Chapter 20 #2
“Fast-forwarding.” Saint taps the keyboard, and the timestamp blurs as hours vanish in seconds until he slows the playback.
“There,” he says. “That’s you leaving.”
Onscreen, I appear, locking my door and adjusting my bag on my shoulder before heading down the hall. The timestamp in the corner reads eleven o’clock.
Saint presses fast forward again, but only at double time. “Now let’s see when that creep appears.”
Thirteen minutes later, another figure enters the frame, this one in a maintenance uniform, his head lowered. Their cap hides most of their face as they approach my door and pull a key from their pocket.
“That’s not your building manager,” Saint says, slowing to normal speed again. “That guy’s about three hundred pounds and bald.”
My heart hammers as the impostor unlocks my door with what appears to be a regular door key and slips inside. The timestamp shows eleven thirteen in the morning. He must have headed up as soon as he was sure I wasn’t just running to the Quick Shop across the street.
“Now we wait,” Sebastian says, his body tense beside me.
The footage continues, Saint fast-forwarding again until the timestamp reads just after noon. The door opens, and the maintenance person emerges, still with his head down. But as they turn to lock the door behind them, the camera catches their face.
“Pause it,” Sebastian commands.
“Already planning to.” Saint hits the spacebar, freezing the image.
The face staring back at us is unremarkable, with average features and light brown hair. The kind of face that would blend into any crowd. But I recognize him from my dive into his background.
“That’s him,” I whisper. “That’s Travis.”
Sebastian leans closer to the screen. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah, it’s him,” I say, my throat tight.
The room falls silent as we stare at the frozen image of the man who’s been terrorizing me. Once again, I’m shocked at how normal he appears. Just an ordinary person who decided that invading my life was acceptable.
My arms curl tighter around myself as terror roots deeper than anger. This man had been inside my home. Had touched my things. Had planted devices to spy on me. And he looks like someone I might pass on the street without even registering his presence.
“Nowhere is safe.” My ears ring. “He got into my apartment with a key. He could do it again.”
“No,” Sebastian says, the single word leaving no room for argument. “He won’t. You’re staying here, at the manor, until we find him.”
Saint’s head snaps up. “Like hell he is. He’s coming to my place.”
“Your apartment could be compromised, too,” Sebastian counters. “If Travis has been watching Micah for as long as we suspect, he knows about you.”
“We have security,” Saint argues, gesturing around the opulent study. “Maybe not billionaire-level, but enough.”
Gabriel, who’s been quiet, clears his throat. “The manor has advantages your apartment doesn’t, Saint. Twenty-four-hour guards, security protocols that would make the Pentagon jealous, and enough space for Micah to roam.”
Saint scowls, disliking the idea of agreeing with Gabriel. “And I suppose you’ll be overseeing his protection?”
“Among others,” Gabriel confirms with a smile that’s all teeth. “The entire family takes threats seriously. Especially toward someone bearing a Rockford Mark.”
I touch the bite on my neck, proof that I belong to this world now.
“I’m not sure,” I say, torn between gratitude for their protection and the terror of how my privacy has been invaded. “I just want this to be over.”
Sebastian’s hand finds mine under the table, intertwining our fingers. “It will be. But until then, let us keep you safe.”
I look from Sebastian to Saint, caught between the two men who care for me in such different ways. One, my history. The other, my future. Both are determined to protect me, even if they can’t agree on how.
“Okay.” I squeeze Sebastian’s hand. “I’ll stay here.”
Saint’s mouth tightens, but he doesn’t argue further. Instead, he closes his laptop with a snap. “Then I’m staying, too.”
Gabriel’s smile widens. “Wonderful. I’ll have a room prepared for you.”
The relief of not being alone battles with the suffocating knowledge that Travis is still out there, watching and waiting.
I jolt awake, my heart hammering so hard it feels like it’s trying to escape. Unfamiliar darkness surrounds me, heightening my panic.
Not my apartment.
I clutch at sheets too soft to be mine, and I struggle to orient myself in the moonlit shadows of Sebastian’s bedroom at Rockford Manor.
A sliver of moonlight cuts through the gap in heavy curtains, casting the opulent room in silvery blue. The ceiling stretches high above me, the corners lost to darkness. The mattress cradles my body. Everything is too luxurious, too perfect, when my life has spun so violently out of control.
My breath comes in shallow gasps as Travis’s face floats in my mind, that ordinary, unremarkable face that had walked into my apartment as if he had every right to be there.
I squeeze my eyes shut, but it only makes the image clearer.
Him watching the first steps of my real-life relationship with Sebastian.
Watching our feelings bloom. Watching me grieve when he left.
The bed shifts beside me, and a warm hand finds my shoulder.
“Micah?” Sleep roughens Sebastian’s voice.
I can’t answer, past my tight throat, air whistling through a passage too narrow to form words.
Sebastian sits up, the sheets rustling as he moves. The moonlight catches the raised edges of his scars, mapping half his face in silver while the other half remains in shadow.
Without speaking, he pulls me into his arms. I go without resistance, my body limp and pliant as he gathers me to his chest. His skin radiates heat through the thin T-shirt he wears to bed, the steady thump of his heart beneath my ear soothing my panic.
“I’ve got you.” His lips brush my temple. “You’re safe here.”
Safe. What does that even mean when nowhere has proven safe? Not my own apartment. Not my own bathroom. Not my own bed. I’ve been spied on, stalked, and hunted in the spaces I thought were mine alone.
“He was in my home.” The words escape in a ragged whisper. “He touched my stuff. He saw everything.”
Sebastian’s arms tighten around me, one hand cradling the back of my head, fingers threading through my hair. “Not everything. He didn’t see the real you.”
I shake my head. “He saw me naked. He saw me sleeping. He—” I sniffle back the tears. “He saw me crying over you.”
Sebastian’s body tenses beneath mine. “I’m so sorry.” He kisses my hair. “For leaving you alone. For all of it.”
“I’m so angry.” The words scrape my throat raw. “At him. At you. At myself for not protecting myself better.”
“You have every right to be.” Sebastian rubs slow circles on my back, each pass loosening the tension wound too tight inside me. “But this isn’t your fault, Micah. None of it.”
His calm certainty cracks the dam inside me that I’ve been building since the first package arrived. Since I first sensed someone watching. Since long before that, maybe, when I first learned the world wasn’t safe for Omegas.
The first sob surprises me, punched from my chest with such force that it leaves me gasping. The second follows, and then there’s no stopping the flood. I press my face into Sebastian’s chest as my body shakes with the force of it, tears soaking into his shirt.
Sebastian holds me through it all, his arms a fortress around my trembling form. He doesn’t shush me or tell me it’s okay. He just holds on, his scarred cheek resting on the top of my head, his breath warm puffs on my hair.
“I hate being helpless,” I choke out between sobs. “I hate that he took my home from me.”
“You’re not helpless.” Sebastian clears the thickness from his throat. “And you’re not alone. We’ll catch him.”
“What then? What if he refuses to stop?” The question slips out, revealing the fear that’s been gnawing at me since we found the tiny cameras. “What if after everything we do, he still refuses to be scared off?”
Sebastian doesn’t point out the obvious solution—the only real solution for a multiple offender like Travis—as his hand sweeps up my spine, palm flat between my shoulder blades.
“I feel so stupid,” I whisper.
“You’re the furthest thing from stupid.” Sebastian’s hand cups my cheek, tilting my face up. “You’re brilliant, resourceful, and resilient.”
His thumb brushes away a tear tracking down my cheek, and my chest aches in a different way at the tenderness in his touch. “I don’t feel strong right now.”
“You don’t have to be. Not every minute.” His forehead touches mine, our breath mingling. “That’s why you have me. That’s why you have Saint. We can be strong for you when you need to rest.”
My lids grow heavy, the emotional toll of the day catching up with me. Sebastian shifts, lowering us both back to the pillows without releasing me from his embrace.
He pulls the covers up around our shoulders, cocooning us in warmth. “Sleep. I’ll be right here.”
“Promise?” The word comes out small and childlike, but I’m too exhausted to be embarrassed.
“I promise.” His lips press against my forehead. “I’m not going anywhere.”
I let my eyes fall closed, Sebastian’s steady heartbeat beneath my palm lulling me toward unconsciousness.
As sleep pulls me under, I think how strange it is that, in a room filled with luxury, the rarest treasure is the simple safety of someone’s arms around me.