I woke early the next day, and glanced over to see Mona sprawled out in bed next to me. But this time, I didn’t feel a surge of panic at the sight of her; I didn’t fear for what was to come next. No, instead, I felt a little buzz of childish excitement at the sight of the sexy-as-fuck woman sleeping right next to me. I reached out to run a hand up her back, and she squirmed against the bed. Her eyes fluttered open, and she turned to look at me.
“Hey.” She grinned bashfully.
“Hey,” I replied, trailing my fingers across her skin. She closed her eyes again, and I watched the way her spine swayed sensually against the sheets. God, if I could have spent a whole month in this bed with her, I think I would have.
“So…” I trailed off. I couldn’t keep the smile off my face. And that was despite everything else that had happened in the last twenty-four hours; we were in a safe house, someone was pursuing me and my daughter, and we’d been followed at least some of the way here. But in that moment, all I felt was that hazy, blissful sense that something had gone really, really right.
“We should probably check on Ella.” She yawned, pulling herself upright. She stretched, and her breasts shifted in the sexiest way—I fought the urge to touch them, because I knew she was right.
I pulled myself out of bed and grabbed my clothes. I was so aware of Monas presence as I got dressed—why had I waited so long to do this? Waking up next to her felt obvious. She was the only person other than me I trusted with Ella—not to mention the fact she was smart, funny, compassionate, and hot as hell. We were a natural match. We made sense, and I wanted to kick myself that it had taken me so long to realize it.
I made my way through to Ella’s room, and found her still passed out in bed; I glanced at my phone and saw that it was barely seven in the morning. It was a Saturday, so I didn’t have to worry about getting her to school or anything. In fact, we could just spend the day together here, the three of us, if we wanted. The thought made my heart swell with happiness, even though I knew this was a strange situation to be happy about. I guessed I was just making the most of a bad situation. And I had to admit, as bad situations went, this one seemed to be turning out kind of alright. We were all safe, we were all here—at least for the time being. I wouldn’t mind if none of this changed for a while.
I made my way back through to the bedroom, and flopped down on the bed; Mona was getting dressed, much to my disappointment.
“She’s still asleep,” I murmured, and Mona turned to me and smiled.
“She okay?”
“Perfect.” I nodded, and walked over to her. I wrapped my hands around her waist from behind and planted a kiss on her neck; I knew it wouldn’t exactly be the best idea, but I would have taken her straight back to bed if I could. She nestled against me and let out a small, satisfied noise against my neck.
I didn’t think it needed saying; it hung in the air between the two of us, our bodies speaking it every time we touched. And besides, it was early days yet. With the intensity of the last twenty-four hours, I wanted to make sure that we would survive being together as normal people, as people who weren’t fighting some crazy, unknown force. I was pretty sure we would. But that didn’t mean the words didn’t cross my mind—that I didn’t want to whisper “I love you” into her ear, just so she knew that this wasn’t like the last time. I wasn’t going anywhere.
But she knew. She pulled out of the embrace, and planted a kiss on my cheek. Was it stupid that I felt giddy just being this close to her? I knew I was acting like an idiot, but I was in love—and lust. I felt as though the world had lurched sideways as soon as she had come into it, and I had to admit I liked it. I was so scared of change, but when it came to her, I wanted it.
“I’m starving,” she sighed. “Do you know if they have anything in here for breakfast?”
She made her way through to the kitchen area and I followed her; I went through the cupboards, and a plan began to form. I turned to her with a grin, and nodded towards Ella’s room.
“You want to check if she’s up? Because I’ve got a feeling that she’s going to want to join us for breakfast.”
A few minutes later, I was standing in front of the stove carefully measuring out dollops of pancake batter into a sizzling saucepan. It wasn’t much, but it was something—a way for Ella to feel like this place was a little more normal, a little more fun. Mona and Ella emerged from her bedroom, and Ella’s eyes practically bugged out of her head when she saw what I was cooking.
“Pancakes?” she exclaimed.
I nodded, laughing at her excitement. “Good morning to you to.”
“Hey, don’t blame the girl, you are making pancakes,” Mona pointed out. She eyed my pan hungrily “And they look so good.”
“I’ll try and save a few leftovers for you,” I teased, and Ella jumped down on the sofa next to Mona. There was an old TV sitting in the corner of the room, and Mona flicked it on, finding a few cartoons for Ella to enjoy as I cooked up breakfast.
We ate as a family—for the first time, I could say that and not feel as though I was lying to myself or trying to make up something that wasn’t there. Mona and I held hands over the back of the couch, above Ella’s head, and kept on exchanging little looks. Even though we hadn’t spoken about it, it was as though we both seemed to accept that it wasn’t time to break the news to Ella. Not because I thought she wouldn’t be delighted—quite the contrary, I knew she’d be beyond pleased when she found out that Mona was becoming part of the family—but dumping that on her on top of everything else just didn’t seem fair.
We managed to make something pretty special out of the day, despite everything; I went downstairs to fill out the forms that said this is where we were staying, and the woman at reception was incredibly sweet and understanding about what was going on. She even offered us some kids’ books that some old residents had left behind, and I happily took them.
Mona went out to a store down the road and picked us up some candy and pizza, and we ended up managing a family movie night in front of the television after spending most of the rest of the day with Ella going through her new books. Yeah, it was just some animated movie that Ella had seen a hundred times before, but she seemed to find it comforting and relaxing. So much so that she dozed off with her head in Mona’s lap. We let her lay there for a while, and eventually I scooped her up and tucked her into bed with George, the stuffed dinosaur she’d brought from home. I looked down at her for a moment and smiled; she was safe, but more importantly, she was happy. I made my way back through to the living room, and found Mona on the phone. My heart skipped a beat, but she waved me over calmly.
“So, when? Tomorrow morning?” she asked, glancing at me and offering me a quick smile. I placed a hand on her leg and squeezed lightly, just wanting to let her know that I was here and we were safe. She paused, and I heard a man’s voice on the other end of the line.
“Great, we’ll see you then.” She hung up, turning to me and raising her eyebrows. “So,” she began, taking a deep breath, “that was Elijah.”
“Oh yeah?” I leaned forward with interest.
“He wants to come by tomorrow,” she explained. “He says he…he says he knows where Ian is.”
Brown spots clouded the edges of my vision for a second. I blinked to clear them, trying to stay focused on the task at hand.
“He’s going to stop in and pick Ella up and drop her off at the precinct he’s been working with while he’s down here,” she went on slowly, scanning my face for a reaction. “And then were going to confront Ian. On his own turf.”
“Fuck,” I breathed, clenching my fists. The thought of getting to him, of finally getting to the man who had terrified my daughter and been stalking us for God knows how long…it was almost too good to be true. I couldn’t want to get my hands on him, let him know exactly how I felt about his bullshit-
Mona covered my fist with her hand. Her touch was soothing, soft, and the tension that had momentarily consumed me began to ebb away.
“I know this is hard,” she murmured. “But we only have to wait one more day and then this will all be over. And we can…get on with things.”
She fluttered her lashes up at me in a gesture so clichéd I would have laughed had it not been coming from her. I tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear, and before I knew it, we were kissing again, our bodies matched up against each other. And, for the rest of the night, I didn’t give Ian any thought at all.