Close Protection

Chapter 33 Daphne

33 Daphne

The sun shines bright in my eyes as I stir awake, feeling Milosh’s chest rising and falling below me. Yesterday, just as Milosh said, two men showed up at the cottage. One was a sketch artist and one was from Interpol, here to take Ryan away for further questioning. The sketch artist was remarkably talented and managed to draw the necklace so that it looked almost exactly as I described it, so I’m feeling pretty good about the plan. Milosh explained to me that after they find the location where my family is being kept, a specialist firearms command unit will breach.

When Milosh spoke with his major he set up a safe house for us to stay in until this is over. Davis also told us that he’d send a car to take us, the sketch artist and the Interpol team up to the safe house. After the team left we packed up our things and took the car, driving back to England where the safe house is.

We got here late last night and crashed on the sofa, sticking in one of the DVDs we took from the cottage before promptly falling asleep. All we need to do now is sit and wait for everything to come together and hopefully I’ll see everyone again soon.

Now, I sit up off of Milosh and start massaging the crook of my neck. After a few minutes, I hear Milosh start to stir.

‘Good morning.’ I smile, looking back at him.

He flashes a sweet unguarded smile in return before speaking, his voice deep from sleep. ‘Good morning, Miss Green.’ He sits up and stretches his neck, and I can practically see the tension in his delts.

Leaning back, I bring my hands around his shoulders and start kneading into them. I work on the knots until they melt away, then move on to his back, languidly trailing my fingers up and down.

‘Feel better?’ I ask after five minutes.

‘Feels amazing, baby, even though I should’ve been the one doing that to you, given it’s your birthday and all.’

I pause. ‘How did you know it’s my birthday?’

‘It’s my job to know everything about you, Miss Green.’ He rises and walks over to his duffel, fishing something out.

‘Here.’ He pushes a small box into my hand and comes to sit back down.

‘You got me a gift?’

‘It’s only small,’ he states gruffly.

My heart blooms when I carefully open the box to reveal a light pink fob watch.

‘For when you start wearing scrubs,’ he explains.

I bite down on my lower lip and fight the tears that are threatening to invade my face. There’s no way he could’ve bought this yesterday; which means he must have got it before we even officialized everything, before we even spoke about my career choices at the gala, and purposefully packed it in his bag when we were rushing out of the house amidst all the stress and worry.

‘I think… I think I’ll be able to get good use out of this.’ I wrap my arms around his neck and he wraps his arms around my waist.

‘Thank you,’ I whisper into his neck, the first tear falling silently. ‘Thank you so much, Milo. This means more to me than you could ever imagine.’

‘I’m glad. Happy birthday, Daphne.’

We stay like this for a moment as I start silently sobbing. When Milosh realizes what’s happening he pulls away to look at me, worry lining his face.

‘Hey, what’s wrong?’ His thumb comes to my cheek, drying my tears.

‘Nothing, I just… I think this is gonna work out. You and me.’

He smiles fully and it’s absolutely devastating. ‘I think so too.’

My tongue juts out to lick my bottom lip and his gaze darkens as he follows the movement. ‘You want me to make you some bacon and pancakes?’

‘Yes, please,’ I answer. ‘I’ll have a quick shower while you do it.’

‘Okay.’

Neither of us moves.

Milosh’s eyes are still lingering on my lips with a hungry gaze. A gaze that I don’t think even bacon and pancakes could fix.

‘Are you going to kiss me, Mr Petrov, or are you going to stare at me all day?’

‘Such a little smart-mouth.’ He chuckles, crashing his lips down to mine. One of his hands comes to the nape of my neck, angling my head, while the other bears down on my hip. His tongue is punishing as it dominates my mouth, so much so I have to grab his shoulders for stability.

‘Yes, but I’m your smart-mouth,’ I whisper against his lips, my breathing slightly laboured.

He pulls back a fraction. ‘I guess you are.’

My hands trail along the breadth of his shoulders as I drop my mouth to his jaw and start placing kisses along it.

‘So, I was wondering…’ He pauses for a moment when I nip at his earlobe, his heady sigh filling the room.

‘Hmm?’

‘I was… wondering if you could teach me some sign language?’

I pause on his neck. ‘You want me to do what?’ I raise my head to meet his gaze.

‘I want you to teach me sign language.’ His hand relaxes on my hip as his thumb traces lazy circles on it. ‘It was beautiful watching you sign at the gala, but it also made me realize there’s a whole group of people I’m unable to communicate with, one of them being someone who means a lot to you, so I wanna learn. Well, that and the fact that talking without speaking is pretty cool.’

I stare at him for a moment, at a complete loss for words. ‘You want to learn sign language to be able to speak to my cousin better?’

‘If it’s important to you, it’s important to me.’

‘Well, all right then.’ I smile. ‘Let’s start with the alphabet. Once you learn this, if you ever get stuck on a word you can just spell it out.’

For the next hour I teach him the alphabet and the basic words, pancakes completely forgotten until my stomach starts to grumble.

‘Let me make you some breakfast,’ Milosh suggests.

‘Okay, I’ll go have a shower, then after I can start teaching you the days of the week.’

He places a sweet kiss on my cheek and walks out of the room.

I grab all my shower bits out of my bag, along with another clean dress and some underwear, and head up to the bathroom, smiling to myself. He bought me a watch for my scrubs and asked to learn sign language so he can talk to my cousin better. He’s crossing off all the love languages faster than I thought possible.

My shower is quick, and as I moisturize I can smell a delicious waft of bacon which spurs me to get ready faster so I can eat. I untie my hair, letting it cascade down my back and pick up my perfume with haste to give myself a few spritzes.

I pause when I hear a light clinking noise. Lifting the bottle up again, I turn it upside down and squint to see if anything moves. The liquid is quite dark and the bottle has a slight tinge to it, but I can just about make out a floating object.

Walking to the window I hold it up to the light, and sure enough my mother’s necklace is inside my new perfume bottle.

Of course it is.

Because that’s a fantastic place to hide something.

I think about how the Daveeno boys completely trashed my room and how many times they must’ve unknowingly walked past the thing they tore my whole house apart to find.

And now I have it.

I have the very thing people are willing to kill over.

I feel sick.

But also slightly powerful.

I know something they don’t.

I slip my clothes on and hurry downstairs, bottle in hand.

‘Yeah, I’ll keep you updated… All right… mm hmm… bye.’

I walk into the kitchen just as Milosh drops his phone from his ear, turning when he hears footsteps.

‘That was Henry. I updated him on everything from after the gala to now. Him and Amelia are gonna stay in Italy because that’s the safest place for them right now, but as soon as this is over they’ll fly back.’

‘Okay, but they’re all right, yes? No one has come looking for them?’

He shakes his head. ‘No, they’re okay.’ His eyes drop to my hand. ‘Why are you holding that?’

‘Oh.’ How did I manage to forget about such a big thing in the space of two minutes?

I walk up to him and hold the perfume up to the light.

‘Do you see that?’

‘What?’

‘Look inside the perfume.’ I lift my hand a little higher and tip it slowly.

‘Is that…?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Huh.’

‘Well, what do we do?’

‘Nothing for now. Put it back in your bag and forget about it. They’re gonna have the replica ready and on its way to your house by the end of today, so we wait and see what happens. After the raid is complete and everyone who’s a threat is in custody, we’ll tell Major Davis. But for now, we wait.’

He takes the bottle from my hands and holds it at eye level, moving it around to see the locket. ‘How did George get it in there?’ he mumbles to himself.

I scoff. ‘My father has a weird ability to exceed the laws of physics, apparently.’

He hands it back to me. ‘Well. Good job, George, I guess.’