Sakura greeted the newscaster, Samui, a pretty young thing who was interviewing one of the players behind home plate, the teams warming up out on the field. Sakura beamed for the camera and shook the player's hand.
"Taguchi, So." He introduced himself, smile lines radiating out from around his mouth.
Sakura answered some of the newscaster's questions and chatted it up with So as the teams prepared to take the field. So's eyes kept slipping towards his coach at the dugout, carefully monitoring when he needed to go.
"Okay, Sakura," The woman said conspiratorially when there was a pause in their conversation. "The world is buzzing that you've gotten engaged. Is it true? Who's the lucky man?"
Sakura tipped her head back and laughed. "Oh, Samui," She mimicked the blonde's casual language, "you know I can't tell! We have to have some privacy."
Samui opened her mouth to press her, but a loud smack! Interrupted her. Sakura turned her head, bewildered, to see Kakashi's gloved hand inches from where the back of her head had been, holding a baseball. Her confusion melted as she realized he had just stopped her from getting hit by one of the balls the teams were practicing with.
Kakashi tossed the ball casually to So, whose face was lined with horror. Kakashi shook out his hand.
"You caught that- Nomo Hideo threw that ball." So stuttered. Sakura didn't know who that was, but it clearly meant something to the baseball fans and players. A few players whistled low in appreciation.
Before Samui could put Kakashi more in the spotlight, Moegi appeared to tell Sakura it was time. The teams streamed off the field to their respective dugouts. Kakashi slipped back into the shadows, like he had never been in the light at all. Her eyes followed his back as he left.
Sakura set her shoulders back, took three deep breaths, and strode onto the baseball field. It was the last game of the season, and the stands were packed. Cheering and hollering filled the night air around her.
Baseball was the most popular sport in the Land of Fire. It did not particularly interest Sakura, she preferred soccer, but it was an honor to be asked to perform the National Anthem (for a country that was not technically hers yet). She heard the announcer call for the National Anthem, heard him call out her name.
Sakura made her way out onto the pitcher's mound, microphone in hand. Lights glared down at her, lighting up the baseball diamond and blocking out her view of the crowd. She could still see the news crews, however, and Moegi, and her guards, all behind home plate. Tsunade hadn't had time yet to hire Sakura a new manager, so she had simply put Moegi to the task for now. Sakura briefly checked that her outfit was still immaculate before the music started. She was in black jeans and a white blouse, with a flowing happi over it, the back displaying the Land of Fire's symbol. Nothing too flashy or scandalous. Her outfit was perfectly coordinated to her situation. On her feet were a pair of black sneakers.
The music played from the speakers around her and in her earpiece, and the crowd hushed. Sakura raised her microphone and made sure to look out into the crowd, even though she really couldn't see anyone. She turned her face and gave the cameras her most radiant smile.
She hit the first note.
It wasn't a long song, the anthem for the Land of Fire. And she was proud to sing it. Glad, so glad, to be there, in Konoha. This was her home.
And as she often did with her music, she let her feelings slip into the performance. Not all of her music was from her heart, but her heart was in this. There were songs she'd done covers of, songs Tsunade had bought for her to sing. She was not herself when she sang those. Even though the anthem was not one of her own, she felt every bit that it was.
When she was done the crowd cheered, and Sakura grinned. Heat flushed her cheeks in spite of the cool air, and she realized there was a bit of sweat gathered on her forehead.
She lifted her hand high, then bowed low for the crowd.
When she was off the field at last, she let her team form up around her, separating her from the news crews and fans, who all desperately wanted to ask her more about her new mystery fiancé. Little did they know that he was right beside her, escorting her up to the private box in the stadium. After her pre-performance interview, she would not be giving the news anything more. Kakashi would normally be off by now, his shift over, but she needed him for later, and after he'd stopped that ball, she was very glad for his presence. Besides, his regular shifts were all but scratched by their new arrangement.
Sakura only stayed to watch the game for the sake of the public. The box she was in was open to the night air, but separated by low walls and guards from the rest of the sports fans. She cheered when the home team did well, groaned when the visiting team struck one of her players out. She even sang along with the little chants.
Kakashi glanced at her out of the corner of his eye from where he stood just in front of her. She noticed that he tensed when their team had a bit of bad luck. He must have been a fan.
Sakura really didn't know anything about either team, so she was only supporting the Konoha team out of a sense of loyalty to the city. Though she found herself rather enjoying all the sweaty, fit men running around the bases in their tight pants. She could see the allure of the game.
She slipped out just as the 9th inning was beginning, to avoid the rush of spectators who would leave the game at its conclusion.
After wishing Meogi a goodnight, Sakura found herself back in her car with Kakashi.
Once the door closed, she let her smile drop, the muscles in her face aching from keeping it up so long. She reached up and gently massaged her cheeks with her finger tips, trying to relax the muscles. She was going to need more Botox to avoid letting crows' feet develop around her eyes. Kakashi watched her with his usual impassive mask on as he tugged the glove off his right hand.
"Where are we off to now?" He asked, drawing his eyes from hers to flip through the calendar on his phone. "I don't have anything else on your schedule for tonight."
"We're going to give Shikamaru and the news what they crave," She said flatly, and rested her head back against her seat. Hours of training this morning followed by an hour in the makeup chair had Sakura's muscles stiff and aching, like her cheeks. She felt like throwing something at Kakashi in retaliation for his brutal treatment of her. She blew out a dramatic puff of air. "Fuck all." She muttered.
Fortunately, the restaurant, a popular steak place, was not too far from the baseball stadium, both being located downtown. As the car sat at the curb, Sakura leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees to convey a few directions to her bodyguard.
"I'm going to go in the front, so that everyone and their brother sees me, 'kay? I need you to go around back-" at his flat look she waved a dismissive hand. "The others will stay with me. Now, you go in back. I already texted Choji, so he won't be alarmed. I want you to slip into the booth he points you to. I'll arrive a few seconds after. I need you to sit facing the back of the restaurant." Sakura knew Choji could be trusted not to tell anyone who she was smuggling through the back of his restaurant.
Sakura pulled a baseball hat with the Konoha leaf on it, and a nice, brown leather jacket from a bag at her feet. "Put these on." He narrowed his eyes at her and made no move to take the things. Sakura rolled her eyes at his stubborn nature. Unstoppable force meet immovable object.
"Hey, if you want I can just announce that I'm marrying my bodyguard on live, right this second." As her guard, he remained mostly invisible to the world, not including the occasional page that thirsted over him online. The second it was out that he was her fiancé, that peace would shatter. They still wouldn't have his name, but regardless.
"You wanted this to be secret as long as possible, remember? Well, I'm trying. Lots of stars have their SOs disguised in public." She shook the garments at him with impatience, and he finally swiped them out of her hands.
She gave him a pleased smile, then pushed open her door. "See you in a minute." She winked at him as the other guards met her on the sidewalk.
Sakura went directly into the front of the restaurant, and smiled at the host, who's eyes became the size of dinner plates as he took in Sakura, and the three deadly men behind her.
"I have a reservation," she said as the teen continued to gape at her. He finally stammered out a few words of welcome, grabbed 5 menus, and led the way into the dining room.
It wasn't a gigantic space but was large enough for the walls to sport booths that curved, with small, round tables spaced throughout the open floor. The elegant, old money bar spread out against the front wall, twinkle lights wrapped around the pillars the went from the bar top to the ceiling. Each table had only a small, stained-glass lantern above it, casting ambient, dim light. It was intimate, and close. The dark was easy to conceal oneself in.
Despite the dim lighting, Sakura heard the excited whispers as she passed and was recognized. She was never truly anonymous if she was out and about.
Her booth was at the very back, where the wall curved just slightly. All she could see of Kakashi was the back of his head, which was hidden by the baseball cap he wore backwards. He had carefully tucked every silver strand out of sight.
The host deposited the three guards, Asuma, Kotetsu, and Izumo, at the round table just in front of Sakura's booth, so they could eat and keep an eye on her without invading her privacy. It also helped keep Kakashi out of view. Guy was at her house, watching over the property, and of course Genma's shift had ended at 6pm. During the daytime, Kakashi and Genma were the only permanent members of her detail, any weak spots supplemented by the existing security at Senju and various venues. So, the other four really only watched her at night and at home.
As she approached with the host behind her, Kakashi ducked his head, so the teen couldn't see his face, masked or not.
Sakura quickly dismissed the poor stuttering kid with a flick of her wrist and settled into her seat across from her guard. She had picked this booth oh-so-carefully, knowing that she would be visible to the rest of the dining room, but Kakashi would remain out of sight unless he leaned forward on the table.
"What are you up to?" He asked, eyes wary as he took in her carefully selected seat, the position of the booth to the rest of the restaurant. Those silver eyes missed nothing. She was certain they never had. Bumps broke over her skin.
"Dinner," was all she replied before picking up the menu and scanning the list of delectable appetizers and entrees. After she had selected her meal and a fruity cocktail, she set the book back down and froze when she noticed Kakashi had his fucking gloves still on.
With a loving smile on her face, she hissed lowly, "Your gloves! Dates don't wear gloves!" She lowered her eyes bashfully, and let a forced blush take over her face.
Sakura had been in her first movie at 17. Now at 21, the tricks she'd learned acting were of great use to her. Every move in this restaurant was strategic, every expression on her face carefully and artfully composed.
Kakashi obliged and removed his gloves under the table, then tucked them into his pocket nearest the wall.
When he was done, Sakura held out her hand over the tabletop. When Kakashi didn't immediately catch on, she kicked him under the table, her sweet smile not faltering for an instant. Slowly, he brought his hand up, and placed it in hers across the table. Renewed whispers broke out at the tables nearest them. All the other customers could see was Sakura and their laced hands, and that was just too tempting to not talk about.
Despite the fact that this was now the third time she had technically held his hand, Sakura was briefly awed. Sasuke had never wanted to hold hands, and when he caved to her begging, his wrist had been loose, and his fingers had been cold.
Kakashi's hand was warm, and huge over hers. She could feel the scars and calluses from battle and hard work. Her own fingers were small, and kind of chilly. And while they were certainly softer than his, she could see his surprise when he felt her own calluses from playing instruments and the various forms of exercise she participated in. Her nails were long, black stilettos, expertly decorated for Halloween with little ghosts and pumpkins. They were sharp enough to draw blood.
Kakashi was staring hard at their hands, and she watched his brown knit ever so slightly, like he was confused by something. Or maybe concerned. She couldn't tell without seeing the rest of his face.
While he certainly wasn't intimate with anyone while he was working, she was surprised this seemed to fluster him so much. Surely, he was seeing women when he was off? He hadn't been nearly so flustered yesterday. But now the mood was different, and everything felt much closer. The dim lights and quiet music of their surroundings changed the atmosphere.
"Know what you want to eat?" Sakura asked casually. Kakashi nodded. "Great, that means you no longer need this." She swiped his menu and propped it up on the edge of the table, then added hers beside it, creating a little privacy screen. Then she leaned across the expanse between them and tugged on his hand, pulling him in towards her, behind the two standing booklets. She brought her face right up next to his, so that anyone who could see them in the dining room would appear to see Haruno Sakura kissing her lover at an intimate dinner.
From the table nearest them, her guards sputtered. She noticed that behind his mask, Kakashi was turning pink. His eyes seemed to glow inches from hers, and she was reminded of how close he had been to her that morning.
When a server came with their water, Sakura sat back, and Kakashi ducked his head again, before they folded up their menus. They each placed their orders, and Sakura noticed how the young woman taking down what they wanted turned a little pink herself, at both the attention of Sakura and the deep timbre of Kakashi's voice. She looked like she couldn't wait to go text every person she knew about what she'd seen.
Perfect. Sakura was certain that multiple people would have snapped photos of their position behind the menus, and the whole internet was probably already flooding with the news.
Sakura signaled to Izumo to go stop any paparazzi from barging into the room. When the server came back, she asked as sweetly as possible if she wouldn't mind taking his food to him near the host stand.
They had a relatively peaceful meal, for being a semi-public spectacle. Kakashi managed to eat and drink without showing her his face. But Sakura respected his wish to remain unseen, so she made it easy for him by politely averting her gaze. If he was surprised by her manners, he remained silent.
They spoke only a little bit, both of them clearly quite tired. Besides, they'd been unseparated all day, what updates were there to give? The silence didn't feel awkward or oppressive. They had often been with one another in silence, and it didn't bother either of them in any way. Kakashi was…comfortable.
When it was time to go, Asuma and Kotetsu made a wall of bodies for them to slip out the back, where Sakura winked at Choji as she went by. Izumo was going to go get Tenzo and bring the car around to the street alongside the building instead of picking her up out front. The restaurant was situated on the corner of two main roads, and the paparazzi would be busy on the first, trying to peek in the front door.
Night air enveloped their group as they stepped out onto the access street that ran behind the building, where delivery trucks and staff parked their cars. It smelled of cooking food and city pollution, which wasn't a great mix. Kakashi removed his hat and the leather jacket, her mysterious fiancé turning back into her guard. He tucked his disguise under one arm.
Sakura allowed the normal distance to be established between herself and her detail as they swung around the corner of the restaurant to meet Tenzo and Izumo. Kakashi and Asuma remained a few feet behind, and Kotetsu led the way.
As they approached the curb, Sakura noticed a red sedan on the road, going too fast, and veering into the opposite lane. The street wasn't particularly busy at almost 10pm on a Thursday, but Sakura watched on in horror, unable to look away, as at the end of the street, a silver car waiting to go through the intersection crept forward in anticipation of the green light. She felt like her feet were encased in the concrete beneath her as she watched, and time didn't slow down, no, it sped up. The reckless sedan hurtled forward, not slowing as the light for it turned yellow, then red. It ran right over the white stop line as the car that had been waiting was in the middle-
Footsteps slapped the pavement behind her, and right before the screeching of metal tearing through metal broke the still night air, the tinkling of shattered glass hitting pavement, a gloved hand wrapped around the right side of her head and covered her eyes.
In the same motion the hand turned her into its owner's chest, turning her back to the scene. There was a roaring in her ears as her face was pressed into Kakashi's soft black t-shirt. She couldn't hear anything except for that metal on metal sound, playing over and over in her head, though she felt the vibration of Kakashi's chest as he spoke. To her, to the others, she wasn't sure, didn't care. She didn't see the moment of impact, but her mind played the scene for her anyways. A direct T-Bone. The sedan would have pushed the other car down the street, or forced it to spin 180 degrees around from its original direction.
There would be metal cutting into flesh, possibly the breaking of necks-
Kakashi's eyes were suddenly right before hers, imploring her to hear him, gunmetal clashing against her green. Sounds other than the sound of the accident slowly filtered in. She was trembling against him, tremors wracking her body. She felt like a leaf swept up in a flood, hurtling towards a storm drain and the dark.
"Do not look." His voice was firm, a commander in battle. "The others went in to help, Izumo called for emergency services." Subconsciously disregarding Kakashi's order, Sakura's head began to turn on its own accord. Kakashi gripped her chin in his hand, the same hand that had covered her eyes, stopping her. "Do. Not. Look." Softly, then. "I've got you."
Sakura stepped into him, fisting his shirt in her hands and leaning her forehead against where his heart was beating. His sounded like hers; frenzied. But his voice was calm. He was unshakable.
"Asuma and Kotetsu will remain here until the police and ambulances arrive. They saw everything, so their statements will be important to the cops. Izumo and I are taking you home." She felt his muscles shift as he looked down at her, her stiletto nails digging into his skin through the fabric she gripped. "Unless you need to go to the hospital for the shock." She shook her head and felt the way her hair was rubbed into a mess from the motion.
Kakashi took a deep breath, and she felt his heartbeat begin to calm, while hers continued to rage. "Ok. Here we go. Don't look." He reminded her again, and she assumed someone must have been ejected from their vehicle, or their broken bodies were visible on the road. She could hear people streaming onto the main street to see what the hell had happened. Every bit of her was constricting, shrinking, twisting.
Kakashi wrapped one arm behind her back, and the other swept under her knees, and he lifted her into his arms like she weighed nothing. Sakura kept her face turned into his shoulder; her eyes squeezed shut. Fortunately, if there were any reporters or paparazzi, they were distracted by the accident scene, Sakura thought morbidly. Kakashi turned from it to meet her car, which had pulled around the back, both to move out of the way for emergency vehicles and to pick her up out of sight.
Kakashi didn't set her down after he opened the car door, only slid into a seat and settled her on his lap before tugging the door shut. She felt the moment the car began to move, carefully maneuvering to avoid the accident site. Still, she did not open her eyes. Still, she did not move her face from Kakashi.
The entire reason this man was even in her life was because of a car accident. It had been caused by a fanatic, and Sakura remembered every nanosecond of the incident. Pieces of memories flashed through her mind like a disjointed film and the roaring started again inside her head, bouncing off of her skull.
Sakura scrambled for her breathing techniques, fought to pull her mind up and out of that place. Phantom pains ripped through her, and she breathed through those too. This was not about her. She would not make someone else's trauma about her trauma. Someone else was suffering, someone else was dying, and it wasn't her. She was in her car, she was fine. She focused on the feeling of Kakashi's body beneath her, the motion of the car, the world and life around her. She gulped lungfuls of his gunpowder and leather smell.
Finally, as the car left the city behind for the country roads to her home, she pulled back. She pulled her mind back, put it back together. She imagined dropping a titanium cage over those feelings, imagined sinking that cage into the ocean of herself, down, down, down.
She did not meet Kakashi's eye as she slipped from his lap to the seat beside him, and buckled herself in. He knew she'd been in an accident. She would not offer an explanation. Besides, she hadn't reacted unusually for someone who had just witnessed something traumatic. Her childhood had been war, she knew what traumatic events looked like. So did Kakashi.
When her hands finally stilled, the tremors subsiding, she lifted her chin high, and forced an aloof expression onto her face. She became Haruno Sakura again, an untouchable idol.
Kakashi said nothing about it. He simply followed her inside when they got home, Izumo taking up a position on the roof.
She went to change into her comfort pajamas, a soft matching set of midnight-colored, shorts that tied near her belly button and a buttoned-up shirt, then pulled her robe around her. She went through her skin care mechanically and ignored the sounds of Kakashi taking his dogs outside.
Exhaustion and soreness tugged at every inch of her being. She was experiencing not only fatigue from their grueling workout, but from the mental low that hit after a traumatic incident. Like Tuesday. God, this week was shit. It took her twice the amount of time as usual to finish up in the bathroom.
When she stumbled out into her bedroom, she pulled up short at the sight of Kakashi sitting on the foot of her bed, in a pair of dark green joggers and a white shirt. His dogs all lay in different spots on the floor, staring up at her. Their wet eyes were expectant.
"What's this?" she asked warily. Because if this was some kind of intervention, she would be throwing Kakashi and his dogs out in a flash.
He simply opened his legs and pointed at the floor in front of him. "Sit."
Heat and irritation warred in Sakura's veins. "Excuse me?" She hissed at him, and closed her robe tighter around herself, turning away from him slightly.
Kakashi rolled his eyes. "Not for that, you perverted pop star. Sit facing away from me." He clarified, and pointed again to the space on her carpet between his legs, which his dogs had conspicuously left open.
Slowly, haltingly, like a fawn prepared to bolt at the first sign of danger, Sakura approached and sat down as instructed, his knees on either side of her head and her back to him. "What now?" She snapped.
"Oh, shut up." He chuckled softly before she felt his ungloved hands lightly, tentatively touch either of her shoulders. Very gently, his fingers began to knead at the knots there. Warmth traveled slowly all the way down Sakura's body. Kakashi's hands were warm and steady, and applied pressure in all the right places. He moved down her back at a snail's pace, and Sakura leaned forward over her crossed legs.
She used to see a professional masseuse once every two weeks, but between all her other necessary body maintenance and her work schedule, she had had to cut those visits out.
Somehow, Kakashi's rough skinned hands felt so much better than the smooth hands of the masseuse. Shivers broke out under her clothes, and she slipped her robe off of her shoulders to allow him better access.
A small sigh escaped her as his hand slid up under her night shirt and trailed along her bare skin. Without a coherent thought, Sakura unbuttoned the top half of her shirt, then let the material slip down her skin to bunch around her waist. She was utterly unconcerned that she was technically half nude; her back was to Kakashi, and she needed him to keep touching her skin unimpeded.
A finger moved up her vertebrae one by one, and as he reached the base of her neck his fingers splayed out over her skin, beginning his kneading again. The tension and stress, the aches, were slowly being pulled out of her by those hands. Normally, she might have blushed, might have begun to tighten in her core, but she was so tired. The tears she'd felt building dried up. And his hands were so warm and comforting that she felt herself slumping forward and dozing off.
Sakura woke up in the middle of the night in her bed, alone. Her shirt was rebuttoned on the top, and she vaguely recalled Kakashi sliding it back up her shoulders from behind her. For a moment she was confused as to what awoke her, but then she heard it: barking.
The dogs sounded like they were outside, and they were barking and howling up a storm.
Alarmed, Sakura got out of bed, wrapped her favorite blanket around her shoulders, and shot out into the hallway. She found Kakashi standing in the open doorway to the main entrance, watching the darkness, the muscles of his back taut. She stepped up behind his shoulder and peered around him at the night dark yard.
When Asuma suddenly appeared in front of them, she swallowed a scream and grabbed Kakashi's bicep, her other hand flying to her heart. Kakashi's expression didn't even flicker.
"Seems like there might have been someone lurking around. They're gone." He said quietly and quickly. The usually unlit cigarette in his mouth was lit up now, smoke trailing off into the night.
Sakura could tell Kakashi was scowling under his mask. Asuma's eyes flicked to her. "Somehow, I don't think we'll catch any breaks with you." he said bluntly. It sounded like an omen. He took a drag off his cigarette. "Car accidents, stalkers…" As he spoke, smoke curled over his lips, making him look like a dragon. "Some retirement." He muttered under his breath.
The dogs stopped barking. "I'll leave them outside with you for the rest of the night." Kakashi said to the older man, who nodded before disappearing again.
Sakura, irritated and reaching her limit, stomped out onto her front step and hollered into the night. "Can't you just fuck off?" She huffed and turned around in a dramatic swish of her blanket, pushing by Kakashi back into her home.
Kakashi closed the front door and slid the deadbolt home with a solid click, then turned to her. He raised one eyebrow, undoubtedly at her outburst, but said nothing.
Sakura started down the hall to her room, but came to an abrupt stop. Another person might have just been on her property. Lurking around the corner. A chill went down her spine that had nothing to do with the cool night. Sakura wasn't sure she could sleep. She turned back around and paced back into the living room, where Kakashi was leaning against the wall by the back door, still watching. Doing his job.
Sakura threw herself down on the sofa and grabbed the television remote from the coffee table in front of her. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Kakashi consider her.
"You should sleep, not watch TV." He said, coming up behind the couch and looming over her.
She snorted, "Like that's going to fucking happen." She tilted her head back to glare up at him, his face neutral. A battle of wills ensued in the silence, their eyes communicating the stubborn exchange.
"You have a filthy mouth." He crossed his arms over his chest in disapproval. "Not much of a lady."
Sakura made an incredulous face at him. "No one ever said I was a fucking lady." He laughed softly down at her.
"No, that's not usually what the people around you say," He conceded. "Now come on, you need to at least try to sleep. I'm not going easy on you in the morning even if you're sleep deprived." She scowled at him. "I like to pretend I don't have needs, like sleep." His face didn't change. "You're a hard bastard, Kakashi-sensei." She could have sworn he grinned under his mask.
"Come on," He reached over to pluck the remote from her hand before tossing it onto the couch, then put his hands under her armpits and lifted her over the back. Like an infant. She made an indignant noise of protest, but he just ignored her and set her feet on the floor. Then he pointed down the hall.
She rolled her eyes at him. "I'm a grown ass adult. I don't need you to give me a bedtime."
He tapped a bare foot impatiently. "It's 2am, grown adults aren't up at this hour. Unless they're working," He amended when she opened her mouth to argue.
She stuck her tongue out at him before she finally trudged down the hall again. She stopped in her doorway though, fear whispering in her ear. So instead of going into her room, she detoured into his instead.
"What are you up to now?" Kakashi's voice was filled with exasperation as he followed her.
"There's no way I can fall asleep by myself." She said as she crawled onto the guest bed. His bed. She noticed he'd swapped out her dusty blue comforter for a dark green one, with what appeared to be…shuriken? It clashed with the walls. She saw that Kakashi's pistol was lying on the nightstand. She didn't doubt for a second that it was loaded.
She watched him rub the back of his neck, suddenly unsure of himself. But how could he expect her to fall asleep again, after the tsunami of things that had happened the last 48 hours?
"Oh come on," She gave him a disbelieving look as she spread her blanket out on top of the comforter and then wiggled under the sheets. The bed was cold. "You've probably shared a bed with plenty of women." She pretended not to notice the double meaning in her words. "Besides, we are getting married, you know. And this is only for tonight." She patted the bed beside her. "Hit the lights."
His hand flashed out and did just that, extinguishing her ability to see him. She didn't hear him either, but she did feel the mattress dip from his weight as he climbed in beside her. He didn't touch her, just lay stiffly on his side of the bed. That was fine. She didn't need him to cuddle her. She just needed a safe presence around her. Considering he had saved her twice today with his quick reflexes, she figured he was as safe as any.
She hadn't slept Tuesday night after the stalker incident. She'd been alone. And now she wasn't. She comforted herself with the strange thought, and closed her eyes.