Chapter 12 Zach #2
He grabs for her arm and she steps back, closer to me. Her features bunch and twist, troubled. “I’m fine.”
“Paige, let me take care of you.” He tries again and steps toward her. “I know what you need.”
This time, in her still sleepy state, she isn’t fast enough, and he manages to latch onto her wrist.
“How the hell would you know what she needs?” My menacing tone causes him to pause as I get up close and personal.
“No.” Paige pulls back and into my side. “I’m staying with Zach.”
My chest swells at her willingness to trust I will take care of her and I widen my stance and broaden my chest like a barrier around her.
“Get him out of here,” Walker says before I can.
Gareth drags Donovan away while he mumbles crap about wanting to be there for her. She grips my forearm, fingernails breaking my flesh, and I grit my teeth to hold back a hiss. Pivoting, she takes me with her, my back now to the men as she steps into me, my body shielding her from their view.
“Get me out of here. Please. What is this, a party or something?”
It’s then the blaring music registers as do the many male voices booming like launched cannons from the game room.
“It’s poker night. I totally forgot when once you answered the phone. I’ll get rid of them.”
Before I can do as I promised, her nails dig into my muscle again. She’s got my attention. “Is there a washroom or somewhere I can go while they leave? I’m not exactly dressed for this.”
Within earshot, Walker offers to take her upstairs and while I want to be the one to do it, I need to tell the rowdy gang to hit the road, and it’s going to take a while. And I want to make sure Donovan leaves.
Thirty minutes later, all except Walker are gone. He lingers by the elevator and the wheels turning in his head are hard to miss.
“Just say it.” I tuck my hands in my pockets.
“Is she the one?”
Now there’s a loaded question if I ever heard one. There are so many ways I could take the question, albeit Walker knows about my plan to get my trust earlier. He even offered to float me the cash but I’m doing this on my own.
“Yes.”
“She’s pretty.” He smirks and my expression grows grim, exhausted and wanting him to leave. But for some reason, he’s not reading the signals or not smart enough tonight to leave well enough alone. “I thought the deal was strictly business. Did you work out benefits on the side?”
He isn’t suggesting anything I wouldn’t think to ask if the roles were reversed and he brought his fake partner to his home. Needless to say, his question more than gets under my skin—it burns—and I won’t entertain this conversation.
Uncurling my clenched fist, I hit the elevator button and the doors slide open. “We’re done here. Good night, Walk.”
“Hey, sorry, Zach,” he calls but I don’t give him a backward glance.
A sliver of light peeks from the bottom of the closed door to the bedroom where Paige should be sleeping. Fighting back the urge to check in on her—I don’t want to disturb her if she’s close to sleep—I take a quick shower, change, and then check again to see if the light is now out. It isn’t.
I tap on the door and wait. I do this a few more times and then whether imagined or not, I tell myself there was a faint murmur from the other side.
That’s all I need to enter the room, where Paige sits on the bed with her back against the headboard, legs out in front of her, tucked under the covers.
Her long hair is bedraggled and she’s staring straight ahead.
The light from the bathroom streams through the open door.
She doesn’t acknowledge me, not even when I call her name. She’s not with me. It’s written all over her face. She’s caught up in the spin of her thoughts, a tornado of chaos.
Sighing, I sit beside her, looking directly into her glazed brown eyes.
Perhaps it’s the movement since I am so close to her, or that I’m now in her line of sight, but she blinks several times and recognition seeps into her features.
It’s as if she’s seeing me for the first time since I came into the room.
“You okay?” I squeeze her knee through the sheets.
“I will be, I just can’t stop the merry-go-round right now. Every time I think of being in the tub, I hear the noise as if I’m there. Except, now I know what it means and then I…”
“You need to try and turn it off. Get some sleep. You must be tired.”
“I know.” She slides down in the bed until her head hits the pillow and I bring the blankets up to her shoulders.
“Do you want me to turn off the bathroom light?”
“No,” she’s quick to say. “And can you leave the bedroom door open?”
“Of course.” I pat her arm before heading to the door. “Night, Paige.”
“Zach?” She doesn’t move, but her eyes open. “Where’s your room?”
I smile even though I shouldn’t. “I’m the next door over. At the end of the hall. I tell you what, I’ll leave my door open, too. All you’ll have to do is call my name, if you need me.”
“Okay. Night.”
Standing at the door, I wait and watch for a while until her breathing slows, and once satisfied she’s asleep, I go to bed, hoping neither of us is wakened by her screaming from a nightmare.