Page 88 of Keep Her from Them

“Affirm,” I replied.

For fuck’s sake. The countdown was on.

I relayed the fact to Jackson who tried to call the flighty count again, coming up empty. He then messaged the time constraint in the hope it hurried the man the fuck up.

“I’ve told him. I don’t know what else I can do.”

“All we can do is sit and wait.”

A quick check back home with Ben told us all was well. I drummed my fingers on my knees, finally snatching up thecaffeine I needed. We still had another refuelling stop to carry out. The weather to dodge.

Dori was cutting it fine.

Jackson watched the concourse. “Need to say something. I’m kind of sad ye didn’t tell me about Alex when ye returned to London.”

I rolled an unimpressed look at my best friend. “Like ye told me about my sister.”

They’d started a secret relationship when I’d been away from my and Ariel’s tower apartment for flight school, with Jackson moving in so she had someone there overnight. She’d pushed back at my overprotectiveness but had eventually agreed. I’d always thought they would’ve made a good match. The proximity had brought them around to agreeing.

He pulled a face. “The difference being the whole forbidden-relative deal.”

“Ye don’t think a princess is forbidden?”

He attempted a smile. It died quickly. For a moment, my friend stayed quiet. “Yet you aren’t fighting the comparison. I always knew it would hit ye hard when ye fell.”

He tapped his screen to display a countdown timer. We had three minutes.

Pressure closed in around me. All of a sudden, I couldn’t stop my words. I’d confided in no one. I’d barely done so with Alex. I trusted Jackson with my life, and he’d been through unimaginable pain in his past. He also knew my history better than most.

“I can’t fall for her. She lives in a different world than I do.”

“Except for the fact she’s living in yours right now.”

I scoffed. “Temporarily. That’s just one of too many barriers.”

He twisted his lips, his dark eyes regarding me. “Name three.”

“Only three? My father finding out her identity and using the connection for his own gain. The fact she lost her closest friend and I’m possibly a distraction, only useful until she gets him back. Which could be today, if the arsehole ever shows, and at which point she won’t need me anymore. That I’m a convenient safe pair of hands when she’s scared.”

“Let me guess, ye haven’t asked her about those last two points?”

At my headshake, he swore and held up his hand with three fingers raised.

He tapped the first. “Talk to her. Ask if she has feelings for ye, then learn from her answer. Don’t guess.” He moved on to the second finger. “Give her back her friend then watch how she still looks to ye. I know you’re not disrespecting her like that.”

I raised my shoulders against the realisation. I had done so, and it was unfair to Alex.

Jackson’s steady gaze held no judgement. “Only my best friend would be the engineer of his own destruction. Always putting other people first. It’s time we all pulled in around ye. So lastly, when it comes to your arsehole dad, if he dares threaten any member of his family or their loved ones again, which now includes me, we do what we should’ve done last winter.”

“Which is?”

Jackson mimed breaking his last finger.

My breathing stuttered. I’d long wanted my father dead. As a child, I’d imagined it too many times. For myself, I couldn’t have done it. If he threatened Alex, the opposite applied.

He held up his phone to display the ticking-down time. “One minute.”

My heart thumped at double the rate of the vanishing seconds. Still, there was no movement at the office. Jackson grabbed the door handle.

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