Safe Haven Read online

  “Blake?”

  I ignored Rex calling me through the intercom. I couldn’t stop shaking. I needed to stop, but my panic was too great. I felt like I had when I’d missed a couple of doses of my sedatives a few years before. I was all raw and full of fear. My hands shook, even when I held them together tightly against my stomach.

  “Blake?” Rex tried again. “We’re sorry. We thought you were drowning. You weren’t breathing. We didn’t mean to scare you.”

  I wasn’t breathing? I had thought I’d been. Did two pills really make me stop doing even that most basic function? But I’d been fine all morning while I’d talked to my therapist and my team. Hadn’t I been?

  With shaking hands, I pulled up my chat log with my team as I felt my mind clearing. My typing was full of simple spelling mistakes, which wasn’t like me at all. One of them had even jokingly asked me if I’d been drinking, but I didn’t drink. I couldn’t because of the sedatives. I didn’t know what horrible reaction there would be if I mixed those two, but my therapist had warned me away from doing that plenty of times.

  “We called your uncle. He should be here soon.” That was CJ now.

  I closed my eyes tightly. Sometimes I had taken half a dose more to get through a particularly stressful meeting that was planned but never a full extra pill. I imagined Uncle Phin would be yelling at me for being so stupid.

  I sat up in bed and waited for my uncle to come find me in my bedroom. He did, twenty minutes later.

  “What happened? They said they thought you were drowning,” Uncle Phin said as soon as he came into my room.

  “I took an extra sedative this morning. I wanted to be more normal. But I—”

  Uncle Phin rushed forward and hugged me tightly. I went back to panicking—not that I’d really left that mode, but I was also too tired from being in that panicked state for so long that I didn’t have the energy to push him away as I normally would have done.

  “You could have died. I could have lost you.” He let me go but didn’t move away from me. “Don’t ever do that again. Please. One pill in the morning. One at night. If you can’t do that yourself, I’ll have one of the bodyguards give them to you to make sure that you’re only taking your prescribed dosage. Blake, they lower everything in your body. Yes, they help with your panic and anxiety, but they make you breathe less and think less, and they slow your reaction time and your heart rate. Everything becomes depressed with this sedative. I thought you understood that.”

  I nodded. I did. I could be smarter without them, but what good was being smart when I couldn’t get out of bed because everything outside of my rooms was traumatizing? “I won’t do it again.”

  Uncle Phin nodded. “Thank you.” He checked the time on his phone and sighed loudly. “I’m sorry, but I need to get back to work. I have back-to-back meetings today and could only get away for a short time.”

  I understood. He’d rushed over and still had a busy work day.

  “Don’t ever do that again,” he warned me—again. “Don’t play with your dosages, not for any reason. If you’re having trouble, talk to your therapist and see what she recommends, but do not go messing around with your sedatives ever. I lost your parents. I don’t want to have to bury you, too.”

  I dropped my chin. I knew that. And I felt badly for making him worry. I hadn’t meant to bring up the past, and I could definitely see things from his perspective. “I’m sorry.”

  Uncle Phin nodded and patted the bed beside my hand. It was his way of touching me without actually touching me, since I didn’t allow that. The hug had been an exception, one I think he did without thinking about it, or what it meant for me to have someone force physical contact onto me. He stood then headed toward the door. “Oh, and say you’re sorry to the blond one. You punched him pretty hard in the throat.”

  “CJ? I didn’t mean to. I’ll talk to him.”

  Uncle Phin frowned at me. “You know their names? Already?” I nodded. “Should I be worried about how this situation is affecting you? If those three men being here isn’t healthy for you…”

  I quickly shook my head, fast enough to make myself dizzy. I held my forehead to keep the room from spinning as I answered him. “No. It’s fine. I made a mistake. I’ll apologize to all of them.”

  Uncle Phin looked me over for a few long moments before finally nodding and going toward my open bedroom door.

  “Uncle Phin?”

  He stopped and looked back at me.

  “I love you.”

  He smiled at me. “I love you, too, Blake. Try to have a better rest of your day.”

  I nodded. I would. I waited until he was out of the house before deciding to talk to the guys. It was a little weird, though, because now I could feel how foggy my brain was since I’d had that panicked moment of clarity to fight through it. And when I spoke, I didn’t want to come across as being as stupid as I felt.

  “Hi,” I said. I could see them in the dining room. They’d had their heads bent together and were talking quietly. Malcolm had changed out of his wet clothes.

  They looked over at the camera, and I decided to talk. “I’m sorry for…” For being an idiot. “For my behavior. I-I played with the dosage of one of my pills this morning, and it made me…” I wasn’t really sure how it had made me actually, other than not myself. But on the pills, I wasn’t myself, anyway. That was the whole point of taking them. “They diminish everything, apparently even my need to breathe. I’m sorry I scared you all. Thank you for bringing me out of the pool.” I could take Uncle Phin’s thoughts to the ultimate conclusion, too, of what might have happened if they hadn’t followed me into the pool room. I hadn’t realized that I hadn’t been breathing. I don’t know if I would have noticed if I were drowning, either.

  Malcolm stood then came over to the camera. “If we’re going to stay here, we need to know that you’re safe and that you’re not doing anything to hurt yourself like you did today. We were hired to protect you from outside forces and situations. But if we also need to protect you from yourself, well, then, we can do that. But if that’s the case, you’re going to have to be where we can see you at all times. We’re responsible for your safety, and we can’t take care of you when we can’t see you. So, if you’re able to take care of yourself then you can stay up there in your rooms, and we can continue just as we have been. But if we can’t trust you not to do something like this again, you’re not going to have a minute of privacy as long as we’re here—not even to piss. We’ve already talked to your uncle about this and he agrees. What’s your choice?”

  I just stared through the camera at him. I couldn’t exist with that lack of privacy. I knew that. So I’d have to promise to be good, just like I had with Uncle Phin, especially since now I knew there would be actual consequences for me not behaving. Uncle Phin would be worried, but these three would invade my privacy and keep me with them at all times. That was a serious threat and one I was willing to pay attention to.

  “I’ll be good,” I promised him.

  Malcolm nodded, “Okay, then. Next time you do something like that, though, you know what’s going to happen.”

  I did and I knew they’d follow through with their promise too. I had the impression that these were guys who did not mess around at all with idle threats. “Okay.” I looked over his shoulder at CJ. He was rubbing his neck. “I’m sorry I punched you, CJ.”

  He shrugged and smiled over at the camera. “It’s fine. Not the first time I’ve ever been punched, and you were too freaked out to really focus your swing, anyway. Want to tell us what that was about?”

  I closed my eyes. I couldn’t. No one but Uncle Phin, Farra and a handful of people I didn’t know had any idea of what had happened to me, and that wasn’t going to be changing any time soon. “No.” My answer was absolute.

  I saw Malcolm’s eyes go wide before he nodded then stepped away from the camera, leaving me alone. I was glad for the space as I curled up under my blankets while still in my damp swim trun
ks, and I tried to rest.

  Chapter Four

  I skipped dinner that night, so by the next morning I was starving as I snuck downstairs at six to start getting things together to make some French toast. I could have just gone with cereal, but I was far too hungry for my usual soggy, cold breakfast.

  Halfway through my pile of battered bread, I heard someone coming down the hall toward me from their bedroom. I froze and was completely unsure of what to do. Hiding in the pantry was an option, but I didn’t want the French toast to burn.

  The person stopped a few feet before coming into the kitchen, though, and for a few seconds I just stood over the stove and tried to breathe.

  “Hi. I’m not going to come any closer. I just wanted to make sure that you were okay after yesterday.”

  I let out a little sigh. I recognized the voice. If Rex really was going to keep his distance, then I’d be okay. “I’m fine. Thanks for asking.” I went back to cooking.

  “That smells really good. What are you making?” he asked.

  “French toast. Did I wake you?” I was nearly done now.

  He yawned. “No. We’ve been taking turns patrolling, so someone is always awake. I’m just getting off my rotation. I know we haven’t even been here a week yet, but this is probably our quietest security job ever. What did your last bodyguard do all the time?”

  “He watched movies. He liked the classics. He really liked The Wizard of Oz. I like the second one, though. It’s less pretty and more asylum.” Which is where I would be if I wasn’t stabilized with my pills and if I didn’t have around-the-clock help if I needed it when I had a breakdown.

  Rex chuckled. “I haven’t seen the second one.”

  He was quiet for a few minutes while I finished off my stack of French toast. I looked at it, then at the hallway where I knew he was standing just out of my sight. “Would you like some French toast, too?” I quietly asked him. I liked cooking, and I didn’t really get to cook for other people that often. There hadn’t actually been anyone to cook for lately, either. And, after scaring them all so badly yesterday, I kind of felt like I owed him this as a way of making it up that I’d almost drowned on their watch.

  “I’d love some. How do you want to work this?”

  I smiled down at the bread as I started battering some more for myself. If I put him in the dining room, there was no direct line of sight to the kitchen once he was sitting down. That would work. “In five minutes, go into the dining room and it’ll be in there for you. But you have to sit in one of the chairs that doesn’t face the kitchen.”

  “Okay.”

  I went to work and put the plate full of French toast, some silverware, a glass of milk, some butter, maple syrup and a linen napkin in there for him. Then I came back into the kitchen and hid in the pantry while I heard him walk past the kitchen and go into the dining room. Once I heard him sit down, I came out of the pantry to make more French toast for myself while he ate.

  “This is really good,” he called to me.

  I blushed deeply. I hadn’t realized that we’d be talking during this experiment. “Th-Thanks.”

  “You’re a great cook. Did you take some classes?”

  I would have had to leave the house for that to happen. I swallowed back my nerves and answered him as I willed my French toast to cook faster. “I read a lot of cookbooks. And cooking shows are good background noise to work to.”

  “Ah. So you’re a natural at it.”

  I’d given him four slices, which was my usual, but I stopped at two for me. I couldn’t handle this any more than the time it had taken to cook my two slices. I ate quickly, practically burning my tongue on my breakfast, which I had without butter or syrup. I drank milk from the jug then hurried through cleaning up my mess and getting the dishes into the dishwasher so that Sophia wouldn’t complain again about me being dirty and lazy.

  I froze before leaving the kitchen, though. “Can you see the stairs from where you’re sitting?”

  “Yes.”

  Shit. “Could you close your eyes please?”

  “Sure.”

  I trusted him enough to keep me safe, but not to sneak a peek. “Are they closed?”

  “Yes.”

  I could go over and test him by waving my hand in front of his face, but that would have required me getting closer to him than I dared. So I knew I’d just have to take his word for it as I walked past him and headed to the stairs. I stopped at the first step, though. “What’s Rex short for?” I’d been trying to work that out. I came toward the dining room entrance and stood in the doorway. He had his eyes closed, as far as I could tell, but he had turned his head toward me.

  “It’s not short for anything. Have you ever seen those cats with the big ears and curly coats? They’re called Rexes and my mom had one when she was pregnant with me. She thought it was a good name, so here I am.”

  I nodded. It was an odd explanation, but I’d had a friend when I’d been five whose name was Blueberry Bell Ramsey, so really it wasn’t the strangest name explanation that I’d ever heard.

  “Star Wars, huh? That’s sexy.”

  I frowned, having no idea what he was talking about. Then I looked down at my pajama pants and I turned bright red. “You promised you wouldn’t look!” I shrieked at him.

  Rex laughed. “I couldn’t help it,” he called after me as I darted up the stairs as fast as I could.

  “See if I ever trust you again!” I shouted down to him before closing the door behind me. I wasn’t too mad, though. I was embarrassed, and a lot freaked out, but I wasn’t exactly upset by Rex getting a peek at me. And he’d called me sexy—or he’d said that my pants were. Or the fact that I liked Star Wars was. One of those was definitely true, but it meant that something about me had been sexy.

  No one had ever called me that before. I was smiling, even though I was freaking out as I headed into the shower.

  When I finished, I checked my phone to see where they all were and saw that CJ and Malcolm were now up and eating scrambled eggs while Rex sipped a glass of milk. I wondered if it was the same one I’d gotten for him before.

  “When he’s not trying to hit us, Blake is pretty cute,” Rex was saying.

  Malcolm snorted. “You can’t date our boss.”

  CJ snickered. “Technically, Phin is our boss, so Rex can do whatever he wants.”

  Still naked, I stared at my phone. What exactly was their relationship, anyway? Did they have one or were they just friends that shared a bed? Did I even want to know or did I even care? I had no idea.

  Rex continued with a big grin. “He was wearing these really low-hanging Star Wars pants. Not much for giving away what’s in front but his ass was so round and perfect in them. Definitely worth getting in trouble for this morning.”

  “I can hear you!” I squeaked out as I hit the intercom button on the side of the bed.

  Rex leaned back from the table and laughed. “I figured you could. You coming down again today?”

  I shook my head. I definitely knew my answer to that question. “No.”

  Rex pretended to pout. “Too bad. I was hoping to get a replay of your ass in those pants.”

  “You’re a pig,” I grumbled.

  Malcolm shook his head at Rex. “Don’t do that. You don’t know him. He may not realize you’re just joking.”

  Beside him, CJ nodded. “We need to be careful with Blake, especially after yesterday.”

  At least they understood me somewhat. And yet…Rex’s playfulness had made me smile. And part of me—the part that wasn’t shaking because I’d been so terrified—didn’t want Rex to be careful with me. I didn’t want any of them to be. I’d seen how they teased and played with each other and I suddenly wanted to have friends like that. I’d barely even started making friends when I’d decided that I couldn’t be in the outside world ever again. And since I hadn’t seen people be friendly with others since I’d been seven, except on TV, I hadn’t realized how much I’d missed out on. I wanted to h
ave friends like that someday. People I could joke around with and bump shoulders, someone to laugh and be silly with when I wanted to be.

  But first I would need to have pants on.

  I considered my options. I could watch their relationship, want their friendship for myself and be a bit of a creepy perv like I had been when they’d been kissing before and I’d stroked myself while watching them, or I could go downstairs and see how much I could handle being around them with just one pill in my system. Option one was the safest route and the one I’d taken for the past twenty years. But, honestly, I was getting a little tired of it sometimes. I saw CJ and Malcolm laugh together and touch each other, and I wanted to have people that I could laugh with too. Definitely not touch, but it would be nice to laugh with someone. And being downstairs at the same time as Rex hadn’t killed me that morning.

  I grabbed a pair of jeans, a T-shirt, my hoodie and my thickest pair of socks. And once I was all bundled up and only my head and hands were exposed, I crept downstairs. Or, at least, I went down three steps. Then I stopped and sat on the stairs because I suddenly wasn’t sure if I could get down the rest of them or not.

  I scooted down one more on my butt, which made a lot more noise than when I had just been walking.

  “Blake?” Malcolm called up to me.

  “Yes?”

  “You okay?” he asked.

  I had no idea how to answer that question. Did okay exist somewhere between completely panicked but still really wanting something? “Um…I’m not dead.”

  The guys laughed. “Should we go somewhere else?” CJ checked with me.

  “No. This is fine. I’m just… I’m trying something,” I told him.

  “Can we help?” Rex offered.

  Maybe by not paying attention to me anymore before I felt like bolting, which would be any second now. “Not really. I’m trying to make it down the stairs.”

  “Then what?” Rex continued to question me.

  “Then not pass out.” It felt weird being honest with him about what I was thinking. I wouldn’t have even tried this with Robert the first week, let alone the first year. But, then again, he hadn’t made me want to come out of my rooms, either. He hadn’t talked to me like these three guys did. Robert had treated me like a job. CJ, Rex and Malcolm almost made me feel like they might want to be my friends—or at least like they wouldn’t laugh at me or think that I was a freak for trying to be social with them.