“Ma’am, do you know this man?”

“How long were you tied up?”

“When did he arrive?”

“Is the gun his or yours?”

“Are you hurt in any other places?”

Two police officers ask me these questions. Responses fumble around my mouth. I think I answer, but it’s hard to know if the voice I hear is my own. One of the policemen walks me to an ambulance and helps me climb inside.

Red and blue lights flicker around me. Other ambulances. First responders, trying to gauge the situation. More policemen and women arrive, descending, digging, determining fault. The sky is dark, not light, but I’m transported back to that morning anyway. You need to come with us, they said.

Not tonight. Tonight I’m clearly the victim.

“Where’s Walt?” I ask the paramedic moving around in the ambulance behind me. I’m sitting at the end of the bay, the hard floor beneath me. If I had a blanket draped around my shoulders, I would look like a scene from a movie. Reality is alarmingly different.

The paramedic comes up beside me and steps down off the truck. She stands in front of me and asks for my wrists. “Who’s Walt?” she asks. I watch her turn my wrists over, and examine them. Her name is printed beneath an emblem on her shirt. Lori Turner.

“The old man. He was in the house with me.” I look at my house. Ginger’s house. The place that was supposed to be a safe haven for me.

She swipes a wet cloth over my wrists. “He’s being examined in another truck. No obvious injuries, just typical stuff that goes along with advanced age.”

I nod. Such a simple response that understates the swell of relief inside me.

Lori glides ointment over the abrasions on my wrist. She kneels and starts on my ankles.

“And the… other man?”

Lori looks up at me. “You mean the shooter?”

Another nod from me.

“They took him away already. He’ll likely need surgery.”

Eric Prince. Deranged. Despondent. Grieving. He needs help.

Lori finishes and stands. “You’re good to go. The abrasions on your wrists and ankles will heal. You’ll need to follow-up with your doctor, and tell them if any new symptoms arise. Take it easy for the rest of the weekend. The first few days following a traumatic event are difficult.”

In my case, it has really been the first twelve months.

Lori reaches for my shoulder to help me stand. She keeps a hand on me while I get my bearings. My legs are weak, I think more from shock than muscle failure.

“Thank you,” I tell her, stepping out from the protection of the partially open back doors of the ambulance.

Like Lori said, Walt sits in the back of an ambulance to my right. A paramedic listens to his heart. Walt spots me over the paramedic’s shoulder. His eyes close and his chin dips. It’s a gentleman-like nod, and it brings tears to my eyes. Growling, grumbling, junk-hoarding Walt wrestled a gun from someone’s hands. For me.

The paramedic starts talking, and Walt turns his attention to him.

“Brynn.”

A strangled voice reaches me. Soaked in fear. Dripping with relief. How can one word, my name, convey both those emotions? I turn, and the sight of him rips through everything I felt tonight. Suddenly I’m sobbing, and then I’m in his arms, burying my face in his chest.

“Connor,” I cry.

He brushes a hand over my hair. I look up at him. His eyes tell me the story of the terror he experienced tonight too. He cradles my cheek, his lower lip trembling. “I can’t believe… Tonight… That guy…” He shakes his head and doesn’t say anything else.

“I know. I know.”

Connor presses his lips to mine. It’s raw, a kiss between the wounded, the battered, the injured.

“All right, break it up.”

I pull away, very nearly smiling. I’ve never been so happy to hear someone’s voice. Stepping out of Connor’s arms, I step right into Walt’s. I hug him gently, even though I want to squeeze him tight.

“Thank you,” I whisper.

“You’re worth it,” he whispers back.

I’m crying again, and just when I think Walt’s going to tell me to quit blubbering, he extends a hand. I step back but keep an arm around Walt’s shoulders.

“Connor,” he says. “I’m glad you didn’t listen to me.”

Connor shakes Walt’s hand and grins. “Just because you’re old doesn’t mean you’re wise all the time.”

Walt wheezes a laugh. “Only most of the time.” He looks down the street to his house. “This old man needs his bed. Going to take a while to recover from tonight’s excitement.”

“We’ll walk you home and help you,” I say, adjusting my arm so that I have a hold of his elbow.

He sends me a playfully derisive look. “Brynn, I just beat up a guy half my age. I don’t need help getting into bed.” I let my raised eyebrows do the responding. Walt sighs. “Fine,” he grumbles. Connor waves a hand at a police officer standing in the open door of his car.

“Is it okay if we take him home?” He points at Walt. “Do you need anything more from us?”

The police officer walks over. I don’t recognize him, but I don’t think I’d recognize anybody from those first few moments after they burst into the house, guns drawn.

“You all are free to go. We may have more questions tomorrow, but we’ll call it a wrap tonight.” He hands me my purse. “This yours?” He nods at Connor. “He thought you might want it.”

I thank him and take it. A thought occurs to me. “In Phoenix, there’s a detective who worked with me about Eric. The, um…” I pause, not sure what to call him. Lori called him the shooter, but I can’t bring myself to say that. “Eric Prince.”

“You told us already, ma’am. It was one of the first things you said. You were actually quite helpful.”

“Oh.” I don’t remember any of that.

“Don’t worry. It’s normal not to recall what you said. Over the next few days, some things will come back to you.” He hands me a card. “If there’s anything you think of and you’re not certain you told us, give me a call.” He passes out cards to Walt and Connor. “You guys too,” he says, backing up. “Try to get some rest. Sleep will come easier than you think.”

“Let’s go tuck you in, Walt.” Connor starts down the sidewalk.

“Sounds good, Connie,” Walt fires back, tucking an arm through mine.

Connor’s shoulders shake with laughter while we follow him down the street, and into Walt’s house.

At the entrance to his room, Walt stops us. “I’ll take it from here.” He kisses my cheek and says goodbye to Connor. “Brynn, there’s an extra house key on top of the fridge. Take it and lock up behind yourself. I don’t want the key back.”

I smile. “Okay.”

I follow his instructions, tucking the key into my back pocket alongside the officer’s card.

Connor wraps his hand tightly around mine as we walk down Walt’s front steps. The ambulances are gone, the police car has driven off, and the street is quiet again. The neighbors who poured from their homes with the commotion of the night have gone back inside. Vaguely, I see Cassidy’s face in my memory. Perhaps things will come back to me as the seconds continue to tick past.

Suddenly I remember something. “Did you get a message from my phone? Is that why you came?”

Connor looks at me, his eyes illuminated by a streetlight we’re passing under. “I was just about to drive away from Walt’s house and looked at my phone. I saw your message and knew it wasn’t from you. It didn’t sound like you.”

“So you walked over—”

“Ran,” he corrects. “I was coming up your steps when I heard the shot.” He shakes his head. “Worst moment of my whole life. Not knowing.”

“Everything is okay now,” I remind him, even though my wrists and ankles burn with the memory.

We reach my house and he pulls me into his chest. “Stay the night with me,” he murmurs into my hair.

“Only if you promise not to let me go.”

He pulls back, looking down at me. “I’m never letting you go, Brynn.”

I’ve never really been in love, but I always imagined it feeling like floating. I was wrong. My heart, my core, my soul, my essence, has been connected to the earth, to the solid and stable surface it needs, to Connor, the man who would have let me go to keep me safe.

My hands wind around his neck. “I hope you mean that. I don’t want any more question marks between us. We have a period at the end of our sentence now.”

He answers me with a scorching and needy kiss. It takes my breath away, and almost my mind too. Luckily I remember I need to change my clothes. It’s embarrassing, but I tell Connor what happened.

“If it makes you feel better I will pee right here, right now.” He points at the yard. “On the grass, I mean.”

I laugh. “That’s the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me.”

“You can shower at my house. I have an oversized t-shirt with your name on it. You left some clothes at my place, too. I found them yesterday and had no intention of giving them back to you.” He grins impishly.

Connor takes my keys and locks the front door. He slips a hand in mine and leads me to his truck in front of Walt’s house.

Oh no. The car service for tomorrow morning. While Connor drives I type out a quick message to the guy who’s supposed to pick me up.

In the morning I’ll deal with canceling my flight. For now, I want to close my eyes and forget tonight happened.

“It doesn’t look the same without your paintings.” Connor’s living room is barren without the canvases, drab without the addition of their color. The empty easels are skeletons. I stop in the center of the room and turn back to him. His t-shirt hangs down to mid-thigh on me, but it’s soft, and clean, and I feel a little better now that I’ve showered.

“I’m sorry I missed your show.”

Connor strides to where I stand. His gaze is intense, his chest heaves once with a massive breath. “Later, Brynn. I’ll tell you all about it.” He grabs me and hoists me into the air. I wrap my legs around his waist and snuggle in.

His nose brushes against my nose, his lips drifting over mine. “You have no idea what it was like to walk in on you tonight. Bound,” he chokes on the word. “The look on your face… It was awful. I don’t think I’ll ever forget it.”

“I’m here. We’re here,” I whisper against the corner of his mouth. “Forget everything. Let it all go. We didn’t think we’d have tonight, Connor.” I graze his lower lip with my teeth. “Let’s make the most of it.”

Connor’s groan fills my mouth, runs down my throat, slides into every inch of me. I wriggle to get closer, but there isn’t any space to overtake. The only way he’ll be closer is if he’s inside me.

He cradles the back of my head with one hand, using the other to hold up my ass. Carefully, he lowers us as one until we’re seated on the drop-cloth covered floor. I pull back, only long enough to pull off his shirt, then dive back in for more. He tugs on my shirt, lifting it as high as it will go. Again, I stop only long enough to lift my arms and be rid of my top.

Arms under my shoulders, he lifts me a few inches and buries his face between my breasts. “Brynn,” he says in a voice muffled by the valley he’s immersed in. “I love you.”

I look down, opening my mouth. Nothing comes out. I have no words. He said it before, in my birthday card, but hearing him say it is different. Connor peeks up and grins. Gently he tugs my hair and forces my chin to point up at the ceiling. He lowers me inch by inch back down onto him, as he kisses and licks his way up the valley, over my collarbone, and straight up my neck to my jaw.

His eyes meet mine. My hands run through his hair, down his neck and over his chest. How did he sneak past my defenses? How did all my seconds get better when I thought they never would? I stepped in front of his truck, and he stepped into my heart.

“This week was painful, Connor. A pain I don’t want to feel again. The last year has been hell for me. The ugliness of what happened felt suffocating. I never thought I’d find someone who wouldn’t hate me when they learned what happened.”

“That was a tragedy, but it doesn’t define you. I see you, Brynn.” One side of his mouth turns up as he runs a fingertip over my cheek. “You’re funny and kind. There’s light inside of you. When I first met you, I thought your eyes held a storm, but even then, I could see color in them.”

My eyes widen. “The painting? The one of the eye?”

A rosy hue sprouts up on Connor’s cheeks. “Yeah,” he admits.

I laugh. “I’m the buyer.”

His eyebrows form a ‘V’ in the center. “What?”

I laugh harder. The movement makes my breasts bounce and Connor looks down, appreciation softening his features. He lays me back, climbs over me, and I hear the rustle of his pants sliding down his legs.

He pushes inside me, and my breath leaves my chest at the unbelievable feeling of fullness. He rocks above me, his pace a steady rhythm, and in my head, I say the words in time with him.

I.

Love.

You.

I love you.

I love you.

“I love you,” I whisper, heightened emotion and incredible feeling sweeping my voice.

Connor pauses, suspended in the air above me. My hips roll, trying to get more of him, until he pushes all the way inside me, stills, and lowers his face to mine. His lips drink my soul and devour my heart. He is a thief, and he has absconded with all of me.

He doesn’t stop again. He doesn’t stop until I beg him to, until my legs go limp and I can’t take another crescendo.

When we come down, when he’s carried me to his bed and we’ve wrapped our limbs around each other, he kisses me softly. “Will you stay tomorrow?”

I kiss him back with all the strength I can manage. It’s not much. He has drained me. Between Connor and the other events of the night, I’m depleted.

“If you let me, I’ll stay forever,” I murmur, as I fade off into sleep.