Page 46 of Protected from Malice
Two years that Eden’s been suffering on her own. Yes, she said she’s seen a counselor. But that’s not the same as having people who love?—
Dammit.
“Rafe?” Eden gets off the bed and heads over to the window to join me. Once she reaches my side, she touches my arm and looks up at me with a worried gaze. “Am I not allowed? Do you think they’ll say no, and that’s why you don’t want me on the call?”
“No, that’s not it.”
As I look at her reflection in the window, alarm rushes through me.
She’s too visible. Someone in the building across the way could look up, see Eden’s petite figure standing beside me, identify her with high-powered binoculars…
Or a scope.
Shit. I should have closed the blinds already.
Taking her hand, I lead her away from the window; away from the potential sniper that somehow found our location and is sitting out there, waiting for the perfect moment to take a shot.
Logic tells me that’s not possible. Not up on the fifth floor of a hotel with over four hundred rooms. Not in a suite that’s registered under another fake ID and paid for with a credit card to match. And not when I already found the little GPS locator in Eden’s purse and destroyed it, so there’s no way for the fucker who’s after her to track her again.
Dammit, that pisses me off. Before we left the last hotel, I checked everything Eden had brought with her—luggage, her laptop, her clothes—in an attempt to figure out how the intruder found her. And that’s when I found it. A tiny GPS tracker glued to the underside of her purse. So small, you wouldn’t notice if you weren’t specifically looking for it, which Ishouldhave done before we even left her house.
Eden wouldn’t have thought to look for it, but I should have.
She was terrified again because I wasn’t doing the thing I came here to do, which was to protect her.
How did the tracker get there? Who knows? It wouldn’t have been hard for someone to do it—just walk by her purse hanging on the back of a chair at a restaurant, jimmy open her locker at the gym, sneak into her office at work…
As I tow Eden into the living room and over to the dining table, she tugs on my hand. “Um. Rafe. Why can’t I look out the window?”
“You can.”
My voice is gruffer than I intended it to be. But now I’m stuck with a new and horrifying image in my mind; one of Eden shot by a sniper, crimson blossoming across her chest as she collapses into my arms, her skin paling as the life drains out of her.
A shudder runs through me.
My gut twists.
“Then why am I all the way over here?” she asks, gesturing at the expanse of room between us and the living room window.
“I just figured we’d sit here for the video call,” I reply after a brief hesitation. “Easier for us both to look at the screen on my laptop.”
Eden stares at me, her eyes narrowing. Her lips thin.
Why didn’t I just tell her the window isn’t safe?
Because I didn’t want to scare her again. That’s why.
But Eden’s far too smart for that. She glances at the window again. Then at the couch set in front of it. Back to the table we’re sitting at. And finally to me. The little color left in her face fades as realization dawns. “You think someone might try to shoot me,” she says flatly. “Right?”
“It’s unlikely,” I hedge, “but it’s possible. With the building across the way…” Hopping up from my chair, I hurry to thewindow and close the blinds, then flip on a light on my way back to the table to chase away the darkness.
Eden glances back at the window, this time with a little shiver of fear. She swallows hard. Sets her shoulders. Draws in a deep breath and lifts her chin. “It’s funny. I always thought it was so interesting, hearing about what you guys could do with a long-range rifle. Taking a mile-long shot and all that. In theory, it is. But in reality…”
I catch her hand again, wrapping mine around her trembling fingers. “I’m just being overly cautious, Brain. I’m sure there’s no one out there.”
I hope, at least.
As Eden turns her hand over so her palm is flush against mine, my heart jolts.
