‘Doesn’t matter. I’m not planning to sleep.’
Three sets of eyes now frowned at him. ‘Thorne,’ Jamie said with a shake of his head. ‘Please. Don’t do this to yourself.’
‘I have to,’ he murmured. ‘They could come after any of you. All of you.’ Because of me. It was too overwhelming.
‘And you’re our guardian?’ Gwyn asked, a thread of annoyance in her voice that Thorne hadn’t expected, and he jerked around to stare at her.
‘Yes,’ he snapped back. ‘You have a problem with that?’
Her chin went up. ‘Yeah, I do. I never asked you to be my guardian. I don’t want you to be my guardian. There is a good security system here and a cop sitting out on the curb. What I want is for you to be well rested so that when we leave this safe place tomorrow, you can be on your guard in case someone tries to hurt you in the light of day. I want you well rested so that you can listen to what people are telling you and what they are not saying. Because if you think they’re just going to fess up like you’re some Perry-fucking-Mason, you have another think coming.’
He found himself snarling at her. ‘Back off, Gwyn. You’re the one who said everyone in my fucking sphere is in fucking danger. You’re the one who said you’d be safer with me. That all of you would be safer with me.’
She straightened in her chair. ‘No, I didn’t.’
From the corner of his eye he saw Jamie blanch, as if realizing that his own words were at fault. But Thorne’s attention was riveted once again by Gwyn, who pushed to her feet, leaning across the table until he was breathing in the scent of lavender and vanilla.
‘What I said was that I wanted you safe, with people who care about you.’ She gestured to Jamie and Phil. ‘I wanted these people who care about you to benefit from the cop on the curb. Yes, I did say that everyone in your sphere was in danger, but I never said you were responsible for guarding anyone other than yourself.’
‘That was me,’ Jamie said quietly. ‘And I was wrong to have said it. I’m sorry, son.’
Helpless fury surged in Thorne’s chest and he heard himself utter a frustrated growl. ‘Don’t apologize. You were right,’ he snapped at Jamie, then pointed at Gwyn. ‘And you’re wrong. This is happening because of me. That it’s not my fault doesn’t matter. What does matter is keeping you safe. All of you. So I will sit on that fucking sofa and keep watch.’
Her jaw tightened, but she kept her voice calm. ‘I am not sleeping in your bed, Thorne.’
That she managed to stay calm when he wasn’t . . . it just made him angrier. Which he knew was ridiculous, but damned if he could stop himself.
‘Fine.’ He stood slowly and watched her eyes narrow, because in her bare feet she was a full foot and a half shorter than him. He leaned across the table, purposely looming over her, and watched her eyes flash with resentment. ‘Stay awake all night then, but stay out of my way while you do it.’ He grabbed the copy of the crime scene photo she’d taken and slapped it on the table between them. ‘This is what they’re capable of doing. Do you think I want that to happen to you? To any of you?’
She craned her head back to lock her gaze with his. ‘Of course you don’t,’ she said, still maddeningly calm. ‘Nobody said that. But there is a cop sitting out there on the curb and it’s his job to keep the bad guys away from us.’
She might seem collected, but her eye had started to twitch. He’d known her long enough to be aware that that was her tell. She was one tiny push away from losing her temper, and he suddenly needed her to. Needed to know he wasn’t the only one scared shitless by this whole situation. ‘Like the cops can be depended on to keep people safe?’ He hated the sneer in his voice, but he had to make her recognize that the threat was real. That four walls and a cop outside weren’t enough to ensure her safety. ‘How’d that work for you and Lucy four years ago?’ Because cops had been guarding Lucy, and Evan had still managed to get them both.
Gwyn flinched, growing pale, and Thorne instantly knew he’d overstepped.
‘Thorne,’ Phil murmured in shocked reproach. ‘Stop. Now.’
‘I’m s—’
She interrupted his apology with a raised hand. ‘Don’t,’ she whispered, but her voice cracked on the single word. She took a step away from the table. Away from him. When she spoke again, it was at a normal volume, but shaky. ‘Suit yourself. Stay awake all night. Then tomorrow, when you need decent reflexes and you have none because you are exhausted because you were fucking drugged last night and should still be in the goddamn hospital, your reflexes will say “Sorry, dude, we’re plumb tuckered” and you’ll get hurt. And then what? Who’ll have to bind you up and call 911 and hope you don’t fucking die?’ Her finger jabbed at the air between them and tears filled her eyes.
Her tears shocked him like none of her words had. ‘Gwyn, I’m sor—’ he started, but once again she swept her hand between them, silencing him.
‘Me,’ she spat. ‘I’m the one who’ll have to watch you bleed. Or lie so still that I didn’t know if you were alive or dead. I had to call them this morning.’ Blindly she indicated Jamie and Phil, who watched wide-eyed. ‘I had to tell them that you were non-responsive. They freaked out because you were fucking non-responsive, Thorne. And because they love you like a goddamn son, which makes you lucky, because not all of us get that. So go ahead.’ She blinked and the tears streaked down her face. ‘Go ahead and stay awake all night worrying because you think that’s all we need you for.’
‘Gwyn . . .’ He wasn’t sure what else to say, but it didn’t matter because she’d already marched herself out of the kitchen.
‘I assume the room with all the posters of Pamela Anderson in a tiny Baywatch bathing suit is Thorne’s old room?’ she called behind her.
Phil coughed. ‘Yes,’ he called back. ‘That’s the one.’
Thorne rubbed his chest, because it physically hurt. She’d cried. Over me. And he’d hurt her when that was the last thing he’d really wanted to do. But he couldn’t put words to any of that now. He forced his eyes to roll. ‘Really, guys? I took those posters down years ago.’
Jamie’s eyes were still wide. ‘We put them up today because we assumed you were coming here to recuperate. We thought it would make you laugh.’
He blew out a sigh. ‘Sure,’ he drawled. ‘This is a laugh riot.’
Phil pursed his lips. ‘Gwyn’s right, you know. She was terrified for you this morning. I knew it was bad, because she was falling apart. In all the years I’ve known her, all the times we’ve talked, I’ve never seen her as scared as she was today.’
Thorne sank back into the chair, exhausted. ‘I know.’ He’d considered how she’d felt finding him in bed with another woman, but not how she’d felt at finding him near death. She was always so . . . strong. So Gwyn.
Except right after Evan, and even then she’d kept her trauma buried deep. Nobody knew that she’d sat in Thorne’s bed and rocked herself for hours after she was safe. Nobody knew but Thorne, because he’d held her every painful minute that she’d been lost in her own mind, reliving the worst experience of her life. He’d held her as she’d rocked, willing her to come back to him.
She’d never let herself fall apart in front of anyone else. Yet today, she had.
‘You were a dick to her,’ Jamie stated.
Thorne dropped his head in his hands with a groan. ‘I know. I’ll apologize when she cools down. I just . . . I lost it. Today’s been a shitty day.’
Phil was pragmatic as usual. ‘You may have to wait until morning to apologize, because she’s really upset. And now she’s taken the bed, so you’re stuck with the sofa. We do have an inflatable mattress. We’re told it’s quite comfortable. I’ll go get it.’
That left Jamie and Thorne alone. Jamie reached over and rubbed Thorne’s arm lightly. ‘You need to talk about it?’
Thorne recoiled. ‘No. God, no.’