et him out of his sight or mine.
“Coffee?” Mia suggests.
I force myself to turn to her. “Yes,” I say, battling a need to go to Eric, but remembering my commitment to him as well, to use Mia to get Grayson out of here, though I’m not certain that’s smart right now. I manage a weak smile. “Coffee is good.”
“I know where the coffee shop is. I was here for a client’s mother a while back.”
I don’t move. I don’t want the coffee. Damn it, I have to talk to her. “Great,” I say. “Lead the way.”
“Of course,” she says and we start walking, but suddenly I just know Eric is near. I stop and turn to find he, Davis, and Grayson, entering the waiting room we just left. They huddle up and start talking and as if he senses me looking at him, his attention shifts, and suddenly I’m captured in his intense stare.
Seconds tick by and I can’t explain it, but the world just shuts down, it shrinks, and pulls us together. There is so much between me and this man, so much to learn, to know, to experience. So much to lose and I have a horrible feeling that’s where this is headed.
Pain.
Loss.
Goodbye.
I need to do something I’m not doing.
What? What do I need to do that I’m not doing?
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
Harper
Eric and I are still staring at each other from across the hospital hallway with the world fading into the distance. Eric’s eyes narrow on me, a question in their depths and apparently he doesn’t like the answer he finds in mine because he starts walking toward me. I don’t know what he saw in me but suddenly, I just need his arms around me. I need to feel him close and I start running toward him. If he’s swimming in shark-infested waters as Grayson proclaimed, I’m right there with him.
I hurry forward, closing the space between me and him before we collide and my arms wrap around him, my head resting on the solid wall of his chest. He holds me close, and for seconds, I wish could be hours, there is nothing but me and him. No Kingston family. No hospital. No assassin, but the world screams around us, and we pull back in unison to look at each other. “We will get to the other side of this,” he promises.
“I know,” I say, realizing that that’s what I need to say to him. “I know we will. I really need you. You know that, right?”
He cups my head and kisses me, a deep stroke of tongue before he says, “Remember that. You need to remember that.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means we need to be alone. We need to sleep. We need to finally talk, really talk.” He strokes my cheek. “Go do what you need to do. Let’s get out of here sooner than later.”
I want to push for more, but he’s right. We need to get out of this hospital. And so I nod and step back from him, our fingers catching, and slowly parting, but I say nothing else. He says nothing else. We don’t need to say more. What we need is to be alone. We’re new. We’re unsteady and the world around us is even more unsteady, and we have to steady it together.
I force myself to turn away, and rejoin Mia, and the two of us fall into step together, and round a corner that leads us toward an elevator. A few minutes later, we’re sitting in a desolate cafeteria at a tiny table, with coffee in front of us, her keen eyes on my face. “He really matters to you.”
“He really does. And that’s why I’m going to get right to the point. Grayson’s right. Eric is swimming in shark-infested waters, and while Grayson feels he needs to be with him to protect him, I believe that any risk or backlash against you or Grayson is what will send Eric over the edge.”
“Define over the edge.”
“He’ll protect you and Grayson at all costs. He needs room to breathe. If Grayson’s by his side, he won’t breathe. He’ll feel the pressure to end this before Grayson gets in too deep. And I mean, end it however he has to end it.”
She sits back, looking as if she were punched in the chest before she leans forward. “However he has to end it?”
“Yes. However, he has to end it.”
She lifts a hand. “I’m not going to try to define what you might be implying. The bottom line is that Grayson loves Eric like a brother. He doesn’t want Eric to feel alone. He won’t leave his side.”
“Eric doesn’t feel alone. He knows he has Grayson. He speaks of him as blood, family. A brother. He can’t lose him. That’s what Grayson needs to understand. Eric can’t lose him. He can’t be a part of taking him down in some way. And you need to understand how dangerous this is, Mia. They tried to kill me and we don’t know who they even are. Now his father was poisoned. Eric has every reason to believe that danger is a living, breathing monster, ready to attack at any moment. He won’t sit back and let Grayson get hurt.”
“What do you want me to do?”