Chapter 42
Forty-Two
ROME
I’m going to curl up around Eloise and breathe her in. I have a call out to Julian, Mateo, and Carson to figure out how and when we can take Rizzo out.
I want him dead.
But first, I want him to suffer.
In the meantime, I need to touch my firefly.
I approach the penthouse, nod at the guard, and walk inside. It’s quiet. She’s still asleep.
Good.
My woman works her ass off. Rita told me just yesterday that she’s never seen anyone work harder than my Eloise, so I’m glad she’s still sleeping soundly.
I strip out of my suit coat but come to an abrupt halt in the doorway of the bedroom, and my heart rate climbs.
Blood.
There’s blood on the sheets.
“Eloise!” I call out and run for the bathroom, but she’s not in there.
There are drops of blood on the floor.
Panic wants to set in, but I ruthlessly push it back and rush back to the bedroom as I dial Eloise’s number. Her phone starts to ring beside the bed.
She doesn’t have her motherfucking phone?
I run out of the bedroom and check every room, coming up empty, and then, with red fury covering my eyes, I pull my gun and step out of the penthouse, take the guard by the throat and push the weapon against his temple.
“Where. The. Fuck. Is. She?”
“She said she’d be right back,” he says, his eyes round. “I thought she was going to find you.”
I growl. “When did she leave?”
“Maybe ten minutes ago? She seemed fine. Said she’d be right back.”
“Was someone with her?”
He frowns. “No. Of course not.”
I push him away and call Luke as I rush to the elevator.
“Yes, boss?”
“My office. NOW!”
Luke’s running to my office as I get there.
“Eloise is gone,” I say, and type quickly on my computer, bringing up the security feeds. “She was bleeding. I don’t know where she went.”
“She didn’t let you know—got it,” he says when I glare at him.
We both watch Eloise make her way through the building. She looks tired. Like she doesn’t feel good. At one point, her hand is over her stomach, yet every guard she comes across, she smiles, and says she’ll be right back.
“Where the fuck did she go?”
In horror, I watch as she waltzes right out the fucking front door.
“Every one of those men is going to die.”
“Boss—”
I punch the heel of my hand on the desktop and stand.
“Why didn’t she have a four-man detail with her?” I demand, getting in Luke’s face.
“Because we didn’t know she was going anywhere,” he replies calmly. “She’s supposed to text, and the guys meet her at the door. She knows that. It’s her protocol. Not that we’ve ever had to use it because she doesn’t go anywhere.”
“I want every man we have to meet me in the penthouse so I can give orders. I’ll be up there in case she comes back.”
Luke nods and starts making calls. Less than five minutes later, I’m standing in the foyer of my home, barking orders.
Every guard who let her leave looks green.
They should.
This will be their last mission.
“She’s been gone for twenty minutes,” I say, pacing back and forth. I can’t even think about the blood upstairs without wanting to lose my goddamn mind. Christ, she has to be okay. “She’s injured. I don’t know how badly.”
“Did someone call her?” Luke asks, frowning. “Why would she leave if she’s hurt?”
I blink at him, then sprint upstairs to get her phone. Why didn’t I think of that?
Unlocking her phone, I look back on her call log and texts, but it’s only myself and Scarlett there. Nothing in her deleted box.
Dammit.
Shaking my head, I return downstairs and slip her phone into my pocket, needing something of hers on me.
I need her. I’m going out of my fucking mind. I’ve never felt this helpless, this goddamn scared in my life.
“No calls,” I tell Luke, who looks as grim as I feel. “I want you all to canvas the area. She can’t have gotten far.”
“Unless she jumped in a cab,” one of the men says, and I rub my hand over my mouth.
Christ.
Where the fuck did she go?
I feel like I’m about to lose control when the mechanism on the front door engages. The door opens, and Eloise steps inside.
She stumbles to a halt when she sees all of the men. Her eyes go wide as they search for me, and when she finds me, her shoulders sag in relief.
“Oh good, you’re okay,” she says.
I gnash my teeth together.
“Out!” I shout, my eyes pinned to hers as my men file out, with Luke being the last to leave. He pulls the door closed behind him, and it’s just Eloise and me, staring at each other.
“Have you lost your beautiful mind?” My hands fist at my sides. I want to rush to her, kiss the fuck out of her, and pull her to me.
I also want to spank her ass until it fucking glows.
“I had to go to the pharmacy,” she says, frowning as she swallows. She winces.
“What happened? If you’re hurt, you call me, and we take care of it.”
For the first time since she walked in, I notice the bag in her hands.
“Don’t go upstairs,” she says, shaking her head. “Just stay down here, okay?”
“Too late. Do you know how fucking terrified I was? What the fuck happened?”
“Stop yelling at me.”
“No!”
I stomp away from her and will my heart to calm the fuck down. She’s fine. She’s safe.
Her father doesn’t have her.
“I have to change my clothes,” she says. “I’m a mess. I wasn’t fast enough.”
“Fast enough for what, Eloise?”
She shakes her head and moves for the stairs, and I follow her. I want to touch her. I want to keep her right next to me every minute of every day to make sure she doesn’t slip away again.
“Rome, this is embarrassing. Let me be alone in here.”
“Absolutely fucking not.” I follow her in, and my gut roils at the sight of the blood on our bed. “What happened, baby? Why are you bleeding?”
“Because I’m a woman!” She spins and stares at me like I’m stupid.
“You’ve fucked me bare like a rabbit, but there were no takers, and I started my period, and it fucking hurts, Rome.
I didn’t have even one tampon to my name, and I was not going to ask someone else to get them for me. I had to go to the pharmacy!”
Jesus. Christ.
“I was bleeding like a goddamn faucet, and I had to hurry. And I wasn’t fast enough not to ruin my underwear and these sweats, and I need to change because it’s gross, and then I’m going to order in food and change the bed so I can just lay there all day and wish I was dead. Okay?”
I walk to her and yank her to me, crushing her against my chest. “No. It’s not fucking okay. You never leave this building without a guard with you. Never, firefly.”
“I was gone for twenty minutes, and I don’t want your goons watching me pick out pads and chocolate. That’s too intimate.”
I kiss the top of her head and breathe her in. “Then I’ll go with you. But you won’t do that to me again. Do you hear me?”
“Rome.” She sniffles, and it’s almost my undoing.
“Don’t cry.”
“I love that you’re holding me and not yelling anymore, but I really need the bathroom and to change my clothes. A shower. Please.”
“Christ, you scared me.” I kiss her once more and let her go. “Go handle what you need to. I’ll take care of the bed.”
“No!” She shakes her head almost frantically. “I’ll do it. Please don’t.”
“Hey, I’ve seen blood before, you know. Although, this gave me a bad moment that I don’t want to repeat, knowing that it’s yours.”
“Please. I’ll change them. I’ll take care of it.”
I take her face in my hands and frown down at her. “Baby. It’s okay. The bed, not you leaving.”
She tries to shake her head, and now her eyes are full of fear.
“Why are you scared?”
She licks her lips. “Bad things happen when you ruin the bedsheets.”
He’s going to suffer so fucking badly.
“Not in our house, firefly.” I kiss her forehead gently, keeping my hands tender as I hold her face. “You’re safe here, remember?”
She nods. “Okay. I need the bathroom.”
I release her, and she hurries to the closet, gathers clean clothes, and then disappears into the bathroom. She shuts the door, and I hear the water start.
I blow out a breath.
Fuck.
I don’t want to repeat that. She just took ten years off my already short life.
I turn to look at the bed, and my stomach clenches again.
I strip the sheets off the mattress and throw them away, then find a clean set in the linen closet and dress the bed.
I’m just pulling the pillowcase onto the pillow when the door opens, and Eloise walks out, her eyes on the bed. Her shoulders slump.
“I’m so sorry.”
“Come here.”
She walks right into my arms and clings to me. “I didn’t think about taking anyone with me. I just didn’t want someone to go for me. Definitely not. And I knew the pharmacy was just down the block, and I would be fast.”
I interrupt her by tilting her chin up and kissing her gently on the lips. “I know, firefly. But just because it’s embarrassing for you doesn’t mean it’s not dangerous. Remember the world you’re now part of because of being with me.”
She nods.
“I didn’t think it was a big deal. Nothing’s happened with my father or his men in a while.”
She doesn’t know.
“Do you want to rest in here or down on the couch with the TV?”
“Downstairs for now.”
I pick her up and carry her, and she doesn’t giggle. She doesn’t argue. She just curls up against me and wraps her arms around my neck.
“Baby, you really don’t feel good.”
“I know it’s not sexy. I just have horrible periods. I always have. With everything that’s happened since the last one, I wasn’t counting the weeks, and it snuck up on me.”
I gently set her on the couch, but I sit in the corner and guide her between my legs, so she can lean back on my chest. I drape my arm down her torso, between her breasts, to rest on her stomach.
“Is this okay?”
“Yeah, it’s warm, and that feels good. Well, shit.”
“What?”
“I forgot to buy a heating pad. I’ll just—”
“You won’t go anywhere,” I growl into her ear. “I’ll get you a fucking heating pad.”
She relaxes against me. “Thank you. I didn’t mean to make everyone fuss. Why were your guys here when I got home?”
I turn her so I can look into her eyes. “They were here because I was arranging a goddamn search party for you, Eloise.”
“What? Why?”
“You don’t get it. Because you left. There was blood upstairs, you were nowhere to be found, and you didn’t have your phone. I was out of my fucking mind.”
She cups my cheek. “I’m sorry. I forgot my phone. I just needed to take care of it.”
“Always call me. Always. Even if you’re on your way out the door, you call me. And text for your protection detail. Promise me, Eloise.”
“I promise.” She sighs. “It was nice to get some fresh air, though. I hadn’t realized that I hadn’t been outside in like two weeks.”
“We have a rooftop area,” I inform her and kiss her head. “You can go up there whenever you want.”
“Oh, I like that.” She yawns. “I’m so damn tired. I’d better nap if I’m going to work tonight.”
“You’re not.”
She snorts. “Yes, I am. I can work. I’ll just take some meds.”
“No.”
She starts to argue, so I turn her around to lie on me, stomach to stomach, and I take her chin in my fingers.
“Listen very carefully. I own this business. You’re miserable. You will not work tonight. You’ll stay here, and you’ll rest.”
She sighs and bites her lower lip, but I pull it back out with my thumb.
“I don’t like calling out sick,” she admits. “This is my first real job, and I want to do well. I want Rita to know that she can count on me.”
I kiss her lips lightly. “She knows that already. And she’ll understand. We have one more thing to discuss.”
“Okay.”
“I want to put a tracking device in you.”
Her eyebrows climb to her hairline. “What? What the hell do you mean in me?”
“It’s subdermal,” I reply and brush my thumb under her eye, over the dark circles there. “And that way, if anything ever happened, I could find you.”
“That feels a little unhinged, Rome.”
I simply lift an eyebrow. “It’ll make me feel more at ease. I would have known exactly where you were when I was losing my shit earlier.”
“It’ll hurt.”
“Yes.” I kiss her nose. “I’ll try to make it as painless as possible for you, but it won’t be comfortable.”
“Will the doctor do it?”
I shake my head. “No. I will.”
She chews that pillow of a bottom lip. “I have one condition.”
I’m not used to being questioned. “What?”
“You have to have one, too. Of the two of us, you’re the one doing dangerous shit. If you can see where I am, I need to know where you are. If you won’t agree to that, then it’s a no-go for me.”
This woman. God, I love her.
If anyone else demanded something of me, I would have glared so hard that they would have run from me. But not this woman.
“I need to know where you are.”
For her …
“I’ll do it.”
Her eyes flash with surprise.
“You will?”
“I’ll do pretty much anything for you, firefly. Now, settle in and get some rest.”
Eloise lies down, her head on my chest, and snuggles in. “If you don’t want to be trapped under me while I sleep, you should move now.”
“I’m not letting you go, baby.” I love you too much to ever let you go. I kiss the top of her head and wrap my arms around her. “Just sleep.”