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Aaron pulls me right into the crowd, and holds my hand with such a tight grip that it seems he’s certain someone is going to yank me away at any moment. His energy has me on edge, but it also has me practicing the skills he’s been teaching me, cautiously looking around me, and I hope that’s the point of his grip. He’s keeping me aware. I hope it’s that and not some threat he knows about that I don’t.
We cut right again and walk two blocks before entering a T-Mobile store where he buys a collection of disposable phones.
We leave, and he opens one of the phones. We then walk back to the subway and just before I think we’re going back inside, he pulls me to the side of a walkway near a fast food entrance. “Call Smith. Don’t say your name. The conversation needs to go like this: ask him if he knows who he’s talking to but instruct him not to say your name. When he confirms he knows your name, tell him to meet you at the pizzeria on 88th in exactly one hour. Then hang up.”
“What if he’s protecting someone? He won’t be able to come.”
“He has a team to lean on just like I did in the CIA. He’ll make it work.”
I inhale and let it out, nerves suddenly exploding in my stomach when I’m the one who suggested this. I need to do this. This is our backup, our support. What Aaron and I need to get the heck out of this mess. I punch in Smith’s number, and he answers on the first ring. “Smith. Who is this?”
“Me,” I say. “Me. Don’t say my name, but do you know who this is?”
“Yes,” he replies immediately. “I know exactly who this is.”
“I need help. Meet me at the pizza joint on 88th in exactly one hour. Come alone. I don’t trust anyone else.” I hang up.
Aaron’s eyes search mine, looking for some reaction I have to Smith, a connection, a bond. “He’s a friend. Nothing more.”
“That you considered fucking.” He takes the phone from me and drops it to the ground. “Let’s go.” Anger spikes in me, but he’s already snagged my hand and started walking.
“Don’t say that again,” I snap. “You know the story there. I was honest, and you’re being an asshole.”
“Do you have any idea who’s around you right now? Do you know who’s behind you?”
“No, but—”
He stops walking, and his hands come down on my arms. “That was a test. That was a lesson. No matter how pissed you get, no matter how upset you are, you have to be aware of your surroundings. It’s life or death.”
“That was not a test.”
“Do you know—”
“No,” I bite out. “No, I don’t.”
“Figure it out right now. Keep talking to me but take in your surroundings.” He lists off everything around us. A trashcan. A homeless man against a pole. A woman in a red dress talking on a cellphone. “I’m protecting you.”
“By being an asshole?”
“Yes. You have to stay alive, Ashley. I need you alive. You will stay alive. Do you understand?” He’s intense. He’s demanding. The lines of his handsome face harder than I have ever seen them. He’s protecting me. He’s afraid for me.
“Yes, I understand, but for the record, I don’t want Smith. It’s all you. It’s always been you.”
He stares down at me, his look so probing that I think he’s trying to see straight into my soul, but he says nothing. He simply takes my hand and starts walking.
We enter the subway again, and it’s not long before we’re on a car, and we start the cycle we’ve just lived all over. This will be one of many subway routes we take. The difference this time is we manage to get on a train that is nearly vacant when all of the others have been packed. Aaron leads me to the back of the car. He leans against the wall and pulls me to him, my back to his front, his hands settling possessively on my hips.
He leans in, his breath warm against my ear and says, “You’re mine. From the day I met you, you were mine.”
Heat rushes through me with this possessive statement that he’s said to me often in the past, most frequently while we were naked. My reply always the same and as it is now. “Are you mine?”
“I wouldn’t be here if I wasn’t.”
The train announcements start, and we begin to move. My body is thrown further into his, and his hand moves to flattens on my belly. My hand covers his, the action meant to tell him that I’m glad he’s here. I am so damn glad that he’s here.
He turns me in his arms, and when our eyes meet, a million words and the charge between us steal my breath. “I can’t see the car,” I warn.
“I’ve got it,” he says. “And you.” And then his fingers are tangled in my hair and he’s kissing me, a wicked, hot claiming, but the taste of desperation on his tongue is something I don’t expect. He’s desperate for more than me. He’s desperate to protect me. Everything he does is about protecting me, even being an asshole. He’s afraid of losing me and the idea that this skilled, powerful man is scared, scares me.
