Mr. Beautiful (Up in the Air #4)(32)

"I owe him everything."  It was debt that was so integral to my being now that I felt it deep, a part of me that resided in the very marrow of my bones.

"He doesn't see it that way."

This was a rare moment for us to talk.  "I hope you know that anything I have is yours.  Anything, any want or need that either of you have, anything on this earth, know it's yours."

"We know.  Thank you."

"Those aren't just words.  I mean them literally."

He smiled wide.  "Oh I know.  We're living in a mansion that you bought us.  Doesn't get more literal than that.  Aside from this, though, we're simple people.  We don't need much to enjoy our lives."

"Well, never hesitate to come to me if you require anything."

He nodded, eyes back on them.  "They need each other.  I've never seen anything like it, but I know, for a certainty, that if one of them had died in that shooting, the other wouldn't have survived it.  They met when they were broken and fixed each other.  The things it took to fix them formed them together into something that can't, and shouldn't, be taken apart."

"Perhaps you guys should stay at the house for a bit longer," I said wryly.

They'd been staying at our house since the shooting.  This was the first night they'd left our house for theirs.  Clearly, that had been a premature development.

"You see, I can't be without her, either," I said softly.  "There has to be a peaceful way to share, and her leaving my bed for his is not it."

Javier chuckled softly.  "Yes, I can see that.  So how should we do this?  Shall we move back in tonight?"

I glanced at him briefly before my eyes returned to my woman, locked in another man's arms.  I couldn't stand the thought of disturbing her rest.  She needed it.

Javier sighed.  "We can't just watch them all night.  And that bed isn't big enough for four."

I didn't point out that there were lots of other beds.  I was pretty sure Javier hated sleeping without his injured Stephan as much as I despised the idea of my bed without Bianca in it.

I was resolute, but not bitter or upset, not about this.  I'd made the grievous mistake at the beginning, thinking that patience, and Stephan, were my lesson, the price to be close to her.

Tolerating their closeness was something to be born, to be endured, is what I'd been foolish enough to think.

They were not.

They were my privilege.

I tried to be reasonable and had settled on sleeping at their house, camping out in the closest guest room.

That lasted for about an hour before I took up residence outside their door, back against the wall, arms folded over the top of my knees.

I leaned my head back and closed my eyes, sleeping in fits and starts for a few more hours.

I went back into the room when I heard their voices.

They were still huddled together on the bed, speaking in low-pitched tones, faces close.

They stopped when they noticed me looming over the bed.

"James," Bianca said softly, rolling onto her back.  "I'm sorry.  Did I disturb your sleep when I left?"

I shot her an exasperated look, turning my attention to Stephan.  "We're heading back over to our house.  You and Javier are coming with.  Clearly we separated you guys too soon."

He just nodded.

I reached down and snatched Bianca out of his arms and up into mine.

I nodded at him once, kissing the top of her head tenderly before I started to carry her back.

"Are you upset?" she asked as I moved.

"Yes, but not at either of you.  It was an upsetting way to wake up, but I'll live."

"I'm sorry.  I just woke up, remembered, realized he wasn't in the house, and I had to see him, had to touch him, to reassure myself."

"Trust me, I know the feeling."

Our extensive security had come out in force with all the activity.  We'd had to hire several extra people, all carefully chosen by Clark, and I was still getting used to the new faces.  It was not an easy adjustment, especially now, as they all lined the path from Stephan's house to ours, a scantily clad Bianca in my arms.

She wore nothing but a thin slip with a whisper of a thong underneath.  I almost chastised her for it, with all of the security we had on the property, but I bit my tongue.  She hadn't been thinking, she'd been reacting, and I could certainly sympathize with that.

"Is she okay, sir?" one of them asked.

My eyes swung to the young man that had said it.  He sounded legitimately worried, as though he cared beyond the job.  It raised my hackles a bit, but I smoothed them back down.

I knew more than anyone did just how unreasonably jealous I could be when it came to Bianca.  I was working on it, as it was a condition that was both bad for my relationship and my well-being.

I told myself that the man was just doing his job, though a part of me didn't believe it.

Joseph was his name, I recalled.  Twenty-five, clean cut.  Blond and handsome, in a nondescript kind of way.  A blank slate of a man, exactly the kind I felt most threatened by.

"She's fine.  Give us some privacy."