The power drill hums in Dayton’s hand. He’s installing an extra deadbolt on the front door of our apartment.

The silver bag from the jewelry store sits abandoned on the tiny kitchen island. I can’t decide whether I should be sitting or standing. If someone bursts through the door, even with the deadbolt in place, I want to be on my feet and ready to run

The last screw goes in tight. Dayton shoves every lock home, then tests the door with his hand, pulling on it with his full weight. The door doesn’t budge. My heart beats high in my throat. Part of that is the baby’s fault, but mostly it’s because of the guy in the car. He tried to kill us. My heart’s been racing ever since it happened. The cab ride home wasn’t even enough to calm me down. Not that it was a relaxing cab ride—Dayton made us switch cars three times over the course of the ten-mile ride.

Dayton drops his tools onto the table in the entryway. As soon as they hit the wooden surface he turns and rushes past my spot in the living room. He hobbles into the bedroom. His foot must be killing him. What the hell does he need in the bedroom?

I remain where I’ve been stationed, watching him install the lock. I take a series of calming breaths, steadying myself, before taking one last deep breath and straightening my posture. This is fine.

Yes, it was scary when the car jumped the curb and tried to kill us, but I can’t freak out anymore. Not anymore. The baby senses everything that I feel.

I put my hands on my belly and baby rolls beneath my touch, a languid turn, as if nothing is wrong in the world.

“You’re right,” I murmur. “There’s nothing to worry about. I’ll keep you safe.” Goosebumps rise up on the back of my arms. I haven’t said it before, but future me will say it countless times. It’s a blow to the heart, isn’t it? You meant those words as a promise, but nothing’s a guarantee.

I follow Dayton into the bedroom. He’s rummaging through the dresser drawers, one by one, methodically searching beneath my panties, beneath his shirts, beneath the spare sheet sets I can’t bend down to reach any more.

“Day.”

He straightens up and turns his head to look at me, and I’m struck by his expression, a combination of determination and terror.

“Come here?” I hold my arms out to him and he limps across the room, the intensity of each step showing in his face, and then he bends all six-feet, three inches of him to wrap me firmly in his embrace.

We stand that way until my heart isn’t racing anymore.

“I have to go.”

I must have misheard him, with my ear pressed up against his chest like that. “What?”

Dayton holds me at arm’s length then, his dark eyes burdened with pain. “I can’t stay here with you, Sunny.” He lets me go and runs both hands through his hair. His voice hitches. “He’s after me.”

“Who’s he?” He turns away from me, but I stop him, gripping his elbow and drawing his attention back to my eyes. “No. You need to tell me what’s going on.”

“It’s nothing you need to know about. It’s nothing you should know about. The less you know—”

My pulse pounds in my ears. “The less I know, the more fucking terrified I am, Day.” My palms are sweating and I feel like I’ve stopped breathing. He steps back over to the dresser and begins rifling through it again. “What are you looking for?”

He straightens up, blows a breath out between his lips. “A gun, Summer. I’m looking for a gun. But I don’t have one.” Day’s jaw works. “I don’t have one, because where was I going to keep one while I was living in that shithole of an apartment? I couldn’t trust any of them with a gun, much less myself—” He roughly shakes his head as if to erase what he was thinking. This is more than he meant to say.

“Dayton, you can’t do this. You can’t walk away from me because you think you’re dangerous.”

He lets out a short, sharp laugh. “I am dangerous. I’ve told you that before. I warned you about my past. It’s back. Don’t you get that? What else has to happen for you to understand?”

“Yes.” My voice trembles, but I force myself to hold my head up high. “I work with people who’ve had rough lives, Day, and I’m not a little girl.”

“I’m sorry.” Day steels himself and heads into the walk-in closet, emerging a couple of seconds later with a black duffel bag. “I’m sorry, Summer. I know you’re not a kid. But you have no idea—” He closes his eyes and curses under his breath. “You have no idea what it was like when I came back home. You have no idea what people like him are capable of.”

“I was standing on the sidewalk right next to you.”

A flash of emotion streaks across Day’s face, and he’s at my side again. “Did you see the man in the car? Did you see his face?”

I search my memory and can picture the man’s profile, his pale face planted behind the windshield, his nasally voice drilling into me from inside the car. “Yes, but—”

“Have you ever seen him before?” Day braces his hands on my arms, holding me still. “Summer, it’s fucking important! Have you seen him before?”

“No.” Something is tingling at the back of my mind. “The only thing was—”

“Tell me. Right now.”

“I’m trying.” I take a deep breath to concentrate. “The only thing was that his voice sounded familiar.” Where have I heard that voice before? “I think he was the one who followed me that day.” That day is code for the last time I ran outside alone.

Day’s face hardens and turns pale. He releases me and returns to retrieve his duffel bag that fell to the floor when I mentioned standing next to him on the street. It takes him all of five seconds to yank open his dresser drawer, yank out an armful of clothes, and shove them into the bag, but in those five seconds, my mind struggles to process a memory.

“That’s not the only time I’ve heard that voice,” I say, thinking out loud, and I tap my fingers in the air, just like I do when I’m sitting at my desk at Heroes on the Homefront.

Just like I do on my desk.

“He called my office once,” I recall, the words floating reflectively into the air as the memory dawns on me, and Dayton freezes in place from his packing. “He left a message that included my name, then there was the sound of some weird breathing. It was when I was at home. They forwarded the message from my office to my phone.”

Day drops the bag. “You’re done there.”

“What?” I say, incredulous.

“You’re done working there. Call in and tell them you’re done.” He snatches his phone off the top of the dresser and tries to press it into my hands.

“Dayton, no. I’m not quitting my job because—”

“He tried to terrorize me…by using you.” Day’s voice is deadly serious. “He followed you in his car. He almost killed us today, and all for the kind of revenge that’s never going to—” He closes his eyes, swallows hard. “I don’t care if you call in or not. You’re not going back there, and that’s final.”

The injustice of this, coupled with the adrenaline from the episode on the sidewalk and the ache at seeing his consuming fear, makes my throat tighten. “Oh, yeah? Is that what you think?” Who does he think he is? My dad? My brother? Does everyone in my entire life think I’m too stupid to make my own decisions?

Dayton levels his gaze at me. “Yes.”

The first tear slips down my cheek, but I’ll be damned if I cry any harder than that. “You’re wrong.” My voice trembles. I hate it for trembling. “I’m going back to work on Monday, like I always do. My clients need me.”

“They’ll get by.”

“Will they?” I advance on Dayton, every step looking more ridiculous than the last, I’m sure. “Where would you be right now if it wasn’t for me? Killing yourself at that factory, that’s where. The rest of my clients deserve the same help you got.”

“I didn’t want your help,” Dayton roars, blood rushing to his cheeks. “I didn’t want anyone’s fucking help. I only went because that asshole at the VA insisted. If I wanted to quit crushing the fuck out of my leg, he said I had to—” His fists clench at his sides in an attempt to rein in his anger. “I didn’t want anyone’s help. I didn’t deserve anyone’s help. And if that’s what this is about—”

“That’s not what this is about,” I shout back at him, fear and rage and hope all coalescing together in my chest. “This is about the fact that I love you. And I’m pregnant with your fucking baby. And if you walk out on me right now, with that guy lurking out there, then—then—” It leaves me breathless, gasping, and now the tears gush forth, the dam bursting. “How would that be the right thing to do, you asshole? How could you say that to me? How could you threaten me with that? You’re worse than him.”

I turn away quickly to hide my emotions, heading blindly for the bathroom. I lean over the sink and turn on the cold water, the rushing sound comforting.

A minute later I sense Dayton standing behind me. He says something I don’t hear, and then I hear, “Sunny.”

His hand comes down on my shoulder, tentative, apologetic, but I’m still fucking furious. I shrug it off. “Don’t touch me.” The water is louder than my own voice. “Don’t touch me. Just don’t touch me.”