Chapter 16 Gabriel #2
I stand slowly. Savannah is staring at me, reading everything.
Her voice is faint. “So it’s all connected.
” “Yes,” I say. Her throat tightens. “It’s because I spoke.
” I turn and look at her, my voice firm.
“No,” I correct. “It’s because you exist.” Her eyes widen, and I step closer, lowering my voice.
“They would have found another symbol,” I tell her.
“Another way. Another woman.” Her breath shakes.
“But they chose you because they thought you’d break. ”
Savannah’s jaw tightens, anger flashing. Good. I lean in slightly. “And now they’re going to learn what happens when they bet wrong.” Her lips part, her eyes flicker, and for a second she looks like she might say something brave. Instead she whispers, “I can’t do this again.”
I step closer, cup the side of her face.
I stroke my thumb once over her cheekbone, a small touch.
“You’re not doing this alone,” I say quietly.
Her eyes fill again, and I hate that my chest tightens at it, because it means I’m starting to want her tears to stop.
Not because tears are weak. Because her tears mean someone else still owns part of her fear, and I want to rip that ownership out of her mind.
“You don’t even know me,” she whispers. I hold her gaze.
“I know enough.” She shakes her head slightly.
“What.” I lean in, voice low like a confession I didn’t plan to make yet.
“I know you didn’t beg,” I say. “I know you didn’t break in that room.
I know you held my ring like it mattered.
” Her throat works. “I know you bit a man who tried to drag you out a window.” A flicker crosses her face, shock and then shame, like she’s embarrassed she fought.
I hate that. “Don’t ,” I say sharply. She flinches.
“Don’t be ashamed of surviving,” I tell her.
Her lips tremble. My hand slides into her hair at the nape of her neck, a grip, not rough, possessive, and then because I’m still a man wired for violence, I feel it.
The pull. The heat. The need to claim her mouth in a way that isn’t for witnesses, to replace the rope with something else, to drown out the memory with sensation, to take control back from the fear.
But I don’t. Not yet. Not without her choosing.
I pull my hand back and step away, and that restraint costs me. I feel it in my jaw, in my hands, in my breathing. Savannah watches me like she felt it too. “Are you going to hate me now,” she whispers, almost inaudible. The question is a knife, because it shows what she expects from men.
I turn back to her, my voice low and deadly.
“No,” I say. “I’m going to love you.” I don’t dress it up.
I don’t soften it. Not soft love. Not sweet love.
A brutal love. A love that means destruction for anyone who touches her.
Savannah’s eyes widen, her breath catching.
I step closer and tilt her chin up again.
“You hear me,” I say quietly. “You are not disposable in my house.”
Her lips tremble. A tear slips. I wipe it away once, then I turn to Juan. “Find Carson,” I order. “Alive.” Juan nods, eyes hard. “And Juan.” “Yes.” “When you find him,” I say, “you bring him to me in pieces if you have to.” Juan nods once and leaves.
The driver is still on his knees, shaking. I point to him. “Take him,” I tell the guards. “He lives, for now.” They move fast. He stumbles, fights it for half a second, then the reality hits him again. The guards drag him out. The door shuts.
The room goes quiet again. Just me and Savannah, and the knowledge that someone inside my world tried to steal her.
Then the deeper truth under it. They didn’t do it because she’s weak.
They did it because she’s the easiest way to hurt me.
Which means if I want this treaty to hold, if I want this war to end, I don’t just protect her.
I make her untouchable. And I make her believe she’s allowed to become that.
Savannah’s voice comes out small. “What happens now?” I hold her gaze.
I don’t soften my face. Soft gets misread.
“Now,” I say, “we make a new pact.” Her throat works.
“What pact?” I lean in, close enough that she hears me without anyone else hearing anything.
“You tell me when you’re afraid,” I say.
“You tell me when someone looks at you wrong. You tell me everything.” Her lips part.
Panic flickers and she tries to swallow it back down.
“That’s dangerous,” she whispers. I nod once.
“Yes.” Then I give her the truth she needs, not the truth that sounds nice. “But silence is more dangerous.”
She swallows hard.
I extend my hand again, not forcing, not dragging her into it, offering a choice.
Her fingers tremble as she reaches for me.
She places her hand in mine. I close my grip, then I pull her up slowly until she’s against my chest, letting her feel my heart beating steady like a drum she can match her breathing to.
A promise. A threat. A vow. She whispers into my shirt, voice cracking, “I won’t be able to sleep.
” I lower my mouth to her hair. “Then you’ll sleep on me.
” Her breath stutters. She doesn’t pull away.
* * *
Outside the door, somewhere in my compound, a phone buzzes.
A guard voice rises, urgent. Then Juan’s voice echoes down the hall.
“Jefe.” I go still. Savannah stiffens instantly.
Juan’s voice is tight. “We found Carson’s car.
” My jaw tightens. “Where,” I call back.
“Burned,” Juan answers. “And there’s blood in it.
” Savannah’s breath catches, because burned cars don’t mean the traitor is dead.
Burned cars mean the traitor is cleaning his tracks, and if Carson cleaned his tracks, he’s not running.
He’s repositioning.
Which means he’s going to try again. Soon.
I tighten my hold around Savannah just slightly and whisper into her hair, low enough only she hears.
“They’re not done.” Her fingers clutch my shirt.
Her voice is a whisper. “Neither are you.” No.
Neither am I. Because now it’s not just a treaty and territory.
Now it’s my house. My name. My wife. And the man who tried to steal her just turned this into something I don’t walk away from.