Page 10 of Darling Wildfire
She shrugged. “I didn’t think it was a big deal. Nothing has ever happened. What are you doing?”
“I’m texting Viktor,” I said.
I’d put the Volkov Brothers—Viktor and Konstantine—on Kaelin’s security detail during the Red Rabbit job and hadn’t taken them off since. The paranoid side of me wanted her watched at all times so something like Cooper couldn’t happen to her again. Especially now that I’d put things in motion to end a decade long revenge plot, I didn’t know what dangers lay ahead—I just knew they would come and I wanted to be as prepared as possible.
“Why are Viktor and Kon still around?” Kaelin asked. “I thought they were only staying with me while you took down Cooper?”
I walked over and slammed the paper down on the counter, pushing it towards her.
“Because of things like this,” I growled. “Death threats might not start as a big deal, but they sure as hell can turn into one.”
“Yeah because—” She stabbed the knife at the paper. “‘I’mgoing to slash your tires you dumb bitch’—is really concerning.”
She leaned her hip against the counter and casually pointed the knife tip at me, giving me a look like I was overreacting which just pissed me off more.
“I’ve traced some of the emails—they’re just from unhappy suburban housewives who don’t have anything to do but browse the internet looking for arguments.”
I ran a hand over my face and shook my head. It was harmless housewives now, but it could be Vetticus later.
“How are you so nonchalant about this after everything that’s happened?”
I saw the confidence falter briefly. I knew the shadows lingered just beneath the surface.
“I just don’t want to think about it, okay?” Kaelin snapped. “If I think about it too hard or too often, it makes it hard to function.”
She went back to chopping, but she was glaring at the vegetables now, the knife coming down harder than necessary. Sometimes it was easy to overlook the trauma she’d gone through because she was so damn stoic and stubborn. She hid her distress almost too well. As soon as we’d come back from the Red Rabbit op, I’d pulled her from her ridiculous self-defense classes she’d been taking and put her through a rigorous, although condensed, military training. She’d hated every second, but it’d made Graham and I feel better. We were still making her take a class at the office once a week and after the initial hell week we’d forced her through; she was begrudgingly starting to enjoy the tactical practice, not to mention she excelled at the gun range. So much so, she asked to go several times a week.
“Okay, then I’ll take care of it,” I said, running a hand over my face. “I need you protected.”
“You’ve said that,” she interrupted. “What does that even fucking mean?”
“It means I need to know every possible place a threat can come from.”
“That’s not an answer—” she sighed. “I don’t know what you want, Theron,” she said. “You can’t keep me locked up in this house, under guard, like I’m one of your possessions instead of a human being.”
I walked over and trapped her against the counter bringing the knife to rest between us.
“What I want—is you.” She shivered at the darkness in my tone, her pupils dilated, filling her vibrant green eyes with black. “I don’t want anyone to take you from me, but I can’t be prepared if you don’t communicate.”
I hadn’t factored her into the plans that were in motion because it caught me completely by surprise when I found her in the Warren. All I knew was I had to make her mine and fuck everything else. But now‘everything else’was here, and I hated thinking about something happening to her again.Except the truly terrifying part was I couldn’t guarantee her safety. Everyone around me had already signed up for the risk we were putting ourselves in, knowing that shit was about to hit the fan in a spectacular way.
“It goes both ways,” she said. “I hardly know anything about your life, but something is going on—I can feel it.”
“I need you to trust me.”
“And I needyouto trustme,” she insisted.
“I can’t trust someone who ‘doesn’t want to think about it,’” I said. “In my world, negligence gets you killed.”
I pushed closer to her so the blade sat against my neck and her breathing picked up.
“And I’m in your world now? Is that it?” She breathed.
I hadn’t expected to have someone I cared about in my life during this time. Nyx and Atlas were different—they’d gone through hell with me and suffered at Vetticus’ hand just as much as I had—so while I cared for them, they wanted this as badly as I did and were willing to see it all come down around us. I knew Nyx and Atlas wanted me to tell her everything, but there were so many moving pieces—and part of me didn’t want to show her the man I really was because I didn’t know what would be left after this was over. But none of that could tame the possessive beast inside me—maybe I should let her go, or give her the choice, but when it came to the people who belonged to me, I’d never been rational.
“You’re mine, baby girl,” I growled. I skimmed my knuckles across her jaw. “Or did you forget?”
“You won’t let me,” she said, her eyes fluttering at my touch.
