I was still shaking after we got on the road.
Chapter Thirty
Bri
“What happened back there?” Ramses asked from the highway. He’d calmed down at this point. I had calmed down, but things were silent for a while. Quiet. His hand drew over his head. “Your ex is Alec Norrington? NFL linebacker Alec Norrington? That’s what they were saying.”
I was surprised he hadn’t figured that out sooner. I mean, if he’d dug deep enough, he probably could have figured it out. Though, the internet knew me by my married name.
Even still, if he’d looked, he probably could have found out, and that was what had been so nice. At some point, it obviously hadn’t mattered to him. My history. I swallowed. “I told you about the NDA.”
The words had his jaw clenching.
“Yeah, I know.” He swung a glance my way. “Are you okay?” he asked, but when he reached for me, I moved my hand away. It was just too soon.
He’s not your ex. You know that.
He wasn’t my ex but seeing him that way tonight certainly hadn’t felt good. I drew trembling fingers through my hair and Ramses noticed.
His eyes expanded. “You’re shaking.”
He reached for my hand again, and this time, I didn’t withdraw. This time I let him, my hand physically spasming like I was coming down from something. My breathing escalated, and I dizzied, so much so that it took me a second to realize Ramses had pulled off the road.
He unstrapped, holding my hands. He advised me to place my head between my legs and I did.
“God, baby,” he said, a worry in his voice I recognized. A fear I recognized, a fear for me.
I hated this, that we were going through this. But what’s worse, I hated that it felt like I had to fight for this so hard, fight myself and everything around us just to make us happen. It seemed if it wasn’t one thing it was another.
I closed my eyes. One thing I didn’t hate was his hand on my back. His fingers pulling through my hair.
His rough touch on my skin.
The panic dulled with every stroke, the ache inflicted from a previous man dulling inside me. That pain, that trauma didn’t come from this man who tended to me now. It never could.
I knew that so deep in my heart now it hurt. I felt the reality of that so hard. Ramses spent many moments bringing me back to him, and when I could breathe again, sitting up, he was here for me.
He brushed hair out of my face. “Tell me what you’re feeling. All that scared you.”
It had. I nodded.
“What can I do?”
I touched my forehead to his, breathing in everything about him. Shaking again, I placed my arms round him, and he buried his face into my neck.
“Tell me.” He stroked my hair. “Please.”
The ache in his voice I felt, like he was helpless and didn’t know how to help me. It showed me even more about him.
Silent, my nose brushed his skin.
“Always make me feel safe,” I whispered, my eyes closed tight. “I just need that. Always.”
I heard my own ache, his, too, when he trembled around me.
“Did I scare you?” His voice thickened. “Back there?”
My answer had been a swallow in his ears, and he guided my face back.
He kissed my cheek before my mouth, holding me there.
“I promise I’ll always do that for you. Be that for you,” he said. Clasping my neck, he brought me into his. “I’m sorry. Sorry if I made you feel any different. I won’t again, and I promise you that too. Never again, Brielle. You’ll always feel safe with me. Always.”
I believed him. I loved him.
My arms tight around his neck, I fell into the soft purr of his car. He would protect me always. I knew that, but we always seemed to have something happen outside of us. It was like the universe didn’t want this to happen.
I held on tight as if to force it. I wanted to protect him too. For him to be and always feel safe. I didn’t want to be the reason he’d ever have to fear losing that, but every day, day by day, that was what I felt. Like I’d be the one to break him. I didn’t know how to stop it.
I didn’t know if it could be.
Chapter Thirty-One
Bri
Evie entered my classroom on Monday as I was putting things away. She waved a hand from the door. “Can you come to my office after you’re done?”
And then, she left. No time for me even to react. I hadn’t seen or heard from her since yesterday, the ballet.
A slow dread formed. There had been paparazzi.
Even still, I refused to panic. She could just want to talk to me about something. I remained hopeful as I finished packing my bag but didn’t drop it off in my office before heading straight to hers. I tapped a knock, and when she told me to enter, I did.
She wasn’t alone.
Ramses sat in front of her desk, the back of his head angling back when I entered. Seeing me, his brow twitched up.
Evident surprise on his face, he either didn’t know what this was about or simply hadn’t anticipated seeing me.
Whatever the case, he sat while his mom stood off to the side. She waved me in. “Come. Sit.”
Ramses’s gaze followed me the whole way as I occupied the seat beside him. He started to say something until his mom took a seat behind her desk.
Completely unnerving.
Evelyn appeared nothing but the educator behind her desk, her features even schooled. I couldn’t read her—at all.
And that scared the hell out of me.
My entire heart in my throat, I watched her open her hands.
“I’m just going to get right to it,” she said, her first tell. An agitation in her throat, a wrinkle in her brow. Her lips pinched tight. “You two are together.”
Not a question.
Not even an inkling of one.
Evelyn’s hand touched her lips, and I didn’t move.
I didn’t dare.
Nor did I breathe. My friend swallowed before she wet her lips. “That’s what TMZ is saying. You two are together. You two are together.” She opened her hands. “As you both know there was a confrontation last night at the ballet. Considering your background with your celebrity husband Brielle, I’m not surprised about that. But what’s alarming is the article was a follow-up to photos that surfaced apparently last week of you two.”
I frowned.
Evelyn’s jaw moved. “They had photos of you both at the store that were submitted by a student here on campus. A whole write-up on how she ran into you a while back, Brielle.”
My mouth dried.
“She had a photo of you and her together,” she paused, then placed a hand in front of Ramses and me. “And the pair of you holding hands at that same store.”
I closed my eyes, not even able to get Ramses’s reaction to the girl I’d obviously seen in the liquor department that day.
I didn’t know she’d gotten pictures.
“Mom—”
“She submitted those photos to TMZ. And they must have come down here to follow up.” Opening the laptop on her desk, she swung it around. “Because they caught the two of you again,” she stated, her voice deadpan. “Kissing this time in the faculty parking lot.”