Page 34 of Keep Me (Rebel Hearts Heists 2)
“Come on baby, we need to go. Take my hand.” The fuck I’m gonna take his hand! I mean yeah ok, I admit it, I’m terrified of heights.
Heights and spiders, these are my biggest fears and you know how they say that we need to face our fears to conquer them and become stronger? Yeah, that’s absolute bullshit, I’m more than comfortable with my fears, I actually like them quite a lot, thank you very much. After all, those very fears have been keeping me alive for over twenty-two years, so …
“Sloane, what are you waiting for? Let’s go. If they look outside, we’re fucked.” I look at Kaden’s dark blue eyes, the determined expression on his handsome face, the tightness of his perfect square jaw is the only thing that betrays his tension right now. His voice, while laced with a sense of urgency, is still pretty calm.
“I … I can’t.” I shake my head to convey the message that there’s no fucking way I’m walking on that ledge.
“Baby, we need to go. Take my hand, I got you.”
My heart is hammering wildly against my rib cage and a bead of sweat is running all the way down my spine, my breathing is labored and as my mouth opens to say something, no sound comes out.
I really can’t do this.
I turn to look at the window we just came from, and I see two shadows behind the cream colored curtains in the living room, just a few meters away from me. Alicia and River are standing by the full-length window and I see Blaine’s mother touch River’s shoulder while they’re engaged in some kind of conversation. Normally, I’d be pissed off that the woman won’t leave my man alone, especially now that she thinks he’s gay but I have no time to dwell on it. Kaden’s right, if Alicia looks outside, we’re fucked. But I’m still hesitant, my feet feel as heavy as concrete, rooted to the ground by my fear of heights.
“Sloane, baby, I got you. Please, trust me.” Kaden’s words snap me out of it and I don’t even have to think about it. I take his hand and let him help me over the railing and onto the ledge next to him.
If you’d told me a week ago that if asked to trust Kaden, I would’ve literally jumped into the unknown, I would’ve laughed or called you crazy. Last week, after he saved my ass in that boathouse by handcuffing me and placing me under arrest, I wouldn’t have trusted Kaden with shit. But we talked, we angry fucked, we fucked again and he opened his heart to me. Both by telling me that he loves me and by promising me that he has a plan to make sure that regardless of how this ends, we’ll be together. The five of us. And when he said that, I looked into the blue depths of his eyes and I knew he meant every word. I know that he’s committed to me and to the others. He’d do anything for ‘Us.’
So yeah, I trust Kaden but man, this is some bullshit. Face your fears, they say. You’ll come out stronger, they say. Who the fuck says this shit, seriously?
Let me set it straight for you, this is what happens when you face your fears: I’m perched on a fucking ledge, barely wide enough for my size seven shoes—obviously I couldn’t have done this in sneakers, no sir. I’m wearing high heeled stilettos because of that stupid high rollers game and my balance is precarious enough without counting the fact that my knees feel like jelly and my teeth are chattering. My hands are gripping the wrought iron of the railing so hard that they’re certainly turning white and my whole body feels like it’s made of stone and rubber at the same time. Stone because I’ve tensed up so much that all my muscles are on high alert, rubber because at the same time, I have no strength left to control my movements, because all my effort is being used not to plummet to my death in this warm winter night in Monte Carlo. So my fears aren’t going anywhere for the time being and neither am I, I think while closing my eyes to avoid looking down at the tiled floor of the extensive gardens that surround the hotel’s main building.
“Baby, we need to start moving. Look, the balcony of our suite is only about a hundred feet. We’ll be in our room in no time.”
I would shake my head but I really, really can’t move. So I force myself to speak. “I can’t Kaden. I can’t even keep my eyes open or I’ll look down. I’m shaking, if I move, I know that I’ll fall.”
Kaden’s voice is firm and calm, the only thing that is keeping me from totally freaking out right now. All my energy is being used to hold onto that railing, so I don’t realize what’s happening until I feel Kaden’s strong fingers over mine. He’s trying to get me to let go of the railing and take his hand.
“I … I can’t. I can’t,” I cry, tightening my grip on the railing and shaking so hard that one of my ankles turns and due to the precarious support of my heels, I almost totally lose my balance.
It happens so fast and I barely realize I’ve let go of my grip on the railing to try and balance myself by flailing my arms around.
It’s just by sheer luck that I fall sideways rather than forward and I don’t know how but Kaden catches me and lifts me up in his arms, so I find myself chest to chest with him and instinctively wrap my legs around his hips. So I’m in his arms but my back is now to the void behind me. The tears that I was barely holding in, decide to spill out as the floodgates open and I hide my face in the crook of his neck.
“Baby, you’re ok. I got you. See? I’m going to walk us to our room, you just need to hold onto me, ok? Don’t let go until I put you down on the inside of our balcony. Got it?”
His clean scent of cotton and sunscreen and the low, deep sound of his voice soothe me enough that I can murmur a shaky, “Yes”. I can feel him moving on the ledge, step after step and he’s solid and steady, confident and fast. I whimper when I feel him try to lift me away from him but he tells me that we’re there and he’s just lifting me over the railing of our balcony and onto safety.
As soon as my feet feel the ceramic tiles of the balcony, my knees totally give in and I slump on the floor, opening my eyes to see Kaden step inside the balcony. He lifts me in his arms again, holding me against his chest as I can finally cry without holding back as the tension gradually leaves my body and I’m wracked by shuddering sobs. I feel weak and defeated, this isn’t me, I don’t usually cower in the face of danger. Kaden walks inside his bedroom directly from the sliding door of the balcony and sits on his bed with me still in his arms.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, still crying. “I almost killed us because of my fear. I—” Kaden’s hand cups my jaw and he looks into my eyes with a serious warmth in his dark blue gaze.
“Baby, you never have to apologize to me. We all have fears and we all have shit that will paralyze us when faced with it. Just remind me not to take you skydiving for our first anniversary.”
I’m giggling and crying at the same time when his lips find mine and sweep me into a tender kiss. I taste the saltiness of my own tears and Kaden’s soft lips that still bear the remnants of the sweetness of the rum he was drinking earlier in the casino.
“You aren’t the only one who ever got paralyzed by fear, Sloane. It happened to me too.” That sounds unlikely, Kaden is always so confident and steady, I don’t think that anything could ever stop him.
“You’re just saying that to make me feel better.”
He tilts his head to the side, running the back of his slightly calloused hand down my cheek. “No, baby. I’m really not. Why do you think I never told you about being undercover? I knew you wouldn’t betray me with the others. But really, I was afraid that you’d choose. That you’d see my circumstances as incompatible with all of us staying together. And by Seattle, I knew that was what you wanted. So I was scared that you’d sacrifice me. Not because you cared less about me but because it might’ve made sense to you to sacrifice one relationship to save the other three. It wasn’t lack of trust, it was fear of losing you. And my fear made me keep quiet and ended up almost costing me you. I can jump off a cliff, be on a ledge, walk through fire for you but the only thing that stops me, is the fear of losing you.”
I believe him, his eyes are full of emotion and honesty is shining in those deep blue irises.
I kiss him again, as softly as he kissed me before and I utter a promise that I know I’ll keep until my last dying breath. “I love you, Kaden. As long as you feel the same way, you’ll never lose me. None of you will.”
Because this is the thing with these men: when I think that I’m permanently tied to one of them, I realize that the connection is just as deep with the others. They all get me in their own unique way, they all love me and protect me and right now it doesn’t matter how this all started and how it might even end because this is what I want. I want them. I want them to keep me.
