Page 32 of Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea

“A Michael setback. We’re staying in a hotel until my house is livable again.”

He chokes out a disbelieving cough. Smitty is such a good man. “You talk to him and get back to me, yeah?”

“Okay. Yeah. I’ll call you tonight to let you know.”

We hang up. Then I breathe out slowly, run my hands through my hair and approach Gage. “Babe, can I talk to you for a minute?”

He clicks off the spreadsheet and turns to me. “What’s up?”

“That was Smitty. He says it’s okay for me to return to work. They have the guard now.”

As I figured would happen, his face goes hard. But then it shifts before my eyes to contemplative. “You think that’s smart? I mean, after yesterday?”

I shrug. “Smitty has the cameras and hired a guard. Michael can’t control my life. If I don’t get back to work, I give him that power and he knows it.”

“Not lying, Liv. I understand it, but I don’t like it.”

“I want to be here with you. Knowing you’re lying next to me at night, I feel safe. But I miss work, too. I miss the people who have become friends, you know?”

He rubs his hands over his face. “Okay, but here’s the deal. I take you and pick you up. I don’t want him seeing your truck and popping in, even if the guard is there.”

“Okay,” I agree quickly.

Gage quirks his brows. “I wasn’t done. You call the police and you call me if you ever see him standing off property, or if you think it’s him standing off property. None of that second guessing ‘what if I’m wrong’ bullshit.”

Of course he’d ask that. I wring my hands together. He knows that’ll be a hard one for me. Not calling if I see him, but I’d hate to mess up some poor schmuck’s day because he happened to look similar to Michael from a distance.

Still…

“Okay. I promise.”

So he doesn’t look happy about it, more cautiously relieved. I can’t blame him. It’s not the best circumstance, but we have to take what we can get, right? This is our first step to a semblance of normalcy.

When I turn to go back to the kitchen, Gage grabs my arm to spin me. “We’ll get it back,” he whispers, then before I can respond, he kisses me slow and sweet. That’s when I know he understands my fears without me having to say a word.We will get it back. The security. The normal. The good.

After he lets me go, I move to continue making us food. I’ve got pasta going in the boiling water for the chicken Alfredo. The sauce already simmers in the pot.

This, this is what I want for us. Cooking dinner while he works on the computer. My last semester at DePaul was a bust after, well, after Chicago. But maybe if I explained what happened, they’d let me back into the program.

Elise manages the club; maybe Gage wouldn’t mind me taking over the accounting for the businesses. We could work together.

I think I’d like that, to work with Gage.

We eat. It’s comfortable, though Gage looks far off. He’s worried about me. I know it.

After dinner he cleans up while I phone Smitty. I’m on the schedule for the morning.

From there it’s a lazy evening. We watch a movie cuddled up on the sofa. Then we head to bed. It doesn’t go unnoticed that Gage holds me closer, tighter even as he falls asleep.

Unfortunately it takes me a bit longer to dial down my thoughts enough to rest. So caught up in them, I almost forget to set my alarm. But I do, and I eventually drift off.

Much too soon my eyes pop open to the shrill ringing of my alarm. I hardly feel like I got any sleep at all. I guess not giving Michael any more control over my life has taken more from me than I thought.

Dammit. I don’t want to break down again. Running from the man I love most in the world because of the memory of another man. What if I break again? What if… What if I can’t put myself back together again?

But if I let Gage know what’s going on in my mind, he won’t let me go back to work, and then my fears realized, they win. Michael wins, and… and Houdini.

After slipping out of bed, I sneak quietly to the shower. Apparently not quiet enough. Gage, natural golden skin and sun-kissed hair, bright blue eyes shining only for me and a morning erection carved by the gods of sex and beauty, slides into the shower with me.

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