Chapter 40
Forty
Roxy waited until Travis’s breath had slowed into deep, even breaths before she slid out from beneath his arm. Padding over to the door, she double and triple checked the lock. It seemed secure, but so had her house in Melody Hills.
Crossing quietly to the fridge, she opened it just a crack, not wanting the light to wake Travis.
Pulling a bottled water out of the pre-stocked fridge—she was sure she had Jodi and Serenity to thank for that—she drank half of it while standing by the tiny kitchen table.
Moonlight filtered through the small windows on the other side of the room, slices of silvery blue light arcing across the bed and the man that lay in it, the sheet barely covering his lower half, one leg thrust out from beneath it.
He looked peaceful as he slept and so beautiful she ached from loving him.
It had crept up on her, stealthy and slow, and she had had no chance of fighting it.
She had possibly fallen in love with him the day she’d woken in his lap after passing out.
When he’d let her see the soft, quiet Travis behind the former MMA fighter ‘The Reaper’ that he let everyone else see.
Or maybe it was the day he’d called her out on her bullshit, and then had still taken care of her even after she had acted like a temper tantrum throwing brat.
Or that night, when he’d confessed to being dazzled by her.
She’d been just as dazzled by him. His quiet grace, the beauty in his strength, the careful way he caged everyone else out. Everyone except for her. He had let her see all of his brokenness, all of his shadows, all of the scars that he carried both on his mind and his body.
He was everything she had never known she wanted, had never allowed herself even the thought to cross her mind that someone like Travis could be hers. That a love like Freeman had found with Jodi, like Kasey had found with Shauntelle, could ever belong to her, too.
Despair fairly choked her. Everything she’d fought so hard for, everything she’d run from… it had all been for nothing. Because he would always find her.
Her eyes burned from both exhaustion and from her tears, but she refused to let her eyes close.
She couldn’t sleep, despite the late hour.
Not with Neal out there, probably watching, waiting for her to be vulnerable.
She wouldn’t let Travis get hurt because of her.
She would rather cut out her own heart than to put him at risk.
Sinking into one corner of the couch, she flipped through Facebook, watched TikToks, and scrolled Instagram.
Every creak and groan of the old barn around her made fear rachet her heart into her throat.
Every shadow that drifted across the floor from the windows by the door caused her eyes to flash toward them, watching for him.
The clock moved at an agonizingly slow pace, the minutes drawing out interminably.
She tried to read on an ebook app for a while, but nothing held her attention, until her eyelids became too heavy to remain open.
Checking the clock, she sighed. In another hour the sun would be up, and Travis would be waking.
And she would be forced to give up the best thing that’s ever happened to her. If only to keep him safe, as he’d done for her.
Sliding back into the bed, she curled against his side, allowing herself this last little bit of time with him. In moments she was asleep.