Page 29 of Merciless King

“You in there, London?” Van said.

I stilled. “Yes.”

“I’m opening the door.”

I crossed my arms, feeling suddenly self-conscious. He gave me a head to toe when he walked in. The muscle in his jaw jumped. “I was waiting for everyone to go so I could talk to you.”

I couldn’t read the look on his face, the tone of his voice. “Okay.”

“The police arrested someone tonight.”

I hugged myself tighter. “They did?”

“They’ll need to formally ID him, and because he was wearing gloves, it’ll take longer than just running prints.” His shoulders stiffened. “But the hair you tore out of his head while you were struggling on the floor…” His nostrils flared. “They’ll use that to match this guy’s DNA with your attackers. That’s just a formality, though. He’s our guy. We ID’d him through CCTV footage we got of him outside your place and the store,” he said. “I saw him being taken in.”

I didn’t know what to say. How to feel. My legs were suddenly weak. “They got him?”

Van dipped his chin.

“I’m…I’m safe now?”

“Yeah, sweetheart,” he said. “You’re safe now.”

“That’s…” I struggled to find the right words and failed, so I said, “Thank you, Van, for everything you’ve done for me, not just the last week but two years ago. I don’t…I don’t know what I would have done without you.”

He shook his head. “Baby, you have no idea how glad I am that I could be there for you. None. No thanks needed.”

Baby.

He’d called me that before, but this time, the deep rumble of his voice when he said it hit me low, so low I had to squeeze my thighs together. I didn’t know what to say, so I just stared at him, speechless.

His eyes were on me, the deep mahogany of his irises nearly swallowed by his pupils. They slid from me to the bed beside me then back, and his nostrils flared. “’Night, London,” he said and stepped back.

I watched as the door closed quietly behind him, my own gaze moving to the bed. I was safe. It was over. That was fantastic, amazing. Then why was there this hollow feeling inside me that yawned wider by the second?

Because you know when you leave here you won’t see him again. Van will walk away like he did last time.

This was probably my last night here with him. Possibly the last time I saw him at all. The thought caused an ache in the center of my chest because, yeah, I knew it was the truth. I knew it.

My whole life I’d been scared, shy, had kept myself apart, had done anything to avoid the fear I’d lived with for as long as I could remember. Van made me feel so much, so much beyond my fear that the idea of leaving tomorrow and never seeing him again, never knowing what it felt like to be kissed, touched by him, far exceeded any anxiety I felt.

Van King would never hurt me. Never.

Even if I walked to his room and offered myself to him, and he turned me down, he would do it in a way that would cause the least amount of pain. I knew that with absolute surety.

Was that what I was going to do? Was I going to go to him and ask to spend the night with him?

Was I going to tell him that I wanted him?

I took a shaky breath, fighting the nerves exploding behind my ribs. This is your last chance. Was I willing to spend another two years, God, another moment living with what ifs? With fantasies?

I opened the door and stepped out into the hall.

No.

I wasn’t.

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