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“For staying with me.” I keep my tone calm but firm. She will come with me, and she should know by now I’m not above kidnapping her to make it happen.
She turns to stare at me, and I see her trying to process everything that just happened. The attack, my sudden appearance, and the casual way I’m rearranging her life without asking for permission.
“I can’t just move in with you.”
“You can and you will.”
“Nikandr—”
“No.” I take a corner harder than necessary, and she grabs the door handle for stability. “That man didn’t attack you randomly, Sabrina. This wasn’t some drunk customer who got handsy. This was planned.”
She frowns, looking still somewhat disconnected, but her gaze is sharpening. “What do you mean?”
“Someone’s been watching you, and it wasn’t my people.”
Her face goes even paler, if that’s possible. “How do you know?”
“Because I know how these things work. I’ve been in this business long enough to recognize surveillance when I see it.”
I pull into the parking lot of her apartment complex, noting the way she flinches when I get out of the car. She’s scared of me now, or at least more aware of what I’m capable of than she was before. Good. Fear might keep her alive.
I come around to her side of the vehicle and open the door. “Come on.”
She hesitates for a moment, then takes my offered hand and lets me help her out. Her fingers are icy cold, and a fine tremor runs through her entire body.
“I need to call Jessie,” she says as we walk toward the building. “She’ll be worried if I don’t come home.”
“We’ll handle Jessie.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means she’s not safe either, and we’re going to make sure nothing happens to her.”
Sabrina’s apartment is on the second floor, and she fumbles with her keys for almost a minute before managing to unlock the door. Her hands are shaking too badly for fine motor control, and I finally take the keys from her and handle it myself.
“Thank you,” she whispers.
The apartment is exactly what I expected, being small, clean, and furnished with pieces that look like they came from thrift stores and estate sales. It’s the kind of place where people live when they’re trying to make ends meet on service industry wages, and seeing it reinforces my determination to get her out of here. “Go pack. Take everything you’ll need for an extended stay.”
She nods and starts toward what I assume is the bedroom, but I catch her arm gently.
“Sabrina.”
She looks up at me with those hazel eyes that have been haunting my dreams for thirteen weeks, and I see fear and confusion and something that might be relief.
“Are you hurt?”
She touches the corner of her mouth where the blood is starting to dry. “Just shaken up. He hit my head, but I don’t think it’s serious.”
“And the baby?”
She freezes completely, her face going white as she stares at me in shock. For a moment, she looks like she might faint. “How do you—” She can’t seem to finish the sentence. Her hands fly to her stomach in that protective gesture, and I watch the exact moment when she realizes there’s no point in denying it anymore. “How long have you known?” Her voice comes out as barely a whisper.
“For about an hour. Your name flagged in a routine security audit of my businesses. I own the clinic you visit… and Women’s Associates too.”
She sinks against the wall like her legs won’t hold her anymore. “You weren’t watching me?”
“No. I let you go, and I meant it.” The admission costs me something, but it’s the truth. I had fought the obsessive need to spy on her directly and hadn’t given in to temptation to have my men follow her. Other than having Maksim check sporadically for the first week, to ensure she didn’t go to the police—and he checked with our contact there, not her by monitoring her directly—I backed off. Somehow, I resisted temptation though she was never far from my thoughts. “This was coincidence… Or bad luck, depending on how you look at it.”