I can’t lose her. I can’t live without her. Fuck, what if I can’t find her once I’m there? I’ll spend the rest of my life looking for her if I don’t get to her in time. There’s no version that ends without Bella by my side.

I’m going at least ten miles over the speed limit. I’m not sure; I’m not paying attention to it, focusing on the arrival time dropping on my phone and the traffic. The minutes seem to drag on like hours, the drive going by in a blur. By the time I reach the exit for Cheyenne, I think I’m going to have a heart attack with how tight my body is.

I’m not sure how I make it in front of the Cheyenne station, but I do, parking illegally on the side of the road as I run inside. I don’t feel the chilly air on my bare arms or the drizzle slowly soaking my t-shirt. Bella would have arrived five to ten minutes ago, and who knows where she might have disappeared to in that time.

The sound of my thundering footsteps echoes through the station, but I can’t spot her anywhere. She isn’t lined up for another ticket or waiting for another bus.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

I run back outside, searching left and right for even a glimpse of her. She couldn’t afford to go farther than Cheyenne. Did she even take enough money for a motel? Food? Fucking hell. I throw the car door open and slip inside, starting the truck without buckling my seatbelt. I’m on the road again, driving up and down street after street as the piercing pain in my chest amplifies to the point that I can barely breathe.

Twenty minutes later, pigtails catch the corner of my eye. I pull into one of the quieter streets and park in front of a driveway. A lump builds in my throat as I run in the direction I saw it as the rain falls harder, turning the air frigid.

Then I see her. Bella.

My Bella.

Walking along the street, staring straight at the ground, not noticing the boutiques and offices she passes. She looks so sad. Broken. I caused it.

I narrow the distance, pulling her into my arms and beneath the awning of a cafe, nuzzling my head against hers to inhale her scent. At once, all the voices quieten. I found her. She yelps and tries to fight me, but I ignore all of it because I can breathe again. My heart no longer feels like it will be ripped out of my chest.

“Fuck, I thought I lost you.” I wrap my arms around her tighter, ignoring the people running past who are trying to get out of the rain. “Don’t you ever do that again.” I’m meant to sound stern, maybe scold her a bit. But all I sound is desperate.

She can’t leave me.

She’s never allowed to run away from me.

“Get off of me!” the princess hisses, pushing against my chest.

I don’t listen, squeezing her against me. “I was so worried.” I should be angry at her for sneaking out when I was asleep, but I can’t bring myself to care beyond the fact that I have her back. “I almost lost you twice this week. I won’t let there be a third time.”

She shakes her head against my chest. “Let go of me, Roman!”

Bile lurches in my stomach from the sight of her red-rimmed eyes and the fading bruises when I let her pull away.

“I’m not going back with you,” she says, choking back a sob as a tear falls down her cheek.

“Either I follow you, or you follow me. There’s no version of this where we go our separate ways.”

Bella tries to squirm out of my hold, while also gripping onto my shirt like it might kill her if she lets go.

“Miss, are you alright?” We both snap our attention to the cop standing a couple of feet away, who has his hand conveniently close to the weapons at his hips.

It kills me to step away from her, but I do it, keeping one hand on the small of her back. I’m not going back to jail, but I can’t tell him that she’s fine when she very clearly looks like she’s not fine. In fact, my ruined knuckles probably make it look like I’m the one who caused her bruises.

“Sir, I’m going to ask you to step away from her,” the cop says slowly, wrapping his fingers around the taser.

I grit my teeth, but do as I’m told, staring at Bella, pleading with her not to send me away like this when we haven’t talked about what happened. The only thing I can imagine that’s worse than being put in a box, is if Bella is the one who sends me there.

“Miss, I ask again, are you okay?” The cop slowly inches forward, muscles tense like he’s gearing up for a fight.

“I…” A shiver rips through her and she hugs herself tighter, glancing from me to the police officer as her bottom lip trembles.

Please don’t do this, I think, even though she can’t hear me.

The silence stretches for a long moment. She can tell them that I kidnapped her and held her against her will, that she had nothing to do with any of the murders. They’ll send me away for a long time, but I’ll still do everything in my power to make sure nothing bad happens to her. Then once I’m out, I’ll come crawling back to her, because since the day I met her, the only thing I’ve known for certain is that I’d die for her.

Her throat bobs with her swallow. “It’s fine,” she breathes out, staring straight at me. My shoulders sag in relief. “He’s… a friend.”

I curl my fingers into fists, but keep my mouth shut.

“Are you sure?” the cops asks.

She nods and gives him a forced, reassuring smile.

“Okay.” He narrows his eyes at me and gives Bella a comforting smile that she doesn’t need as he backs away to the other side of the street, out of earshot, but perfectly in his line of sight.

“I won’t come with you,” Bella whispers.

“Princess—”

“I was so scared, Roman,” she cries. “I was scared all my life, and you were there to protect me, but what if you’re the one I’m scared of?”

I reach for her, and she steps away. “I would rather kill myself than intentionally hurt you.”

“You got me out of the life I know, and however shit it was, I still had Jeremy. Now? What do I have? A life where I’m constantly at risk of getting killed? Where I don’t have Jeremy? All I have is the unknown, and you don’t know what we’re doing. Hell, you don’t even know what you’re doing.”

I shake my head. “Neither of us has known what we are doing ever since we were kids. When have we ever had a solid plan on anything? Everything we did was spontaneous, but we didn’t give a shit because we had each other.”

Tears fall down her face and I want so badly to hold her again. “I don’t want to go back to hiding and being scared. What if something happens to you while you’re fighting or going around killing people? What if you’re dead? What am I going to do then?”

“What you’ve always done, Princess. Survive. And I told you, there’s going to be no more fighting, no more gangs, no more killing—unless absolutely necessary.”

Bella hugs herself tighter. “I’m not safe with you.”

She’s right, but she’s also never been more wrong.

I reach for her again, and this time, she doesn’t fight me when I pull her into my arms. “You’re safer with me than without me.” Her chin trembles, wiping her tears away with her shoulder.

“That’s clearly not true. Should I list all the times I’ve ended up hurt with you around?” She looks at me with a mixture of sadness and fury, like she wants to curse my name and then kiss me after.

“I have a better idea; how about you list all the times you were hurt when I wasn’t around.” She shakes her head. “That wasn’t a suggestion, Isabella. Look at me and tell me every single time you were hurt because I wasn’t there, and the people who will never hurt you again because I stepped in.” I cock my head at her silence. “No? Alright, how about I start with the ones I know about—because I know you like to keep quiet about what happens.”

“Roman, don’t—”

“Greg. Marcus. His friends.”

“Roman.”

“Maxim and Mikhail. Mitchell.”

“I get it.”

“Skinny and Ugly. Those fucking customers at your work. The fucker that followed you from work the night you found me,” I list.