Roman had been off the phone with the FBI agent for nearly fifteen minutes. The two of us just sat in silence together as we each pondered over what the man on the phone asked Roman to do.

Before long, and after the sun had risen high enough to bear down on us, Roman cleared his throat and turned me to face him. I relented against him a bit, knowing what it would mean to face him and the situation that now presented itself to us.

I held fast against his grip and the way he tried to move me. Instead I just shut my eyes and pushed my face into his neck, where I tried to pretend that nothing the FBI agent on the phone had told us within the past ten minutes had happened.

It was a somewhat childish thing to do, I knew that, but I wanted to do it anyway. If I could only just steal a few more moments with him, where we were at peace and nothing wrong was going on in the world, I would.

I felt Roman sigh against my hair, and I knew this must have been as hard on him as it was on me. I knew that he didn’t like the situation that had arisen anymore than I did, so I loosened my body to enable him to turn me around.

He was adamant, so he turned me fully to stare at his gorgeous blue eyes.

He sighed when he saw the look my eyes mirrored in them and rubbed at them slowly, trying to wipe away the sleep and the worry—not that he could—from them.

"I will be safe." He tried to reassure me, but it was the first time I heard him speak words even he didn’t believe.

"You can’t promise me that." I told him as I called him out on the lie.

But he was speaking honestly. "No, I can’t." He placed a tender kiss on my forehead as he continued to speak. "But I can promise you that I will do everything in my power to protect you. I did promise you that. And I can promise you that I will look after myself–"

Roman let out a gasp of breath as I launched myself onto him and wrapped my arms and legs around his waist. I wanted him to stop talking. I wanted to delay the inevitable.

Whatever this conversation would bring, wherever it would lead us... I wanted to pause time for a moment and delay it.

"Can we talk about something else, please?" I begged him quietly. "Just for a moment... I just want one more moment."

I felt him nodding as he stroked my hair.

"Your hair looks gorgeous today." He spoke soft words kindly into my ear. I laughed lightly, although heavily, at the way he never ceased to amaze me.

"You might die, and you’re complimenting me on my hair." My words were gravel against tar— rough and unyielding.

"Hey," he admonished as he tugged lightly at my hair and pulled my head back, "you were the one who said they didn’t want to talk about it." 𝘧𝘳𝘦ℯ𝓌𝘦𝒷𝘯𝑜𝑣𝘦𝓁.𝒸𝘰𝓂

I huffed lightly and tried to look anywhere but him, but his gaze followed me wherever it went.

"And I won’t die." He corrected me.

"It doesn’t seem like a very not-die plan to me." Rolling my eyes, I tried to get off from him, but I was held there firmly in his lap at my hips by his large hands.

"You understand why I have to do this, right?" Roman asked me as he looked into my eyes sternly. I only rolled my own eyes again and pushed his face away.

"Yeah, I get it." The reality of the situation was dawning on me. I wasn’t sure I was strong enough not to break down in front of him if I thought about the situation any longer.

He held me still tightly to his body. "No, tell me. Tell me why it has to be me."

Furrowing my eyebrows together, I was quickly becoming irritated with him as he forced me to say it.

"Because other than Marcus, you’re the only one who has seen this big scary boss everyone is so afraid of." I recited the words of the FBI agent on the phone.

"And because of that..." He prompted me to continue. I let out a deep annoyed sigh as I stared at him.

"And because of that, they want you to go into this new location of the Auction House and identify him to make sure that this time a second raid will be successful." I threw my hands up in the air and then placed them on his shoulders.

"I understand that, I do. And I know that you’re doing it because you have to and to put a stop to what happened to me, but Roman, risking your life... " I shook my head as I thought about it. "It’s too much to handle."

I felt the prickling sensation in my eyes. Roman’s face softened as he stared at me.

"Hey." He rubbed at my cheek as he spoke softly, "I will be safe. Mainly because I know if anything happens to me, you’ll bring me back from wherever I was crazy enough to go without you."

A sobbed laugh escaped me, and I playfully punched him in the chest.

"Don’t joke about that," I told him sternly.

He only shook his head at me. "It’s not a joke, sweet girl. If ever I was insane enough to leave you here alone, you’re very welcome to drag me back to you."

"You should let me come too so I can look out for you," I said hopefully.

His breath-taking laugh was enough to put a stop to that notion immediately. "No, darling. As safe as I know it will be and sure that nothing bad will happen, I can’t guarantee the safety of anyone else if someone so much as touches, or even looks at you, the wrong way. That place... It’s not where you belong."

I raised an eyebrow at him. "Oh? And where do I belong?"

He only hummed as he smiled at me and brought his face closer. "Here," he whispered, "with me in my bed, under me, on top of me." Roman began listing as he pulled me closer and gave me kisses like his life depended on it.

I hoped it didn’t.

Pulling away from him, Roman questioned the look on my face.

"Why are you kissing me like that?" I asked him woefully and held his head in my hands this time.

"Like what?" he asked without a clue. I only shrugged.

My response came out in a hushed whisper, "Like you’re saying goodbye."

Roman only sighed deeply again. He didn’t say anything for a long time before he spoke again. This time, his voice was a lot harder than it had been before.

"I can’t promise you that everything will go smoothly. Nothing up until this point has. But this is something I have to do Hannah, not just for you but, for all the girls who have been mistreated by these men and all the girls that will be if no one stands up to them."

I nodded along to what he was saying. It made sense.

Roman wasn’t a selfish man, I knew that from the very first moment I met him. But to do this, and for people he didn’t even know... It was going above and beyond the call of duty. He was an honorable man in more ways than I could count on my fingers and toes.

And I loved him for that. God, did I love him. I loved him so much that the thought of anything going wrong or him ending up hurt in any way, shape, or form felt like it was a dagger to my own heart.

I just held him close for the few moments I had left with him and hoped it would be enough to encourage him and to give him strength for all the battles he may have to face in that wretched place.

We sat like that for a long time, kissing and whispering affirmations so low that we refused even for the universe to hear it. Those words existed only for us. Those kisses and touches were only for the two of us to bear witness to and hold its memory in our hearts.

"I love you," I whispered to him as I laid a kiss on his right cheek. "I adore you." I kissed his left cheek.

"Please come home safely to me," I begged him before his phone rang again. The spell that we had cast over ourselves to keep us safe from the world broke as that ringing pounded against the shield we had made.

It rang and rang until the phone went silent. We breathed for a moment. And then it rang again.

Roman gave me one last kiss before he left.