Page 18 of While She Sleeps (The Hunter and The Thief #1)

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

ORION

“ Y our girl is definitely investigating you.” Killian’s amused voice comes down the line, and I rub my face. I’m in my office in the heart of the city today doing some of my legitimate work, but I was tracking Ember all morning until I was pulled into an investors’ meeting.

“What’s she doing?”

“She was at the old warehouse, the one we moved out of six months ago because we thought someone had found the location.”

I chuckle and shake my head. It’s kind of cute that she’s trying to find the Hunter when he’s been in front of her for weeks. “Well, I guess that confirms they had.”

“Lucas is becoming a problem, Orion. He’s getting cockier, and you know what that means.”

I do. He’s not the first person who has gotten too big for their boots and thought they could take me out.

Hell, the Lounder Cartel is the most recent organization that thought they could take my enterprise from my cold, dead hands.

But they paid for that misconception with their lives. Just as Lucas inevitably will.

“We’ll take care of it when the time comes.”

He groans and the sound of his car turning on fills the line. “Your girl is on the move again. I wish she’d drive somewhere so I can stop being a creeper following her at a snail’s pace.”

I chuckle. “You could walk,” I suggest.

“Fuck off.”

I lean my head back against the chair and scan my remaining meetings for the day. I try not to come into the office every day, but that just means the days that I am here are full of bullshit I have no interest in.

What I want to be doing is exactly what Killian is complaining about.

There’s a part of me that feels unsettled when Ember is out of my sight, and although I’m quite aware of how insane that sounds, I don’t bother fighting it.

Why would I?

I knew this is how it would be when I found my woman.

There were traces of it with the women I’ve pursued in the past, but that was nothing compared to how it is now. How wild and unhinged my chest feels when I think about her. How much emotion she has dragged out of my cold, dead soul without her even realizing.

Honestly, I’m more worried about how I’m going to be when I can finally make her mine. When I can tie her to me in every single way possible to make sure she can never escape me. And when I can finally see her growing my babies.

I bite back a groan at the thought of seeing her swollen with my kids. It’s way too soon to be thinking about such a thing, seeing as we’ve never had a face-to-face conversation, but I don’t give a fuck. She’s mine, and I’m planning our lives to reflect that.

“Stay on her and let me know where she goes next.”

“Do you want me to organize for her to find some fake leads?”

“No.” I shake my head as a smirk tugs at the corners of my lips. “Let’s see how far she gets.”

“Are you sure? She could tell Lucas what she finds.”

“He won’t be alive long enough for it to matter.”

E mber snores softly, spread across her sheets rather than under them.

This is the third night this week I’ve found myself here, watching her dream from the safety of a dark corner, but I can’t drag myself away.

She looks so peaceful, even as her brows furrow and her head twists to the side, but I can’t help but wonder what it is that fills her unconscious thoughts.

I tug my phone from my pocket and scroll through a few emails.

I’ve tried to sleep while I’ve been here the last couple of nights, but it never comes.

I’d like to think it’s because my subconscious knows how risky it would be for me to fall asleep in an apartment I broke into in order to watch the woman I’m obsessed with sleep.

But it has more to do with the distance between us.

I’m desperate to lie next to her, to pull her into my arms and breathe in her scent as I slip into a peaceful slumber.

Not yet, I remind myself.

Killian is no closer to figuring out who was bold enough to steal from us, and soon I’m going to have to start questioning those who work for me, something I loathe the idea of. I’m a good boss, despite the line of work we’re in, and I help my employees in every way possible.

If one of my delivery drivers needs a day off with their sick kid, I make it work.

If one of my dealers has a death in the family, I pay them to have time off with their loved ones, as well as pay for the funeral.

When Larry, one of the warehouse workers, found out he had cancer last year, I paid for his treatment and all his expenses so he could get himself better.

I may be a shady criminal, but I’m a good boss, and I’m going to be especially fucking pissed if one of them thinks they can steal from me. I run the business the way I do to ensure loyalty, because that’s the only way you build mutual trust.

The number of people who know that warehouse exists is lower than some of the others, so the suspect pool is much smaller than most of the others, giving me hope it’s none of my guys.

A small whimper fills the room, and I shoot my eyes up to see Ember roll onto her side, her entire body trembling.

A nightmare.

I’ve watched her have a few on the cameras, but this is the first one I’ve seen in person. I was beginning to delude myself into thinking my presence alone was enough to keep them away, but clearly, that’s not the case.

“No,” she cries, and the sound of her distress has me out of my seat before I can think it through. If she wakes up to me looming over her, it’s going to take a whole lot more work to make her mine. She’ll run from me. She’ll try to deny me. Though the end result will remain the same.

But I would rather our relationship not begin that way.

Another cry fills the room, and before I know it, I’m kneeling beside the bed.

I’m not a man that kneels for anyone, but for Ember I’ll get on my knees every damn day if that’s what it takes to keep her.

I brush my fingers down her cheek, noticing the cold sweat that’s broken out across her brow.

There’s nothing I want more than to pull her into my arms and hold her close. To tell her she has nothing to fear because I’ll never allow her to feel another moment of pain, but I manage to restrain myself…just.

The small section of sheet that covered her hips falls away, and my chest tightens at the sight that greets me.

Cuts.

So many that I can barely count them in the dim moonlight.

They litter the tops of her thighs where her clothes would cover them, and my stomach sinks.

I knew she was hurting, but I didn’t realize just how badly.

An ache settles in my chest as I brush the tips of my fingers over the aging scars.

I need to move the timeline up.

I can’t allow my woman to suffer alone.

I won’t.