Chapter 20 Hunter
Hunter
The limo feels smaller on the way home, tight with everything I didn’t say after I hit Connor.
Aunt Jane is asleep within minutes, her head tilted slightly toward the window, mouth parted in the soft surrender of someone who gave the night every ounce of strength she had. Mrs. Lane sits beside her, shoulders relaxed, eyes closed, still somehow in charge even in silence.
Across from them, Adaline folds into the corner, making herself small. The lights from passing streetlamps sweep over her face in slow pulses.
I should say something.
I should do something.
Instead, I move on instinct. I reach for the folded throw near the seat and drape it gently over Aunt Jane, tucking it around her shoulders.
She makes a small sound in her sleep, a quiet hum of comfort. Then I pick up the second blanket. I hesitate with it in my hands—because offering warmth is an admission. Because comfort is a kind of intimacy, I’ve spent years training myself not to give.
But I hold it out anyway.
Adaline’s eyes flick up, startled, like she didn’t expect kindness to exist in my direction.
She hesitates, then takes it. Her fingers brush mine for half a second, quick, accidental contact, and she pulls back like she’s afraid of the current. She wraps the blanket around herself, shoulders drawing in.
I watch the way she tries to slow her breathing. The way she stares out the window like the dark might contain him.
Connor. The name tastes like metal in my mouth.
“You okay?” I ask, keeping my voice low so I don’t wake Aunt Jane.
Adaline nods immediately.
“Yeah,” she says, but her voice is thin, scraped down to essentials. “I’m fine.”
She isn’t.
Her knee bounces once under the blanket before she forces it still. Her hands twist together near her lap like she’s trying to wring out the leftover panic. Her cheeks are damp, lashes clumped slightly, and there’s a tremor she can’t fully hide every time the limo slows.
Something sharp flashes through me. A hot spike behind my ribs. The kind of helplessness I hate most.
I punched him. I threw my fist at the problem like violence could erase what he did to her.
And it didn’t.
It just proved what I already know. I’m good at breaking things. Not fixing them.
I haven’t hit anyone in years. And I hate that my first honest thought is how good it felt. My knuckles burn.
I flex my hand slowly, testing the stiffness, keeping it angled away from her. The skin is slightly split across two knuckles. There’s swelling already, a deep throbbing ache crawling up my wrist.
I don’t let my face react.
Pain is manageable. Pain is clean and doesn’t ask for anything. Adaline’s gaze drops to my hand.
Her eyes narrow slightly, not judgmental, not annoyed, focused. Like the nurse part of her cuts through the mess and sees what’s needed.
She doesn’t ask.
She just shifts, leaning toward the small compartment built into the limo’s side. Her movements are quiet, careful, like she doesn’t want to draw attention from Mrs. Lane or Aunt Jane.
She opens the compartment and pulls out a small first-aid kit. Then she opens it like she’s done this a thousand times, which she probably has.
I don’t tell her to stop. I should. But I don’t.
She takes out gauze. A cold pack. And makes a wrap.
She glances at my hand once, then back to the kit, assembling it with practiced efficiency.
The silence between us turns different, still heavy, but no longer empty.
When she leans closer, her hair shifts forward, and a faint vanilla scent with a hint of floral, brushes the space between us, soft, clean, unmistakably her.
Roses. Her. The garden, and that night she fell. The way she looked at me like she hated needing me.
Adaline extends the makeshift ice wrap toward me. Her hand hovers, waiting. Offering without forcing.
I take it, my fingers closing around the cold pack.
“Thanks,” I say, and the word comes out rougher than I intend.
She gives a small nod like gratitude isn’t the point. Like this is simply what you do when someone’s hurt. She cared enough to notice, cared enough to act. She did it even after I stood in her life like a locked gate and called her irresponsible.
She folds back into her corner, blanket tight around her shoulders. The tremor in her hands eases a little now that she has something else to focus on, my injury instead of her fear.
I hate that she had to do that. She’s learned how to redirect her own panic by taking care of someone else. I know that trick, I’ve been using it for years. The limo rolls on, tires humming over the road like nothing in the world has changed.
But everything has.
Because Adaline is not just some woman who wandered into my house.
Because “Wind” isn’t a stranger anymore. She’s sitting across from me, wrapped in a blanket I gave her, trying not to fall apart. And I’m sitting here with a cold pack in my hand, realizing I’ve been holding two versions of her in my head like they were separate people.
They’re not.
When we reach the mansion, I step out first. The night air is colder here, sharper. The house looms, lit in soft amber through tall windows, solid and quiet, like it’s always waiting to swallow whatever drama tries to follow us home.
Mrs. Lane wakes gently, immediately attentive. Aunt Jane stirs as we help her out of the limo, her hand instinctively reaching for mine.
“Home?” she murmurs.
“Yes,” I say softly. “You’re home.”
Adaline hangs back for half a second, watching. Her expression unreadable, she steps forward when Aunt Jane shifts unsteadily.
“I’ve got her,” I say, voice careful.
She doesn't argue. “Go inside. Rest.”
Her eyes flick up. “I’m fine.”
That lie again. I keep my tone firm. “Rest.”
She stiffens like the word feels too much like an order, then nods tightly and moves toward the door.
Mrs. Lane and I guide Aunt Jane upstairs, each of us balancing her with practiced familiarity. Aunt Jane mumbles something about “boys who try too hard” and “men who deserve a kick,” and Mrs. Lane makes a soft, amused sound.
“Jane,” Mrs. Lane whispers, “you’re safe.”
Aunt Jane sighs. “I know.”
Then, half-asleep, she adds, “Don’t be mean to her.”
The words make me pause for just a second.
I leave Aunt Jane in her bedroom. Mrs. Lane lingers in the doorway, hands clasped. “She’ll be fine,” she says quietly, like she knows what’s running through my head. “But Adaline… that girl looked frightened tonight.”
“I know,” I say.
Mrs. Lane studies me for a long moment, her gaze flicking briefly to my clenched hand. “And you look like you’re about to set the world on fire.”
I flex my injured hand.
“I’m going to my office,” I say, because if I stay here, I might do something stupid. Like, go check on Adaline. Like, ask her if she’s okay again. Or forget I’m supposed to keep my distance.
Mrs. Lane nods. “Don’t stay up all night.”
I don’t promise.
My office door clicks shut behind me, sealing the quiet in with me, the laughter of earlier days replaced by a heavy stillness.
I sit at my desk and open the report from the private investigator. The file stares back at me in crisp lines and bullet-pointed facts, clean and efficient.
I read.
And the more I read, the colder my blood gets.
Connor Davis isn’t just a bitter ex. He’s strategic. Vindictive.
He wanted Adaline as a trophy, good for his image, good for his career. She dumped him.
And he decided she had to pay for it.
The report confirms what his voice already told me tonight. Strings pulled. Investigations nudged, and reputations threatened. The hospital’s chaos turned into a weapon aimed squarely at her.
Revenge. That’s what he wants. My jaw clenches so hard it aches. Guilt sinks like a stone in my stomach. She was surviving.
She was running from something that followed her even into a small town with too much gossip and not enough mercy.
And I—Hunter Rexon, the man who swears he protects his own, looked at her and assumed the worst.
Connor’s face flashes back into my mind, too close to her in that hallway, his mouth near her ear, and the way Adaline’s shoulders went rigid. But she held herself upright like she refused to let him see her fear.
And I want to go back and hit him again.
Not for the implication.
Not for the insult.
For the fact that he thinks he’s allowed to touch her life.
I drag a hand through my hair, breath harsh. The urge to tell her presses hard against my chest.
I want to tell her I’m North.
That I’ve been the one reading her late-night messages. The one who has been telling her to breathe. That I’ve been the one who cares when she thinks no one does.
I want to tell her I’m sorry for doubting her, for pushing her, for making her feel alone in this house.
But then her words flash through my mind, typed in that chat window, raw and honest.
I can’t stand my boss.
She didn’t know she was talking about me. And that’s exactly why it was true. If I reveal myself now, it won’t feel like comfort.
It will feel like betrayal.
Like I stole her safe place and wore it like a mask. Especially tonight, after everything with Connor. She’s already shaken. Already bleeding from old wounds.
The last thing I want is to become another man who traps her with information she didn’t consent to share.
My hand throbs again, and I squeeze it into a fist, ignoring the pain.
Fine.
If I can’t fix this with truth yet, I can fix it with protection.
I pick up my phone and call the security company, my security, Aunt Jane’s security, the quiet system I built when I realized the world doesn’t leave you alone just because you lock your gates.
They answer immediately.
“This is Rexon,” I say. “I need a new alert.”
“Understood, sir.”
“Dr. Connor Davis,” I say, voice flat. “Any movement near Rose Hills. Any sighting within a fifty-mile radius. I want a call. Immediately.”
A pause. “Is he a threat?”
I stare at the report on my desk, the facts lined up like a verdict.
“Yes,” I say. “To my family.”
I hang up and sit back, staring at the dark window.
My reflection stares back, tux loosened at the collar, knuckles swollen, eyes too sharp.
I built HeartLines because control was the only way I knew how to keep people safe, including myself.
A place where no one judged you by your name. Where you could be seen. Where you could breathe. But life throws a curveball when you least expect it.
Somehow… the one person who made that place feel real ended up in my house.
In my life. In my head.
I’m falling for her in every world.
The world where she calls me Hunter and glares at me like I’m an obstacle.
The world where she calls me North and trusts me with her fear.
And I might already be too late to fix either one. The more I care, the more there is to lose.
I stare into the dark, and one terrifying thought settles deep in my chest. If she ever learns who I am… she might never forgive me for being the only safe place she had, without her consent.
And I don’t know how to survive losing her twice—once to the truth, and once to my silence.