Chapter 6 Gabriel
Gabriel
Sydney stares at me with eyes open far too wide. Knees exposed by her rucked-up black cotton dress, she perches on the navy armchair, her weight resting on her heels and her muscles coiled like a barn cat on a rafter.
I’ve been praying for her to come out of her stupor, but I thought—hoped—it would be like something out of a movie. She’d blink, then reach for me. Instead, she watches me like I’m a predator.
Desperate to reassure her, I lift my hands in a placating gesture. “You’re safe at home.”
Her face twists in confusion, then she goes still and silent before lowering her legs, one at a time, with movements so measured, they look like slow motion. I reach to stabilize her but pull back without making contact when she shies away.
This isn’t what I expected. Depressed or confused? Maybe. But not this. “Sydney, what do you need? How can I help you?”
Barefoot, she moves to the center of the room. I stay where I am and keep my voice low. “Do you remember me?”
“My name is Sydney Walsh McRae. I don’t know anything else,” she rasps in a voice she hasn’t used in more than a week.
I nod, though my chest aches and my sinuses sting with thwarted hope. “I’m Gabriel McRae.”
She recoils, then darts for the bedroom door, wobbling precariously, holding on to furniture, doorframes, and walls as she goes. I follow, but slowly, to avoid giving the impression I’m chasing her. Five seconds later, I abandon subtlety and sprint toward the crash that occurs out of my eyesight.
Rounding the corner, I leap over the massive vase of flowers she either knocked off the hall table accidentally or hurled off deliberately.
She runs deeper into our 6000-square-foot penthouse.
My heart pounds with fear when she slips on the polished hardwood and narrowly misses smacking her head off the interior exposed-brick wall.
She regains her balance and continues her flight. As she goes, she swipes up books, a lamp, candles, anything that catches her eye, and hurls them to the floor behind her. Rufus yowls and speeds away to hide.
Her head lifts, and she momentarily skids to a stop at the sight of the glass doors leading to our balcony.
“Do you want to go outside?” Anything to help her calm down sounds like a good idea to me.
Instead of walking around the furniture, she half falls and half climbs over the back of the brown Chesterfield sofa in her single-minded mission to get to those doors. My wife is acting like a zombie in a goddamn horror movie.
“Sydney, you’re not a prisoner. You don’t need to escape.”
She keeps moving, her eyes on those doors, and I stop fucking around. “Dave, get Granthy here, ASAP,” I bellow.
She jolts, then runs harder, her terrible physical condition making her progress slow and precarious, despite her desperation.
I put on a burst of speed and easily reach the doors before she does, then face her and work to sound calm. “It’s a sunny day. There’s nothing to be afraid of. Let’s go outside together.” I won’t stop her from exploring, but she could hurt herself if she’s confused.
Her eyes close to slits as she comes to a halt before me. “Rub some dirt on it.”
I’ve heard her say that phrase many times. She doesn’t allow herself to wallow in self-pity when something goes wrong, but what is the context here?
“This is your home.”
I open the door, and she steps onto the spacious balcony. I match her pace. She speeds up. So do I.
Sydney’s head turns on a swivel, taking in the tall courtyard-style walls that surround us on two sides and the chest-high glass barrier that extends the length of the space, offering safety without restricting the view of the Manhattan skyline. The pool, covered for the season, lies to our right.
Abruptly, she stops moving and shoots me a sidelong glance. Then she heads for the seating area around a gas firepit.
Stopping next to it, she turns only her head to face me.
A cool wind ruffles my hair and stings my skin.
Her bare feet must be freezing. For the past week, I’ve clothed her in mostly T-shirt-style dresses.
They were easiest for me to help her with hygiene, and most of her old clothing didn’t fit.
Now, her nipples bead under the too-thin fabric and goose bumps cover her exposed arms.
“It’s a little chilly. Do you want me to light the fire? Or”—I raise the lid of an upholstered bench to reveal hidden storage—“we have blankets or the heaters.”
Sydney’s beautiful brown eyes turn sly, and my heart lifts at the familiar expression. That look usually comes before a quip or an inside joke only she and I understand.
Tentatively, so carefully, I offer my hand. “Yes?”
She steps closer and takes it in her left. I let out a grateful breath as my palm makes contact with hers. She tugs me closer. When she gestures for me to bend to her height, I lean down eagerly.
She plows her fist into my dick.
Pain sears through me in a breath-stealing spear of agony. Stars burst behind my eyes, and I double over. She may be weak, but a sucker punch doesn’t take strength.
I gag, nausea getting the best of me. If she thinks I’m Markov or someone like him, I can’t blame her for it. Definitely. Not. Ready. To. Congratulate. Her. Though.
Even my inner monologue speaks those words through gritted teeth. Holy fuck.
I lift my head in time to see her scurrying back toward the penthouse. She windmills to a stop at the sight of her bodyguard, Dave, standing in the doorway.
Mid-forties, huge and gnarled, with a scar running through his upper lip, a nose broken multiple times, and military-short dark hair, he looks intimidating, but he always got along great with Sydney.
He forces a smile and ignores my retching. “Hey, Syd. How’s it going?”
Without waiting to see him make room for her to pass, she spins in the direction of the chest-high glass wall at the edge of the deck. As she goes, she hooks her elbow under the back of a small bistro chair and drags it across the balcony, awkwardly scraping metal against stone tile.
When she pushes the chair against the glass barrier, I waste precious seconds bent over, cupping my cock, and breathing through clenched teeth, before I come to the panicked realization that she’s not planning to sit in that chair and admire the view.
I push off against the stone tile floor like a sprinter at the crack of a starter pistol, racing toward her.
She climbs onto the chair and stands, wobbling on the seat, her knees level with the top railing.
She’s still in the act of straightening when I wrap my arm around her, jerking her away from the edge and against my body.
She flails and kicks, disturbingly silent in her struggle.
The wind, our heavy breathing, and the slaps of skin as she makes contact with my face and arms are the only sounds, despite her panic . . . and mine.
“You’re okay.” I speak the way I would to a terrified animal.
Calm. Firm. Gentle. Inside, though, fear and a broken heart fight for supremacy.
My strong, beautiful, fierce wife nearly went somewhere so deep in her pain that I could never follow and bring her home.
If it had taken me one second longer to understand the danger she was in, it would have been too late.
I can’t process the reality of it. I don’t want to. I adjust my grip, tighten my arms, to keep her safe. For her, but also for me. I need to feel her here. Alive.
I trap her arms against her body. “Stop. Fighting.”
No part of me expects the demand to work. Since when has Sydney ever listened to an order from me? But the words come from instinct, fear given a voice.
She closes her eyes and goes so still that she stops breathing, her face flooding with color as she refuses to suck in air.
“Breathe.” Fear morphs to fury, burning like hot coals inside me, welcome and necessary. I want to kill Markov all over again for what he did to her. This time, slowly.
She opens her eyes and drags in a noisy, wheezing lungful of air, then she frowns, her gaze raking over the skyline. She looks down, down . . . her mouth dropping open.
“We’re on a building?” Her voice emerges in a shocked squeak.
Thank God. Thank God. Thank God, it wasn’t deliberate. “Yes.”
I don’t know what she thought she’d seen. Markov’s home? My warehouse where he’d planned to murder her and dump her body?
She gulps, then her teeth chatter. “Oh God.”
“I’m taking you back inside where it’s safe and warm.
” This isn’t the time to lose my shit. Sydney needs me to stay solid as a rock when I’m about fifteen seconds from breaking into gravel or crumbling into sand.
The worst part is, even I don’t know what I’ll do if that happens.
Beg her to recognize me? Punch a hole in the drywall and picture Markov’s face when I do it?
“Drown,” a voice whispers inside me. “You’ll fucking drown. ”
She leans on me, presses into me, like I’m a lifeline. I release her arms, and she wraps them around my shoulders. But when I turn to face the doors where Dave stands with his phone to his ear, her panicked battle renews.
“Dave, get out of sight. She’s afraid of you. Send PT home when they show up.”
His concerned expression transitions to regret, and he moves farther back inside and out of the way. She stops fighting. When he’s out of view, I step inside and set her on her feet.
Her gaze darts warily around the living room. This is our home. But none of us knows what happened in those hours before she disappeared. There was an entire night spent here alone after the situation at the lab and before she disappeared the next day.
“Do you want to leave the penthouse? We don’t have to stay here,” I say.
Her mouth tightens. “Get me out of this city.”
I nod, relieved. It’s a good idea. “Then we’ll go. I need to pack for a trip. You need shoes and a jacket, first.”