Chapter 1 - The Weight in the DarkMy hand froze against the cool steel grip of the custom SIG Sauer beneath my pillow.
The master bedroom was bathed in the faint, pale moonlight filtering through the heavy velvet curtains. The only sound in the multi-million-dollar fortress was the steady, rhythmic hum of the central heating and the quiet, shallow breathing of the woman curled beside me on the mattress.
It was Emma.
She hadn't taken off her dark blue cleaning apron. Her worn sneakers were still on her feet, resting near the edge of the Egyptian cotton sheets. Her cheek rested against my silk pillow, her long lashes casting dark shadows over her pale skin. One of her hands, rough and cracked from hours of bleach and floor polish, was loosely curled near my chest, holding a half-folded pile of clean towels she had probably been carrying when her body simply surrendered.
She hadn't climbed into my bed for warmth or intimacy.
She had collapsed from sheer, brutal physical exhaustion.
I stared down at her for a long, silent minute. My hand slowly slipped away from the firearm. For two years, the only people who had entered this room were armed guards checking security locks, terrified nurses holding pill trays, or therapists who looked at my paralyzed legs with a mixture of professional pity and concealed disgust.
No one had ever slept beside Daniel Hayes since the sniper’s bullet shattered my spine on the docks of South Chicago.
I reached out, my broad, calloused fingers hovering an inch above her shoulder. I meant to shake her awake, to roar at her the way I roared at Luke or the housekeepers, to remind her that she was trespassing in the private wing of the city's most feared syndicate boss.
Instead, my hand dropped gently onto her shoulder.
"Emma," I rasped out, my voice rough from disuse and the lingering edge of phantom pain.
She didn't move. She let out a soft, tired sigh, her forehead leaning slightly closer to my side, instinctively seeking the warmth of another human being.
A strange, unfamiliar ache tightened inside my chest—an ache that had nothing to do with severed nerves or broken vertebrae. I looked at her pale face, taking in the dark purple circles under her eyes, the faint bruise on her collarbone where her heavy cleaning caddy had rubbed her skin raw, and the faint trembling of her hands even in deep sleep.
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"Jesus Christ, girl," I whispered into the quiet room.
I reached for the velvet blanket at the foot of the bed, pulling it up over her shoulders, tucking her in beside me. Then I leaned back against my pillows, resting my hand near hers, and for the first time in two years, I didn't spend the night staring at the ceiling wishing for a bullet to end my life.
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