CHAPTER THIRTEEN

 

 

The house smelled like fried chicken, filling the air with that savory odor that had Stanley underfoot as Kiki moved around the kitchen. The dog was hungry so she ended up feeding him some kibble as she finished up the chicken.

There was a ton of renovation going on in the house at this point but the kitchen was one of the last frontiers to be touched, so Kiki still had a full kitchen to work with. It was a good thing, too, because Trace not only liked to eat, he liked to cook as well so they spent their nights making dinner and having drinks, and Kiki’s pants were starting to feel tight because of it.

She had to laugh at herself, the woman who never let herself gain any weight because, in the past, Mark would make comments if she did. Trace, however, didn’t care in the least. On the weekends, he liked to cook for her and he liked to see her eat. It had become a routine for them – they’d stuff themselves at dinner time and then he’d take her outside and make her go for a long walk along Mountain Street, across Fair Oaks, and into residential neighborhoods until they made about a two-mile loop.

They always brought Stanley along on their walks but the dog had little stamina so Trace would end up carrying the pooch most of the walk. He and Stanley had formed quite a bond because of it. But it was lovely, and domestic, and just about as wonderful as Kiki had ever imagined a relationship to be. She’d never known anything so utterly wonderful.

So she cooked for Trace on a regular basis and she also washed his clothes, made his bed, and bought him little things that struck her fancy. Trace came home to her every night and that’s the way she loved it. Nearly every night after their walk, they would kiss and cuddle, watching television in Kiki’s bedroom, and it was all quite wonderful. But they still hadn’t sealed the deal yet with sex.

Heavy petting and lots of touching, but no sex. Trace seemed to pull back before things got too heavy and when Kiki questioned him about it, he said, simply, that he hadn’t moved into her house to get her into bed. Having known her only three weeks, he didn’t want to move too fast and ruin anything. Kiki understood for the most part but it was getting to the point where she didn’t much care. She wanted the man in her bed no matter how long they’d known each other. To her, it just seemed like the natural progression of their relationship.

So her wicked plan was to cook him a decadent dinner this evening and take advantage of him when he was too overcome by food to fight her off. She’d gotten a recipe for fried chicken and waffles from a cooking show, which included bacon-infused maple syrup, and she was in the process of finishing up the chicken when she heard Trace’s truck pull up in the driveway. It made her heart leap with excitement to hear it. Then she heard the truck door slam just as she was taking the chicken out of a cast iron skillet, putting it on brown paper bags to cool off and drain off extra grease.

Keys in the back door. As soon as Trace opened the door and entered, he grunted happily.

“Good Lord, woman,” he said. “It smells like heaven in this house right now. What are you making me for dinner?”

Kiki grinned as he tossed his keys on the counter and came up behind her, slipping his big arms around her and kissing her on the neck.

“Fried chicken, waffles, and bacon maple syrup,” she said. “Everything you shouldn’t be eating.”

He held her tightly, his mouth still on her neck. “I don’t give a damn,” he muttered. “It smells like something I need to put in my mouth right this second. God, I’m lucky to have you.”

She was trying to move to the waffle iron to make the waffles now that he was home, but he had such a grip on her that she couldn’t move. And his mouth on her neck was making her body quiver. Before she realized it, she had turned in his arms, latching her mouth on to his, and he pulled her against him with such force that she grunted.

Trace was a very strong man, made apparent by the way he suddenly picked Kiki up and manhandled her onto the moveable island in the middle of the kitchen. They had purchased it from a furniture store to give her more counter space in the old kitchen, but the moment he put her on it, the wheels rolled and she nearly fell off. That brought out the laughter and the frenzied lust of the moment was broken.

“Tell me it’s always going to be like this with us,” Kiki said softly, her hands on his face. “Tell me you’re always going to want to put me on the kitchen counter and take advantage of me.”

He held her close, his forehead against hers, her legs wrapped around his hips where she still sat on the island. Tell me it’s always going to be like this with us. He’d come home planning to tell her what had happened with Harry the very first thing, or at least as much as he could tell her, but as he held her in his arms and gently kissed her face, somehow, he just didn’t want to do it at this moment. He wanted just a few more minutes of normalcy and laughter, of pretending that the future, for them, would always be full of rolling islands and passion.

Not full of killing people that were trying to kill him.

“It will always be like this, I promise,” he said. “At least as far as I’m concerned. I’ve worked too hard to get where I am with you to let any of this change. I like it just the way it is.”

She grinned and he kissed her one last time before setting her down on the floor. But the fact that she had been all wrapped up around his hips in a lovemaking position had him fairly aroused, so he tried to make himself more comfortable as Kiki went over to the waffle iron and poured in the batter.

Kiki couldn’t help but notice he was spending an inordinate amount of time adjusting himself through his jeans and she fought off a smirk.

“We can take care of that, you know,” she said as she closed the top of the waffle iron.

He wasn’t sure what she meant. “What?” he asked, but when she turned and looked straight at his crotch, he laughed softly. “Oh, that. Well, let’s eat first and then we’ll talk about it.”

Kiki moved over to get the plates out of the cabinet. “That’s all we ever do, Trace. Talk about it. I’d like to see a little action one of these days.”

He watched her as she pulled the plates down and began dishing out the friend chicken. “You can have as much action as you want, baby,” he said. “I told you that I didn’t move in here to get in your bed. I don’t want you to think that my ultimate evil plans are being realized if we sleep together. I was trying to give you time to get adjusted to all of this before we progressed like that.”

She turned to look at him, wryly. “What about my ultimate evil plans?” she wanted to know. “What if that was the only reason I let you move in here?”

He couldn’t help but chuckle. “Was it?”

She kept a straight face. “Yes.”

His laughter grew. “Okay, then,” he said. “I wouldn’t want to disappoint you.”

She remained serious. “You do find me sexually attractive, don’t you? I mean, it’s not because you have some aversion to me, is it? Because if that’s the problem, then we really need to talk about it.”

His laughter vanished. In three strides he was on her, pulling her into his arms and kissing her so forcefully that she could hardly breathe. It was deep, hot, and delicious, and the lust that so easily sparked between them roared to life. But Trace stopped short of grabbing her breast or any other body part; he simply held her tightly as his lips did the talking for him. He could hear her gasp.

“You are, by far, the sexiest woman I have ever known,” he muttered against her mouth. “I don’t want to hear anything like that from you ever again. I would have screwed your brains out nightly since the day I met you if I thought I could get away with it, so my attraction to you has nothing to do with my holding off on the sex part of our relationship. Got that?”

Breathless, she nodded. “Got it.”

His eyes drilled into her. “Good,” he said. “Now, let’s eat and then after we eat, you and I are going to pick up right here, right where we left off. Okay?”

He meant the kissing. She grinned. “Okay.”

He let her go, watching her stagger because he had overwhelmed her so much with the force of his passion. Smiling, he went to the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of white wine they kept in there. Stanley, finished with his kibble, came out of his doggy bed and over to the refrigerator, begging for more food. Trace gave the dog a piece of cheese, knowing it would make him fart like crazy but he couldn’t deny the begging doggy eyes. He was very fond of Bullfrog. As Kiki finished up with the waffles and Stanley ate his cheese, Trace poured the wine.

“So I invited an old friend of mine over tonight after dinner,” he said. “I hope that’s okay. I really want you to meet him and he’s only in town tonight.”

Kiki had the waffles and chicken on the plates, drizzling both with the bacon syrup. “Of course it’s okay,” she said. “Who is it?”

He took a sip of his wine has he headed over to the little breakfast table they had in the kitchen. Stanley followed close on his heels, hoping for more food. “His name is Harry King,” Trace said. “I’ve known him for twenty years. He and I worked together in Washington.”

Kiki picked up the plates and headed to the table. “Oh?” she said. “Was he with the CIA, too?”

He nodded as he sat down, faced with an utterly delicious plate of food. “Yes,” he replied. “Christ, this looks good. You are one amazing woman.”

He reached out and took her hand, kissing it, as she sat down next to him. Then he picked up his knife and fork and plowed into the feast. Kiki was a little slower to eat; mostly, she just liked to watch him and how happy he was when he ate her cooking. She loved watching him.

“I think I need to cut back on making big, heavy meals like this,” she said, taking a sip of her wine. “If we keep eating like this we’re both going to weigh five hundred pounds before we realize it. It’s just that I’ve never been able to cook like this before and it’s really fun.”

He nodded, mouth full. “Fun and delicious,” he said. “You’re a fabulous cook.”

She grunted. “Thanks,” she said. “All Mark liked to eat was fish or chicken and vegetables, so that’s all I ever made.”

Trace made a face. “Boring,” he said. “I think one or two meals a week like this aren’t going to kill us. It’s been the best time of my life, bonding with you over greasy food.”

Kiki laughed as she dug into her chicken. “Me, too,” she said. “Who knew I could fall in love over mashed potatoes and steak?”

He stopped chewing, immediately looking at her. “Have you?” he said, swallowing the very big bite in his mouth. He was looking at her with a rather startled expression. “Fallen in love, I mean? Have you?”

She looked at him, rather coyly. “Have you?”

“I asked you first.”

Kiki held his gaze for a moment before looking away, back to her food. “Would it scare you away if I told you that I had?”

“It would make me the happiest man on earth.”

She looked up from her food, into his handsome face. There was so much joy and love in her heart that she was nearly bursting with it. What was not to love about the man? At that point, she almost couldn’t remember when she hadn’t loved him.

“You have made me happier than I’ve ever been in my life,” she said softly. “The way you and I have bonded… it was like it was meant to be, Trace. I needed you and I think you needed me, and it’s like the universe put us together at the right place and time. Everything about us has just meshed so well. I woke up the other day thinking that I have loved you since the start. You’re everything worth loving.”

He just stared at her. Kiki thought that his eyes actually grew moist. Reaching out, he pulled her out of her seat and onto his lap, and once she settled on his thighs, he put his arms around her so tightly that he was nearly squeezing the breath out of her. His face was in her bosom as he spoke.

“I have waited my entire life to hear that,” he said, muffled. “I’ve known that I loved you since the beginning but I was too afraid to tell you, too afraid it would scare you off. If that happened, I don’t know what I’d do. I never want to be without you, Kiki.”

She smiled, her arms around his neck and her chin resting on the top of his head. “You won’t be.”

“Swear it?”

“Of course I do.”

He was quiet for a moment, his hot breath against her cleavage. Love had been declared between them and, at that moment, things changed. Something had been cemented and that bond between them, the one Kiki had talked about, turned to steel. There was no turning back now.

“Will you marry me?” he asked softly.

It was the perfect moment for it, the perfect timing of a question that had been silently lingering between them since nearly the beginning. Tears sprang to her eyes at the beauty of the question.

“Of course I will,” she murmured.

He squeezed her tighter. “Thank you,” he whispered. “For everything… just… thank you.”

Kiki thought he sounded rather emotional but she was emotional herself, so she simply sat there and held him, thinking that the future had never looked brighter. There wasn’t anything about her life that wasn’t perfect at the moment and she was more grateful than she could express.

Trace was grateful, too. To have her love was everything he’d ever dreamed of. But he was also deeply torn about what was coming and what he needed to tell her. It had been rather unfair of him to ask her to marry him before telling her something that could quite possibly change both of their lives forever, but he was feeling particularly selfish. He wanted her and he wanted to have something waiting for him when he returned from what was to be, inarguably, the most important mission of his life.

In a sense, he was doing all of this for Kiki because he couldn’t bear the thought of his past bleeding onto her, affecting her, creating havoc for an innocent woman who just happened to fall in love with a former CIA operative. What he had to do was for her as well as for him.

He had to save them both.

And she needed to know that.

“How big of a ring do you want?” he asked, although his mind was still on the things he needed to talk to her about. He just wasn’t sure how to start that part of the conversation.

Unaware of his turmoil, Kiki gently stroked his hair. “Giant.”

“How giant?”

She giggled. “I’m just kidding,” she said. “I don’t need a rock. I just need you.”

He kissed the flesh that was next to his mouth. “You got me, forever,” he said. “But I want to get you the ring you want, so maybe you can show me some pictures sometime.”

She loosened up on his neck a bit so she could look at him. “I’ll do better than that,” she said. “We’ll go out to the Santa Anita mall this weekend and I’ll show you what I like. But I don’t see any rush, do you? I think if you give me an engagement ring after having only known me three weeks, our parents will have us committed.”

He grinned, reluctantly letting go of her as she stood up and reclaimed her seat. He watched her as she picked up her knife and fork again, watching the dog as he begged for whatever she was eating. God, he was going to miss this. Just when he finally had what he wanted, he was going to have to leave it.

But in her statement about the weekend, he saw an opening to tell her what was on his mind. It was either that or he’d be leaving before she woke up, writing her a note like a coward.

“No, no rush,” he agreed. “But I won’t be around this weekend. In fact, I need to talk to you about it.”

Kiki didn’t sense any impending doom in his tone. She took a bite of chicken. “Oh?” she said. “Where are you going?”

Trace turned back to his food, hoping that he could ease her mind on this critical conversation if he acted casual about it. As if it wasn’t breaking his heart to tell her what he was about to. He cut into his waffles.

“Let me back up a bit and preface this conversation,” he said. “Let me tell you first that you can’t repeat any of this. What I’m going to tell you can’t leave this room. Okay?”

Kiki was serious but still not afraid or worried about what he was about to say. She nodded sincerely. “Of course,” she said. “But why?”

He put a piece of waffle in his mouth. “You already know that I worked for the CIA for many years.”

“Yes.”

“That’s actually why my friend Harry is here,” he said. “To talk about something that I had to deal with a few years ago that’s come back up again. I didn’t finish it the first time and now I’m going to have to.”

Kiki took another bite of chicken, listening with interest. “What is it?”

He swallowed the bite in his mouth, struggling to stay on an even keel so he wouldn’t upset her. “I started out at the CIA as an analyst before moving into field operations,” he said. “I can tell you that I was involved in espionage. I can also tell you that I have had to do some pretty James Bond-type stuff in my career. I became very good at what I did, so much so that I earned a nickname with allies and enemies alike. The Russians called me istreblyat.”

Her brow furrowed. “Really?” she said, fascinated. “What does that mean?”

“Loosely translated, it means eliminator.”

She cocked her head curiously. “Eliminator?” she said. She still wasn’t really following him. “Why did they call you that?”

He sighed faintly and set his fork down. “Because if there was a dirty job to do, I was the one to do it,” he said, seeing that she still wasn’t really getting it. “If someone needed to be eliminated, I would do it.”

Now, Kiki understood his meaning and her eyes widened. “Elimin -?” she couldn’t even finish the word. “You… you would get rid of them?”

He nodded. “Any way I had to.”

Her jaw dropped. “No,” she hissed. “I don’t believe it!”

“It’s true.”

 “You were some kind of… of assassin?”

“Yes.”

“Seriously?”

He nodded. “Seriously,” he said. “Baby, you have to understand that I wasn’t going to tell you any of this for a long time, if ever. I didn’t want my past to enter our world. It’s such a beautiful and peaceful world, and I’ve spent the past twenty years living in a hell of my own doing. I never knew life could be so wonderful until I met you and I don’t want anything to ruin that. Does that make any sense?”

She was still looking at him through horrified eyes. “It does,” she said, her voice oddly small. “But… a killer? Really, Trace?”

He could see her disbelief and he sighed again. “I did what I had to do for my country,” he said. “It was my job. It wasn’t anything I took any pleasure in. It was simply something that needed to be done and I was paid to do it. Please tell me I didn’t make a mistake by telling you this.”

Kiki shook her head quickly. “No, you didn’t,” she said. “But… I’m just having a tough time believing it, that’s all. You are the sweetest, most normal man I’ve ever met and now you’re telling me you had this secret life of being an… an assassin?”

“That’s about the gist of it.”

She set down her knife and fork completely, pushing her plate away. She wasn’t hungry any longer. “Oh, my God,” she breathed, struggling to come to grips with what he was telling her. “Jesse tried to tell me once that he thought you did more for the CIA, but I didn’t believe him. You’re saying that he was right?”

Trace frowned, deeply unhappy. “Did he really tell you that?”

“Did he really know?”

Trace shook his head. “No, he didn’t know,” he said, annoyed. “I never told him a thing, but he’s always had a big imagination. I can’t believe he said that to you.”

Kiki could see that he was genuinely upset by it. “It was just in conversation,” she said. “He wasn’t trying to convince me of anything. He was just talking about his suspicions. I didn’t believe him but it looks like I should have.”

Trace shook his head. “That kind of thing needs to come from me. He didn’t have any right to do that.”

She reached out and touched his arm. “Don’t be mad at him,” she said. “He wasn’t trying to be malicious about it. So what about this weekend? Where are you going? What is happening?”

He latched on to her hand, holding it tightly. Dinner, for the moment, was forgotten as they begin to delve into the heat of the conversation.

“A few years ago, I was assigned with taking out a Ukrainian mobster,” he said. “The guy ran the Ukraine’s biggest cartel – human trafficking, drugs, guns, you name it. Huge. Anyway, in the process of trying to eliminate the guy, my partner and best friend was killed. After that, I walked away from my job and never looked back. I came out to California to start a new life away from that stuff. After Marcos died, I just couldn’t do it anymore.”

Now, his move to the west coast was starting to make some sense. She’d remembered him speaking of it, back when they first became acquainted, and it had seemed like a difficult subject for him. “You said you moved here because of your divorce,” she said. “But it was more than that.”

He nodded, caressing her hand. “Much more,” he said. “My wife and I were over for the most part, anyway. We had been for years. The divorce just made it official. Coming home to work for my dad last year was my way of trying to start fresh and forget about everything. So I assimilated myself into Rocklin Construction and then I met you three weeks ago. Honestly, baby, you couldn’t have been more unexpected. Never in my life did I imagine to meet anyone like you.”

She squeezed his fingers and he lifted her hand, kissing it. “You were pretty unexpected to me, too.”

He grinned. “The best unexpected event I could have ever had,” he said. Then, he sobered. “But back to your question about what is happening this weekend - I’m afraid I’m going to be gone longer than just the weekend.”

She didn’t like the sound of that. “How long, then?”

He shook his head, kissing her hand again. “I have no way of knowing,” he said quietly. “I have a job to do and there’s no knowing how long it will take.”

She watched him as he rubbed her hand against his cheek. It was such a loving, longing gesture, one that pulled at her heart. She was beginning to feel very anxious. “You said you didn’t finish a job,” she said. “That’s where you’re going? To finish it?”

“Yes,” he said. “For your own safety, you need to know what it is. Do you remember that guy who broke into your house a couple of weeks ago?”

She shuddered at the mere thought. “Yes, of course.”

“I don’t think he was random. I think he was here with a purpose.”

She turned ashen. “What purpose?”

“I think he was looking for me,” he said quietly. “Or, at the very least, he was going to try to get information from you as to my whereabouts. I’m not certain about that, but it’s a possibility.”

She was looking at him with her mouth hanging open. “That’s why you wanted to move in so soon and protect me!”

“Yes. It was possible that someone was after me and I was afraid they were going to try to get to you again.”

Kiki stared at him. Then, she suddenly yanked her hand away from him, standing up from the dinner table. Both hands were over her mouth, a gesture of utter shock and dismay. Trace stood up, greatly distressed to see the expression on her face.

“You should have told me,” she said as the tears began to come. “You should have told me what was going on, Trace. It wasn’t fair not to tell me. And my girls… my God, my girls were here right after that happened. They could have been in danger, too!”

He moved to her quickly, wanting very badly to soothe her. “I’m sorry,” was all he could think to say. “I’m still not sure that was what really happened and I didn’t want to scare you. You’d only known me for two days, Kiki. You would think I was a lunatic if I told you my suspicions. In any case, the house is secure, the perimeter of the house is secure, and nothing else will happen, but just in case, I’m going to have Jesse come and stay with you while I’m gone. He’ll be able to protect you if something… well, if something else happens.”

Kiki dissolved in a flood of tears. “My God,” she hissed. “What have you done, Trace? What kind of danger have you put me and my children in? You weren’t honest about any of this, not in the least!”

He was starting to lose his composure, terrified that his dreams and hopes for a future with her were about to come crashing down. “There was no point in telling you anything,” he said, trying to be firm but gentle. “But I will admit that I was selfish. I was very selfish. I have found the woman of my dreams and I don’t want anything to ruin that. I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you everything right from the start, but would it have mattered? Would it have made a difference in how you felt about me?”

Kiki was sobbing at this point. “It wasn’t fair,” she wept. “You let me fall in love with you and then you lowered the boom. Assassins chasing you? Really?”

He hung his head. “It’s not like that, but….”

She cut him off. “You’ve put me at risk and my children at risk all because you didn’t want anything to ruin our relationship,” she said. “You know what? You ruined it with your dishonesty. There are men out to kill you and you couldn’t even tell me that!”

He was beginning to panic. “I love you,” he said; it was all he could think to say at the moment. “I love you so much, Kiki. I would never let anyone or anything hurt you. But the reality is that I didn’t have a normal job for the past twenty years. Does that make me a monster? Of course it doesn’t. What I did was in the line of duty for my country. I need you to understand that.”

She just turned away from him, devastated. But she wasn’t half as devastated as Trace was. He could feel something slipping away and he was unwilling to let it go. More than anything else in his entire life, he was going to fight for this until the bitter end. She had to understand his position.

“I have to go to the Ukraine and eliminate the daughter of a man I was ordered to assassinate,” he said, total truth on the table now. He wasn’t going to hold anything back. “She is now head of her father’s cartel and she wants to see me dead. There are a lot of people around her who would like to see her dead, too, so once she is gone, I believe that my problems will be over. I strongly believe that I have to do this in order to make sure you and I have a peaceful life. I want to open this wedding venue with you and be by your side, for better or for worse, ‘til death do us part, but for that to happen, I have to pull one more job. It’s just the way it is. I’m sorry if that is upsetting to you, baby, but I don’t have a choice. I have to keep me safe and I have to keep you safe.”

Kiki was slumped against the wall at this point, crying her heart out. She was horrified and terrified, for her and for her children and for Trace. All of the information had overwhelmed her and all she could think of was her fear and the fact that she felt Trace hadn’t been forthright with her about any of this.

“You should have told me all of this at the first,” she said. “Maybe it would have been overwhelming to me, and scary, but at least you would have been up front and honest about it. Now, I feel as if I’ve been betrayed. You let me fall in love with someone who didn’t exist. I fell in love with a normal guy who worked at a construction company and now I find out you’re some kind of James Bond with people who are still trying to kill you. They almost killed me to get to you. And I have to deal with this for the rest of my life? You should have told me that from the start.”

He sighed heavily, very much wanting to take her in his arms but knowing this wasn’t the right moment. It could work badly for him if he tried.

“I’m sorry you feel that way,” he said hoarsely. “It was never my intention to lie to you. My past was my past as far as I was concerned and I didn’t see any reason to tell you about it. As far as people coming after me and trying to kill me, I have done my best to cover my tracks and slide into anonymity, but no system is perfect. Things could still happen and if they do, I will deal with them. But know that I will protect you with my life. You and your girls and that damn farting dog. You all mean the world to me and I would do anything for you. Please, Kiki… all I want is a normal life with you. I’m sorry if you feel betrayed but please know that was never my intention.”

Kiki heard him but she was simply overcome with everything. She loved him; that was certain. Her guard was down, her emotions vulnerable, and she was deeply hurt and confused by what he had told her. She had no control left, her composure shattered. There was so much she wanted to say but she was afraid to, afraid she would say something she would regret. All she seemed to want to do was scream at him. Pushing herself off of the wall, she ran around him, giving him a wide berth, and raced up the back steps.

Trace followed her but he didn’t get very far. She ran into her bedroom, slammed the door, and locked it. He stood at the door, heartbroken, listening to her weep. He even heard her vomit, several times, emptying her stomach of that beautiful meal she had so proudly made for him. Forehead against the old door, he called out to her softly.

“Kiki, I’m sorry, baby,” he said. “I love you. I’ll… I’ll be right here in the hall if you need to talk. I’m not going anywhere.”

She didn’t answer. He didn’t really expect her to. Shattered, he slumped against the door and sank down to his bottom, sitting there, listening to her hysteria on the other side. Not that he blamed her. It was true that he hadn’t been totally forthcoming with her and that was on him. It was his fault. But he hoped that she would find it in her heart to forgive him.

He prayed she would.

As he sat there, he caught movement out of the corner of his eye to see that Stanley had pulled himself up the stairs and was now waddling over to him. Trace watched as the dog plopped down next to him, laying down, and he put a big hand on the pooch. With the other hand, he pulled his phone out of his pocket and texted Harry not to come. He’d meet him at the airport tomorrow. Putting his phone back into his pocket, he looked at the dog.

“Looks like it’s just you and me tonight, Bullfrog,” he said quietly.

The dog twitched in response.

In the dark upper hallway of Kiki’s beastly house, Trace and Stanley stayed right outside of her bedroom all night.