you from the window every night after that in case of trouble.”
“Why didn’t you stop me?”
