“I love this, lying here naked with you wrapped in my arms,” I told her softly. “I love it just as much as when I’m inside you.”
“Me too.” Alyssa exhaled slowly, then raised her head and set her chin on my chest. “How are you so perfect? I feel like there is no way this can last. It’s just too…perfect.”
I tucked some wayward strands of her hair away from her face and smiled as my fingers brushed her cheek. “Get used to it, baby. I’m not going anywhere, and if you think I’m perfect, I’m not going to try to change your mind.”
She giggled, and I pulled her up for a soft kiss before settling her against me once more. “Rest, baby. I worked you hard tonight, and I already want you again.”
“Is that so?” she asked slyly as her fingers walked across my stomach and headed down my trail of hair.
I caught her hand and grumbled, “No. You need to rest.”
She sighed and laid her arm across my chest. I wasn’t surprised when her breathing deepened not even a minute later.
There was a lot of shit for us to work out once the real world intruded, but if the rest of my life was even a fraction as good as the past couple of weeks, then our future together would be amazing.
A sound woke me a few hours later, though I wasn’t sure what it was. I slipped out from under Alyssa, careful not to wake her, and sat up on the side of the bed. Silently, I opened the drawer of the nightstand and withdrew my Glock. Then I heard it again. A faint squeak.
I quickly pulled on a pair of jeans and padded across the carpet to the closed bedroom door. When I didn’t hear anything again, I opened the door and slipped into the hall without making a sound. Then locked it from the inside before closing it again. I made my way down the hall to the top of the stairs and stopped short when I spotted the source of the sound.
With the house surrounded by woods and only a sliver of a moon, the house was unusually dark, so all I could make out was a shadowy figure standing on the stairs. They were paused and twisted around as though to communicate with the other shadowy figure in the front entryway.
“I saw a light on in the master, but you check the other rooms down there,” the one on the steps whispered. He’d spoken so low, I almost hadn’t heard him, but the other figure must have because he hurried away. As he rounded the corner, I saw the small amount of light coming through the skylights glint off a gun in his hand. Rage built inside me when I realized the motherfuckers were probably here for Alyssa.
The man on the stairs began moving up again, and I moved to block the top, then racked the slide on my gun—causing the shrouded figure to freeze—and aimed it at him.
“Don’t take another fucking step,” I snarled.
9
Alyssa
I wasn’t sure what woke me, but I went from being deep asleep to wide awake in the blink of an eye. Rolling over, I was surprised to find the other side of the bed empty. Garrison tended to stick close to me—to the point where I always knew where he was. Even when he just needed to use the bathroom in the middle of the night, he woke me up with a kiss before slipping out of bed.
Cranky from having my sleep interrupted, I’d asked him about it on our second night in the house. My heart had melted at his explanation—that he wanted to make sure I always felt safe and waking up to an empty room while people were after me was bound to scare me. I’d thought he was just being sweet, but it turned out he was right…I was beyond freaked out right now. For him to have left me alone sleeping, something bad must’ve happened.
Crawling off the mattress as quietly as possible, I snagged the T-shirt he’d left on the floor and pulled it over my head. Then I tiptoed over to the dresser and held my breath as I opened one of the drawers to grab a pair of sweatpants. Being caught undressed by crooked cops wouldn’t be my fault, but I had a feeling Garrison would punish me for it anyway. And probably not the fun kind of discipline if they actually saw me naked. But first, we had to make it through whatever was happening for me to worry about that.
Some of the supplies Patch had brought us on the first day were weapons. I’d thought the guns, knives, and ammunition were a little bit of overkill, but not so much anymore.