Page 63 of While She Sleeps (The Hunter and The Thief #1)

CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE

ORION

I watch as recognition turns to pure panic, and then she’s gone.

Ember clambers off the edge of the bed, pain lancing over her features from moving too quickly, and I flinch at the idea she’d rather hurt herself than be close to me.

“Little Flame,” I say carefully, my hands up in front of me. “It’s okay. I’m not going to hurt you.”

“Not going to hurt me?” she asks incredulously. “You almost killed me! And you did kill my brother. The only person that’s ever had my back. You stole everything from me!” A ragged sob tears from her throat as she backs away, putting more and more distance between us.

“Just let me explain.”

“What’s there to explain, Orion? Or should I call you Hunter?

” She drops her head for a moment, trying to get control of her raging emotions.

“You’ve lied to me every single day since we met!

You’re the reason my whole fucking life fell apart!

The reason I can’t get into a car. The reason I’ve wanted to die every day since Travis died! ”

I flinch at the admission. I knew she was struggling. I knew she was hurting herself. But I didn’t realize how deep that pain ran. I didn’t realize she’d thought about making it all go away. Forever.

The thought of a world without Ember is so painful that I barely keep my legs underneath me. She’s the stars that shine in my darkness, and I wouldn’t want to live in a world where she’s not.

“You don’t understand,” I say carefully. “There are things you don’t know.”

“I’m sure there are. Like that the man I let inside me is the same man that tore my life apart.”

She doesn’t give me another second to explain before she slips into the bathroom and slams the door closed behind her. The lock clicks into place a moment later, and I eat up the distance between myself and the door.

“Ember, please let me explain. It’s not what you think.” That’s a lie. In a lot of ways, it’s exactly what she thinks.

I did do all the things she’s accusing me of.

I killed her brother.

I almost killed her.

I am the reason she’s been miserable since the accident. The reason she’s struggled. The reason Lucas threw even more debt onto her plate.

But it wasn’t purely selfish.

“Go away.” She sobs from the other side of the door.

“No,” I say. “I’m not going anywhere. It’s you and me, Ember. Forever.”

“I’ll never let you touch me again, Orion. I’d rather die than have your hands on me ever again.”

“You don’t mean that,” I murmur, but there’s truth in those words. I can feel her anger, her despair, even through the door. “That night, the night of the accident, Travis was driving you up into the hills to force you to marry Lucas. He traded the rest of his debt for you.”

Silence greets me on the other side of the door, but I wait. It’s a truth I’ve been desperate to give her for months, long before I allowed myself close to her.

“You’re lying.”

“I’m not, Ember. I promise I’m not. Didn’t you wonder why they got so protective of you all of a sudden? Why they tracked your movements? Why wouldn’t they let you out on jobs that involved men? Why they sabotaged your dates?”

“How do you know about all of that?”

“Because Lucas works with the Hunter closely, and I make it my business to know everything that’s happening in the lives of the people I work with, especially liabilities like Lucas.

He had Travis digging into my identity for most of the time they were working on the deal.

Finding out my identity, as well as your hand in marriage, was the price of paying off Travis’s debt, and then he planned to leave LA. To leave you behind.”

I hate knowing what I’m telling her will only hurt her more than she’s already hurting, but I have to give her the truth. I have to lay it all out on the line and hope she doesn’t run for the hills.

Not that I would blame her. Quite the opposite, in fact.

The problem is, it doesn’t matter how far she runs. It doesn’t matter where she hides. I’ll be right there on her heels.

I’ll never let her go, no matter how hard she begs.

I’ve never claimed to be a good man. I’m a killer. A criminal. A notorious sociopath. But I’ll always take care of what belongs to me.

“That’s not true. Travis wouldn’t do that to me.”

“I’m sorry, Ember. I wish I were lying. Fuck, I wish everything was different. I wish I’d met you before that night. I wish I’d known that I would fall for you the second I pulled you from that wreck.”

“Stop.” She chokes on the word. “Just please stop. I can’t take any more right now.”

I sigh and drop down to the ground, leaning my back against the door. “I’ll be right here when you’re ready to talk.”

“And if that’s never?”

“You underestimate my obsession with you, Little Flame.”

She doesn’t reply to that, and I don’t expect her to.

Instead, we fall into a deep silence that I feel in my bones.

I always knew this was a possibility. I just wish I could take away her pain.

I lose track of time leaning against that door, listening for any sound that comes from the other side.

The occasional broken sob draws me closer to breaking down the door and hauling her against my chest, but I manage to rationalize myself away from doing that.

As much as I may want to, I can’t steamroll her at every turn. I have to give her time to accept everything I’ve thrown at her tonight.

My eyes fall closed as I fight off a yawn. Even if I fell asleep, she wouldn’t be able to make it out of the apartment without me knowing, but I want to be here if she decides she needs me.

A soft cry of pain has my eyes snapping open. Maybe she just needs more of those painkillers Parker gave her.

I shove myself to my feet and head into the kitchen, moving through the motions of adding some crackers to a small bowl, pouring her some water and popping the pills from their bottle.

Once I’ve got everything ready, I head back to the bathroom and knock softly. “Ember, I have some pain meds here for you. You don’t have to talk to me if you don’t want to, but it’s important to keep on top of your pain so your body can heal.”

There. That was nice and gentle, not pushy.

But still there’s no response.

“Ember?”

Nothing.

Panic creeps into my chest. What if she’s fallen and hurt herself?

You would have heard that, I remind myself.

But that doesn’t mean she isn’t hurt and can’t get to the door to let me in.

Before I can talk myself out of it, I drop the bowl and glass on the bedside table and move back to the bathroom.

“Step away from the door, Little Flame.”

I give her a few seconds to do as I’ve instructed before slamming my shoulder into the solid wood.

The flimsy lock gives way beneath the weight with ease, and I look around the room, but it’s not Ember that catches my attention.

No, it’s the blood.

So much fucking blood it looks like someone’s been tortured in here.

“No,” I breathe, frantically looking for the woman who holds the heart and soul I didn’t think I was capable of having.

It takes two passes before I find her. The high rim of the bathtub hid her from my view, and with each step I take, more and more panic rages through me.

Because she’s the source of the blood.

A bloody razor blade sits on the edge of the bathtub, and there are deep slices across both of her wrists. She’s covered in crimson, and I race toward her, immediately tugging her out of the tub and against my chest.

“Ember, please wake up, Little Flame,” I choke on the plea as I lower us to the tiled floor. I need to get the bleeding under control before I can get her to the hospital, because she’s already lost too much blood to make it if I don’t.

I reach for the towels beneath the sink and wrap them around her wrists, securing them with sports tape I had from when I hurt my shoulder last year in a fight, wrapping it tightly so it won’t budge.

But the blood immediately turns the white towels red.

“Ember, please.”

Her head lolls to the side, and her sapphire eyes look up at me. The vibrant color I fell in love with is dull and muted, but it’s the dejection that stares back at me that feels like someone has reached into my chest and pulled out my heart.

Her skin is so pale, void of the vibrance I’m used to seeing, and I realize that she’s dying in my arms, and there’s nothing I can do about it.

She coughs, her body jolting in my arms. She’s losing the battle, and I’m paralyzed in place, unable to move.

Her eyes drift closed slowly, and I tug her against me harder.

“No, Ember. Please don’t leave me. Please stay. Please fight. Please, Little Flame.” Tears roll down my cheeks, and I try to remember the last time I cried. But it’s been years. Decades even.

Ember’s lips part, her labored breaths whispering against my bare chest as I hold her tighter, uncaring about the blood that covers us both.

She forces her eyes open again and stares at me so deeply, I swear she can see right into my soul before she says the words that will haunt me for the rest of my days.

“Why did you have to make me love you?”

To Be Continued…

W ant to know how Orion and Ember’s story ends, preorder While He Breathes , releasing late July 2025.