I have no excuse for myself.  No justifications that don’t ring hollow.

I let him keep me there.

I could have escaped, could have fought him harder, could have easily talked Bastian into getting me away.  It would have made the brothers come to blows, but it would have worked.

I didn’t do any of that.

This was the whole problem, the entire reason I was so stubbornly devoted to hating Dante’s guts.

Because when I didn’t, I was too weak to fight him.  Just a few days in his proximity and I didn’t even have the will anymore.

Without the hate, I forfeited all of my power against him.  I lost and he won.

Even knowing it was temporary, transient, even knowing it was all a lie, that when it finished I’d be in much, much worse shape than when we’d started, I let him keep me there for another day.

It’s no secret how we spent that day.  We locked ourselves in my room and barely came out even to eat.

The day went too fast and the morning came too soon.

The sun rose and drama was not far behind it.

Something had happened between Bastian, Leo, and Adelaide in the middle of the night, the details of it shrouded in mystery, but word had it that Dante’s mother was throwing a fit to end all fits, so much so that the reading of the will was postponed.

I was in the kitchen pantry scraping together the ingredients to make crepes when Dante told me the news.

“God, she’s crazy.  I can’t stay another day.  I have work.  I need to leave tonight.”

His answer was to grab me and kiss the breath out of me.  “No,” he said simply.

I bit back a smile.  “You know there’s a term for what you’re doing here, right?”

“Kidnapping,” he supplied without an ounce of shame or remorse.

But a few hours later he changed his mind completely, did an abrupt about face.

I was soaking my sore, overused body in the bath.  He’d gone downstairs to grab some water, but I fully expected him to join me when he returned.

He burst in the door, looking agitated.  “You need to get packed.  You need to go.  Now.”

I sat up, completely caught off guard.  “What?  Why?”

“It’s my mother.  She’s gone crazy, and she’s on her way over.  I don’t want you here when she gets here.”

I waved an unconcerned hand in the air.  “Who cares?  I can handle her.”

Because what could she even do to me at this point?

He set his jaw.  “I’ll start packing for you, but you need to get ready fast.”

My dismay was turning to anger as he shuffled me out of Gram’s house like a bomb was about to go off.

“What the hell is going on?” I asked him as he peeled out of the driveway.

We were just pulling onto the main road when Dante’s mother passed us, careening around the corner like a maniac.

I watched her go by, staring at the strange tableau.

Tiffany was sitting in the passenger’s seat, and she stared right back.

“She won’t follow us.  My dad’s still there, so she’ll go after him,” Dante reassured me.

“What the hell?”

“I don’t want her coming near you when she’s like this.  She’s deranged right now.  Capable of anything.”

We were silent for a long time.  “Why are you always trying to protect me?” I finally asked him quietly.

He turned his head and looked at me, something bleeding out of his eyes, something intense and so tormented that I had to look away.  “Because it’s my job.”

I didn’t say the thing I was thinking, but my thoughts felt so loud I knew they spoke to him without the aid of my voice.

Who’s going to protect me against you?

I thought he was taking me to the local airport, but as he drove for a while, I realized he was headed the opposite way, straight out of town.

“I know this is a silly thing to ask your kidnapper, but where are you taking me?”

His mouth twisted and his hand went to my leg, but he wouldn’t look at me.  “Seattle.  We’ll get a hotel there.  I’ll let you fly out in the morning, but not yet.”

He glanced at me, his brilliant ocean eyes deeply unhappy.  “I’m not ready yet,” he stated, squeezing my knee.

I wasn’t ready either, but I didn’t tell him that.

It was just over a two-hour drive, and we took it in silence.

I, for one, kept my piece because I didn’t know what to say, didn’t know what subject could be broached that wouldn’t lead to something volatile or hurtful.

I didn’t feel like messing up the fragile, temporary truce we seemed to actually be succeeding at.

His motivations were a mystery to me, but whatever they were, he barely said a word, the only part of him communicating was his constant hand on my knee, and it spoke in a continual, soothing stroke and occasional tight squeezes.

I didn’t touch him back.  I reclined my seat, brought my arms up to my chest, and stared straight up, wondering what to do with myself.

I wanted to turn my brain off.  I wanted to be numb.  I wanted to take back every inch I’d ceded to him in the last few days.

I wanted tomorrow to never come.

Dante wasn’t messing around.  He checked us in to a Four Seasons, and I smirked when I realized he’d booked the Presidential suite.

“Doesn’t the waste of this make your frugal, little conservationist heart bleed a little?” I took the dig at him, voice mock sympathetic, as the bellhop situated my bags.  The suite was spacious, beautiful, and had to cost a small fortune.  It was very un-Dante to flaunt his wealth in such a way.