Chapter 7

I sat in the shadows and watched her cry.

Like a lump of fucking useless man.

I sat in the shadows while she suffered alone and did nothing.

Just like?—

I clench my teeth together so tightly that a sharp bolt of pain slices through my jaw.

But it's enough to center me, to shove those memories deep down, to lock them away, forget they exist.

I can't think about her now.

I can't remember now.

Because I'm standing in the shadows, watching Lauren again, seeing the toll it's taking on her to let her son be a normal kid, doing normal things, and my respect is growing for her by the second.

And my obsession.

Which had already grown to fucking troublesome proportions before tonight.

Now...it's closing in on me from all sides, sending me sliding toward the edge of a cliff that's crumbling beneath my feet.

I'm already on my belly, limbs sprawled in all directions, trying to disperse my weight so I don't go plummeting toward the canyon below. I know it's not going to be enough. The edge is breaking apart beneath me.

And I still can't fucking stop watching her.

Especially now that she's emerged from the bathroom, her skin dewy and pink, her hair piled on top of her head, her robe tied around her body?—

I freeze, don't tear my gaze from the window, from the woman inside who's so fucking beautiful it takes my breath away, but I'm not seeing her any longer. Every single one of my senses is focused behind me.

On the man who's creeping closer, trying to?—

I whip around, grab his wrist, and yank him toward me, snapping the bones with one sharp move that has his hand spasming open, dropping the gun. I kick it away?—

And then it's...messy.

Fists meeting flesh, air pushed from lungs, grunts escaping. Nails digging, feet kicking, bodies battling.

He's good. And strong.

But I'm better. And stronger.

I get him pinned, his face in the dirt, hands restrained behind his back, my knee digging into his spine as I reach into his back pocket and yank out his cell phone, swiping up and shifting his body enough to get his face to unlock the screen.

Then I'm hitting the contact of the man behind this bullshit.

"Pascal," he says lightly, picking up the call after the first ring.

"Felix."

A beat. "Is he still breathing?"

"Is that concern I detect?" I say softly, listening and restraining, but also hyper-aware of my surroundings.

Because I wouldn't put it past him to stab me in the fucking back.

He's done it before.

Felix's soft laugh tells me that nothing's changed in the ten years since I got out. "Only for my own time. That one took a long fucking time to train. I'm too busy as it is."

I pull in a breath through my nostrils. "But not too busy to be here."

Another laugh. "You know why I'm making my presence known now."

Yeah, I do.

Because he wants my help.

"I'm out of this shit," I remind him. "And I've been out for a decade."

He laughs quietly. "You're never completely out."

There's some truth to that, but that's also why—after I fucking lost everything—I made sure to cover my ass...

And to have plenty of blackmail material.

"I'm out," I say again. "Use someone else."

More laughter. "Pascal."

And I know I'm about to burn some of that blackmail material.

Not the biggest.

But what will hit Felix the hardest.

"New Hampshire," I say softly.

There's no laughter now, no response for a long, long moment. "That's not a pin you can pull."

The fucker below me bucks and I dig my knee harder into his back. "Try me."

To him.

To Felix.

Another long moment of quiet. "This woman is worth that?"

"This woman is innocent," I say. "She and her son stay out of our shit. Permanently."

More quiet. I know he's thinking, he's calculating every angle, trying to figure out which brick to pull without sending the entire archway down on his head.

The trouble—for him—is that if I let out what he did in New Hampshire...

He'll be fucked.

Criminally and financially.

Felix clicks his tongue. "So," he says, "she's not for you."

A jab of pain in my chest, but I ignore it. "No," I tell him. "She's not for me."

Even though every cell in my body revolts at the thought.

"This will be difficult without you."

"You'll manage," I mutter, hopping off the fucker, then moving to grab the gun I won't leave unattended, not even for a second—not with Matteo and his friends running around this yard on the regular.

I tuck it into the waistband of my pants, then turn and grab the fucker when he tries to run off, knocking him to the ground a second time.

He groans, holding his groin.

Felix sighs. "Very difficult."

"New Hampshire," I remind him as I pin the phone between my ear and shoulder, hefting the motherfucker who dared tramp through Lauren's flowerbeds up to his feet, marching him out of the yard, through the shadows of the neighboring yards.

I stop outside the expensive sedan I know he drove here.

Because I don't recognize it. Because it's Felix's style.

I dig into his pocket, find his keys, and bleep the locks before shoving the fucker in the passenger's seat. "You'd better come and clean up your mess."

Another chuckle. "And you'd better remove the bugs from her house."

I bite back a growl, hit a pressure point, watch as Felix's underling goes unconscious.

"Stay the fuck out of my life, Felix," I snap, ending the call and tossing the phone into the man's lap.

I disassemble the gun, making sure it can't ever be fired again, then shove it in the glove box so some idiot can't pick it up and try.

A scan of my surroundings as I slam the door, as I slip back into the shadows.

As I head back to Lauren's house.

Only this time, I head straight for the front door.

I knock, and I don't do it quietly.

Then I wait, knowing that she's likely inside, trying to decide if she's going to answer the door.

She shouldn't—who the fuck knows who could be on her front porch.

I could call her. I have her number—not that she gave it to me, but because I can get anyone's number, anytime.

But that would require me giving her explanations I can't afford to give.

I bite that back, knock again, and I still don't do it quietly.

When I finish, I sense movement inside, can faintly hear footsteps on the floor coming close to the door, and I tense, trying to brace for what's going to happen next.

She peers through the window, and some part of me settles because she took the time to take that look, didn't just whip the wooden panel wide and open herself up to whatever danger was lurking on her porch.

Her eyes widen when she takes me in there, and she stares at me for a moment before she seems to shake herself, brows slamming together as she disappears from sight.

I hear a click then the sound of metal sliding against metal, and then the door is pulled open.

"Pascal?" she asks, fucking beautiful without a lick of makeup, the flannel pajama pants and hoodie she must have pulled on after her bath doing nothing to show off the gorgeous curves I know are hidden below. "Is everything okay?"

I nod. "Can I come in?"

Teeth pressing into her bottom lip, and then she shakes her head, steps back. "Um, yeah. Sure."

I slip inside, looking around, taking in a view I've only seen from through the windows. She has a bulletin board with Matteo's drawings on the kitchen wall, a shoe rack loaded with rain boots and sneakers and flip flops, a row of hooks mounted into the sheetrock—and my jacket is there, hanging from one, as though it's waiting for me to walk through the door. I suck in a breath, focus on my surroundings instead of what the sight of my jacket suspended there makes me feel, and allow my gaze to keep moving. It slides toward a painting of the ocean filling up one wall in the blues and teals and purples I know that she prefers then around the rest of the space, trying to locate where Felix would have hidden the bugs.

Here near the door, for sure.

"Uhh," Lauren whispers. "Is there a reason that you showed up on my porch?"

A framed picture, near enough to the door to pick up on any conversations, and because it's of her and Matteo, I know that Felix would see it as an extra fuck you to me.

"Can I get a glass of water?" I blurt.

Her brows furrow further, but to her credit, she just nods. "Yes, sure. Of course."

Then disappears into the kitchen.

I move quickly to the photo, run my fingers along the edges of the frame, and sure fucking enough, there's a goddamned bug there.

I yank it free, drop it to the floor, and crush it beneath the heel of my boot, managing to pocket the remnants just as she comes back in with my water.

"Sorry for the kids' cup," she murmurs, cheeks turning slightly pink. "I haven't had a chance to do dishes yet."

My eyes flick to the sink as I take a sip. "I'll help you."

"What—? No, Pascal, I?—"

But I've already moved into the kitchen, using the chance to sweep my gaze around the room, searching for likely spots, identifying a handful even as I make a mental note to bring a team out to sweep the house tomorrow when Lauren and Matteo are at hockey practice, just to make sure I got them all.

"I'll wash," I say, setting my glass on the counter and moving to the sink. "You dry and put away."

"I have a dishwasher," she whispers. "I just...it's full and I was too tired to empty it."

I stop with my hands a couple of inches above the dishes and glance over my shoulder at her.

Beautiful, but with dark circles under her eyes. "You've got a lot going on," I say quietly, switching spots, shifting to the side and tugging open the dishwasher.

"You don't?—"

I tug out a glass, hold it up. "Tell me where this goes, sweets."

Her nostrils flare and I'm barely able to keep my arm extended. Because—fuck—that shit just slipped out and I shouldn't have said it, God knows I shouldn't have said that. I promised myself that would never happen again. Not after?—

Thankfully, she puts me out of the misery of my memories and tilts her head toward a cabinet to the left of the dishwasher. "They go there."

I nod, start unloading, taking advantage of Lauren doing the same to surreptitiously sweep the space for bugs.

It takes until I'm putting a mixing bowl away before I find it, tucked beneath the lip of granite on the underside of the island.

I pry it free, palm it, and then bring it to the sink, disabling it by running it under the hot water and crushing the components with the edge of a pot as Lauren finishes putting the silverware away. It goes into my pocket and then the rest of the dishes get washed.

"You know I was planning on getting these in the morning," she murmurs.

I look at her again, see those dark circles, know that she's constantly playing double duty, constantly having to be Mom and Dad. "I don't know Matteo all that well," I say as I rinse out a bowl, "but from what I do know, it doesn't seem like he ever runs out of energy."

Silence for long enough that I glance to the side, see that she's standing there, eyes soft.

When she catches me looking, she jerks, reaches for the glass I washed and sticks it in the top rack of the dishwasher. "No, he doesn't ever get tired," she says on a chagrined sigh, but when she meets my eyes, hers are dancing with humor. "But I don't want to miss a moment of it. I know he won't want me as much when he's older. Heck—" A wry twist of her mouth. "He's already abandoned me for his friends."

She looks like she needs a hug.

But I don't know how to do that, how to be the man to give her that and to not be her man in every sense of the word.

And...I'm not good for her.

Case in point? I'm searching her fucking house for bugs because my fucking past is...

Fucked.

And not just in regards to Felix, though I'm going to make sure that shit doesn't touch her.

Fucked in other ways that mean I can't touch her.

"So," I say, shoving that down and moving on from the pot, starting to scrub a plate, "it goes that dishes are less important than spending time with him."

Her breath hitches and she's quiet for a long moment. "Yes," she whispers. "That's true."

"And it goes to say that a woman who's got dark circles beneath her eyes and works her ass off for her kid can stand to cut herself some slack."

She inhales, exhales quietly. "You sound like Brit," she says quietly.

"Well," I tell her, my tone dry enough to bring a smile to her lips, "she had to learn it from somewhere."