Page 23 of Defended By Love

He’s going to give up and leave. He’s going to give up and leave.

I chant this to myself, despite the fact that I can hear his calls for me getting closer and closer. Not once does he stray, even though there’s a perfectly good client lounge within sight where I would much rather be. No, it’s like he’s drawn to me, following an invisible string that’s tied to my pounding heart.

“Hailey!” he yells. “We’ve got to get out of here!”

Okay, seriously. What’s with this guy and bringing me to a secondary location?

Then, his footsteps are in the filing room.

My brain races to try and come up with an escape plan, but how do you outrun a guy who can fly? And manipulate centers of gravity?

No, there’s no chance of outrunning him. I’m pretty sure I can outsmart him though. I just can’t let on that I know he’s working for Zagreus Hart the (alleged) supervillain.

“Hailey.” His voice is both a sigh and a growl when he steps in between the box towers into view.

“Oh, hi Grant.” I try to make the fact that I’m crouching amid dusty files in the middle of the night look natural, like maybe this is some new fitness trend I saw on social media. “You know, you’re not really allowed back here. Privacy issues.”

“We need to go. Now.”

Mmm, how about no?

“Sure, sure. I just have a bit of work to do. Let’s meet for a midnight dinner. There’s this 24-hour breakfast place just—”

“Now, Hailey!”

It is so not the time, but the command in his voice is quite possibly the sexiest thing I’ve ever heard. In a different scenario, one that doesn’t involve mistrust and cowering, I would love for him to say that while I’m on my knees.

Oh, why do are all the good ones either taken or evil henchmen?

“It’s just you look so nice in your, uh, spandex, and I’m not really dressed for going out…”

Grant goes to run a hand through his hair, but his hair gel is pristine and impenetrable. He makes a frustrated sound.

“God damnit, just come with me. I’m not going to drag you.”

The words aren’t even out of his mouth when the building rumbles. Exactly like the first shake yesterday that climbed and climbed into the frenzy that had me clinging onto the pillar for dear life while office artifacts arced through the air like bludgeoning darts.

“Fuck it. I’m going to carry you. Just know that I really do respect your agency.” He throws me over his shoulder fireman-style and jumps into the air to fly us out of the filing room.

Right as we leave, the floor-to-ceiling shelves that house our thousands upon thousands of boxes of files groan and snap, tumbling over like dominoes. If I had stayed any longer, I know I’d be at the bottom of it all.

And to think, I just joked with a paralegal that these files would be the death of me. Move over, Nostradamus.

Grant adjusts me as we fly. He slides me down his body so that he’s holding me underneath him as he flies horizontally through the zigs and zags of the office.

A loud crash, one that I remember from yesterday—I think it was an award from the government for outstanding environmental work—smashes against the pillar and makes me yelp. I don’t know if it’s because I remember how scared I was yesterday when it smashed right beside me or if I’m scared now, being here in this deathtrap. Again.

“I got you,” Grant murmurs into my hair, pressing me closer against him. It’s the sound of his heartbeat that reaches me in the far-off place of fear I’ve found myself. It brings me enough into the present to notice that most of the objects aren’t coming towards us. They’re giving us a wide berth, like we’re inside of some invisible forcefield.

It’s not perfect. Occasionally, an object reaches us, but each time, Grant turns so that his body takes the impact.

Like yesterday, I have no idea how long it all lasts. It seems like an eternity until we’re out through the already-broken wall of windows and into the waiting night sky. In truth, I know it lasted only a couple handfuls of heartbeats.

Time, what a tricky thing.

Back in the righted position, Grant still has a firm grasp on me, although I can feel his fingers tremble on my waist and his eyes on my face. There’s a pull to him. I can sense the tension and fear in him and every part of me screams to comfort him. I want to be there for him, let my heartbeat calm him, like his did for me.

Lucky for me, I don’t make decisions with my heart.

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