Chapter 31
Bastian
I waited for Joanna to finish packing upstairs while I gave my driver instructions on where to pull up. I didn’t want Sid arriving at her mother’s house in the middle of the night if she didn’t have some form of protection. Unlike my other driver, Ethan, this driver, Joe, had spent some time in the Marines before returning to the United States. He had done former jobs as security for celebrities, so I felt confident having him parked in the shadows for the night. He knew how to handle a shady man with a gun if needed.
Finishing up the text message, I glanced up the stairs to find Joanna coming down the stairs with her bags in hand. She stepped lightly around a few floorboards, clearly used to the house’s noises, before handing me a few of her bags.
“I set a note next to her bed,” she whispered. “Did you talk to your driver yet?”
Headlights filled the foyer. I glanced out the window to see Joe park a few feet up between two other parked cars to blend in.
“He’s right there,” I whispered back. “Don’t worry. He’ll keep a good eye on her. He used to be a Marine and a bodyguard for celebrities.”
“Impressive,” Joanna said as she slipped into a pair of boots. “How did you end up with someone like that as a driver?”
“Friend of a friend,” I said. “It’s a long story, but let’s get out of here. I don’t want to wait around for Sid to show up. Having a gun pulled on me twice is more than enough.”
I pulled the front door open quietly to let Joanna out into the night. Closing it gently, I helped Joanna carry the bags across the street to my SUV that was parked directly in front. I stacked her bags in the back before helping her into the front passenger seat. I pressed a quick kiss against her lips when I saw Joe approaching from across the street.
“I’ll be right back,” I said. “I have to talk to Joe real quick.”
I shut the door before turning to meet Joe as he came up on the sidewalk. His hands were shoved deep in the pockets of his coat, but he pulled one out to shake mine.
“Good to see you,” Joe said. “What’s the story?”
“An ex-cop who’s corrupt,” I replied, gazing at Joanna in the passenger seat. “Abusive bastard, too. He’s been stirring up trouble in my office, but he’s been stopping by here with threats, too. We aren’t sure if he will be coming by tonight. Most likely tomorrow night.”
Joe nodded as he gazed at the house. “I’m assuming he’s packing heat, too?”
“Pulled it twice on me, so be careful. I wouldn’t confront him if he is just stopping by. She’s worried that he’ll hurt her mother once he figures out that she isn’t around anymore.”
“I doubt that he will. He’s obviously using the mother for a bridge between him and her.”
I clasped Joe on the shoulder with a grateful smile. “Thank you, Joe. I appreciate you coming out on short notice. Expect a healthy paycheck this time around. Enough for you to go on vacation for a month.”
“Can you see me on vacation for a month?” Joe questioned, laughing. “I’d be fucking bored out of my mind, bro. I’ve got you covered. I’ll call if there is something shady going on.”
He retreated back to his own SUV parked across the street. I climbed into the driver’s seat to start mine. I did a U-turn in the middle of the street before pulling back onto the freeway to drive for a little bit.
“Where are we going?” Joanna asked in confusion. “I thought we were going to a hotel.”
“We are,” I responded, one eye fixed on my rearview mirror and the headlights following us. “I just want to make sure we aren’t being followed.”
Joanna twisted around in her seat to look at the headlights as well. She glanced over at me before settling back in her seat to chew on the pad of her thumb nervously.
“He told me that he had my mother’s house bugged,” she said. “Do you think he could’ve done that when my mother and I were out of the house?”
Anger simmered through me. Sid had wasted no time in trying to put the fear of God into Joanna with those types of comments. It was possible that he had, though. It wouldn’t surprise me, but I didn’t want to add to the nervous fear mounting in Joanna by the minute.
“I don’t think so,” I said. “He has a tendency to say things that aren’t necessarily true, so I wouldn’t worry about it.”
“What if that is a cop behind us, though?”
The fear in Joanna’s voice cut straight through my heart. I reached out in the darkness to grab ahold of her trembling hand. I pressed a soothing kiss to the back of her knuckles. I knew it wasn’t right to tell her that we were safe, that everything would be all right, but I couldn’t stand to hear that fear.
“You’re with me,” I said with more confidence than I felt. “He can’t fuck with you when you are with me. You’re safe, trust me. My staff is good about protecting my interests and what I tell them to protect.”
“They don’t accept bribes?” Joanna asked. “Because that’s how Sid gets away with everything. He bribes people.”
“I noticed,” I replied dryly. “The people I’ve surrounded myself with are people I trust my life with. They’ve proven that over the years. You’re going to be fine. Trust me on that.”
Joanna’s hand squeezed mine softly. “I trust you.”
Her delicate fingers threaded through mine. I drove along the dark highway with one eye trained on the following headlights. It wasn’t until they pulled off on a different ramp that I let out a relieved breath. More than anything, I wanted to get Joanna into a hotel and away from Sid’s grasp.
I turned us around to head back in the direction of the hotel I had booked a suite for us at. There was no doubt in my mind that Sid would go crazy trying to find Joanna again. I mentally braced myself for the next couple days because the heat would come down on me again.
And I didn’t give a flying fuck either.
All I wanted was a chance to love Joanna and to let her be loved the way she needed to be loved. Getting rid of Sid was the only way I could think of doing that. It wouldn’t be easy if Joanna refused to say a word about the past few years of dealing with Sid’s abuse.
I pulled up into the VIP parking lot thirty minutes later. A bellhop immediately dashed out to help with Joanna’s suitcases.
“Your bags are upstairs, Mr. Burke,” he said. “They arrived about an hour ago.”
“Thank you,” I said, nodding while I wrapped an arm around Joanna’s shoulders. “Let’s get you inside and out of this cold.”
“You were going to stay here tonight regardless of what happened, huh?” Joanna asked teasingly. “You must think you have me pegged.”
“I was hoping you would be okay coming back here with me.”
Joanna stuck close to my side while I checked us in. We crossed through the quiet lobby to the elevators once I had the hotel keys in hand. I nodded to the security guards that loitered about the top floor before ushering Joanna inside.
While I shrugged out of my coat, I watched as Joanna slowly walked about the spacious living room that overlooked the entire city of Salt Lake. She stopped to look down through the large windows.
“This suite is beautiful,” she whispered, turning to look at me. “You didn’t have to get the nicest room for one night. A room with a bed is just fine.”
“We’re spending more than one night here,” I said. “Until I talk to my lawyer about the information you gave me, both of us are going to stay here. I don’t want that prick coming around my properties anymore.”
Joanna folded her arms over her chest as she crossed the room to sit down on the couch. I joined her with a relieved sigh to be off my aching feet. Exhaustion tugged at me, relieved exhaustion to have Joanna back in the security of my world—even if it was temporary security until the problem was fixed permanently.
“What am I going to do here?” she asked. “I mean, what am I going to do now?”
I opened my eyes at the terse question. I frowned at the troubled look on Joanna’s face.
“What do you mean?” I questioned softly, tucking an errant strand of her hair behind her ear. “You’re safe now. That’s all that matters.”
Joanna’s eyes fluttered shut at that. “I realize that, but I meant that I didn’t want to stay closed up in this hotel room forever.”
“You can go for walks if you want. I can arrange for a few guards to follow you and—”
“That’s not what I meant, either,” she blurted out and jerked away from me with a sigh. “I want to go back to work, Bastian. I want to go back to some sort of normalcy.”
“I don’t think that would be a great idea,” I said, shaking my head. “There are police officers in and out all the time. It’s too much for you to be there right now.”
“What do I do then? I can’t stay guarded in a hotel room for the rest of my life.”
I regarded Joanna’s tense form as she bounced her legs anxiously up and down. “You could press charges, Joanna. You could go above Sid’s head. I have names and numbers that you could call.”
“It wouldn’t go anywhere,” she said flatly. “It won’t go anywhere. Sid will talk himself out of trouble. He’s done it so many times.”
Frustration rose in my chest. I had known that talking to Joanna about pressing charges against Sid would be difficult, but it seemed damn near impossible. There was always a fear blocking that direction, but I knew it was the only way a crooked cop would be set straight.
“I’m just saying that if you want to press charges, that is the only way Sid will go away,” I said sternly. “You can’t keep playing this cat and mouse game, Joanna. He won’t stop because you aren’t standing up to him. He won’t ever leave me alone either because I have no intention of letting you go. You have to stop it yourself. You have to face the demon inside you that is saying you should be afraid of him. I can only shelter you, but that’s eventually going to stop if you want to step out to resume a normal life.”
Joanna blinked a few times at that. I let those words soak in while I rose from the couch to draw us both a hot bath. The entire week played heavily on my mind as I entered the bathroom to turn the tub faucet on.
I slipped out of my shirt to toss it onto the tiled floor. I found myself praying for the first time in a very long time that Joanna would hear the logic in my words. The only way this would ever stop was if she stopped it herself. She had the control and the choice to do it. It was only a matter of whether she could find the strength inside herself to do so. I couldn’t do anything else until she made the decision to tell the truth.