Page 56 of Love What's Left
Unfortunately, I agree. “You could have taken household security with you instead. But you left home without telling anyone. I was on a business trip and didn’t know about any of the scheduling issues until after the fact. Your private security team is separate from the rest.”
She frowns. “Why is that?”
I turn and sit on the edge of the desk, both to make eye contact and so I don’t loom over her. “You felt it was the same thing as maintaining separate bank accounts. You have your own and ones we share. Having your own employees was important to you, and it made sense to me. There’s a certain power dynamic if I pay the people in charge of your safety. I’d never use your guards against you, but you were uncomfortable with even the possibility of it.”
“If you got b-bored or angry with me, you could turn on me,” she says.
“I wouldn’t do that, but I know that’s how you feel.”
“Were you bothered by me having separate guards?” she asks.
“It was my idea.” Did her lack of trust in me burn? Like acid, but I was more than used to it. I fought the demons from her past the only way I knew how: by giving her tools to fight them herself.
She cuddles the cat. “Does this mean I s-stole the data for Markov?”
I shake my head. “I wouldn’t believe that in a million years.”
“Then why?”
“Protecting it?” I theorize.
She frowns. “Who would I . . . protect it from . . . but not report to you or your father?”
“Maybe you planned to and didn’t have time.” She had all night—didn’t leave our penthouse until ten the next morning, but maybe she felt it warranted an in-person conversation.
“Maybe,” she says doubtfully.
“Or maybe you’d already been drugged before you were taken, and you weren’t in your own right mind.”
She scrubs her temple.
“Does your head hurt? Do you need me to call the doctor?”
“No. I’ll be good.”
“You do know that I’m not talking about punishment, right?” I ask gently.
She blinks, then laughs nervously. “Oh. Yeah. No . . . Yes. I know.”
She sets Rufus on the floor, then walks to the wall of windows and stares out into the sunshine. “No more appointments alone. No PT or doctor or . . . no one. I want you or Dave next to me for all of them. Part of what freaked me out was d-doubting my own mind.”
“You got it.”
“I need a new doctor. It’s not her fault, but Dr. Frankhouser freaks me out,” she says.
“No problem.”
“I’m going to start taking my meds.”
In response to her declaration, a tiny chord of hope strums to life inside me. It’s enough to make the events of the morning feel like progress. That’s the funny thing about hope—it doesn’t have to be big to be loud.
Moving closer, I bend to kiss her. She stiffens and shies away. I freeze, then do the only thing I can. Straightening, I put some space between us.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers. “Until I know what I did . . .” She shakes her head.
“No apology necessary.” I give her a smile and wink and pretend she didn’t just put my heart through a cheese grater. “My kiss rocked your world. Take all the time you need to recover.”
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