Page 29 of Beyond Protection
It was 3:02 AM, and I moved on to concentrating on sounds. The radiator hissed every eleven minutes. The refrigerator hummed a flat B.
My phone sat dark on the nightstand. Silent for the last three days. Nearly a week past Thanksgiving, the quiet was more alarming than the threats.
847 documented images.
I rolled onto my side. The mattress springs squealed. Everything in Ma's house announced itself—you couldn't move through it quietly if you tried.
Downstairs, Eamon was on the basement fold-out. Twenty-three stairs away. I knew the exact path: through the kitchen, down the basement steps, turn left. The couch faced the ground-level window he didn't like.
My mind conjured an image without permission: Eamon asleep, one arm thrown across the pillow above his head. The grey hoodie pushed up from shifting in sleep, exposing the pale stretch of his stomach, with a trail of amber hair below his navel disappearing into his flannel waistband.
That flush he got so easily would fade in sleep, leaving just the freckles I'd noticed scattered across his forearms. His chest would rise and fall in the deep rhythm of actual rest—something I hadn't managed in days.
The sheet probably tangled around his legs, kicked half off because I'd bet he ran hot, always too warm in Ma's overheated house. His beard would be softer without the day's tension held in his jaw. Mouth slightly open. Vulnerable in a way he never allowed when conscious.
I'd sit nearby, looking.
I shoved the thought away, but it left heat in its wake.
Professional relationship. Bodyguard doing his job.
The bodyguard who'd made me tea yesterday without asking. Who'd positioned me away from windows without making me feel weak. Who'd looked at me in the rain and understood that sometimes you needed to feel something other than afraid.
The radiator hissed.
I tried Mom's breathing technique. Four counts in. Hold. Four out.
Made it through two cycles before my brain started calculating: if someone broke through that basement window, would Eamon hesitate? He'd mentioned failing once. Would that second cost—
Stop.
I sat up. 3:08 on the clock.
Water. That's all I needed.
The hallway floor announced every step. I gave up trying to be quiet, letting the house broadcast my presence.
I crept past Graham McCabe's firefighter portrait. Past my dad's wedding photo. Past ten-year-old me with a baseball bat taller than I was.
The kitchen light was already on.
Eamon stood at the stove, barefoot, in his grey hoodie and soft, worn flannel pants. Steam rose from Ma's dented kettle.
He'd pulled the hoodie down properly. Of course it was. My imagination had been working overtime.
"Chamomile," he said without turning. "Two bags. My mother's remedy for everything from insomnia to heartbreak."
I walked in. "Guess I'm not the only one who can't sleep."
"You're allowed." He poured into two mugs—one with faded shamrocks, one that saidWorld's Best Mom. "Three hours is standard for me anyway."
"That's not healthy."
"Neither is lying awake counting glow-in-the-dark stars." He glanced over his shoulder. "Forty-three, right?"
Heat crawled up my neck. "You counted them too?"
"When I worked with Michael on a case. I spent a night here in the guest room. He told me he put them up when he was twelve. Said the Big Dipper's wrong, but he was too stubborn to fix it."
