Chapter Twenty-Two: Hiding
The house felt too quiet after the storm of dinner. William and Adrian had retreated to the study, the heavy oak door closing with a muffled thud that seemed to swallow all the sound from the world. I could imagine them in there, two profiles etched by lamplight, one young and burning with a son's protective fury, the other older, colder, sculpting that fury into strategy. The weight of the name, of the enemy, of my own newfound role as a "weapon" and a "beacon," pressed down on the elegant corridors.
I tried to read. I tried to sketch in the notebook Adrian had bought me. The lines came out tense, jagged. All I could see was the reporter's hungry eyes, William's flinty gaze, and the weary, furious set of Adrian's shoulders as he left the room.
He was carrying it. All of it. The insult to me, the threat to his family, the political chess game he'd been born into. He was trying to be my shelter, but who was sheltering him?
A childish, impulsive idea bloomed in my chest. It was silly. It was undignified. But it was a piece of us—the us that existed before scandals and political enemies, the us that was just two people tangled in sheets and laughter.
I waited until the deep quiet of late evening settled. The grandfather clock in the hall chimed eleven. The study door was still closed. I crept into our bedroom, my heart doing a silly, nervous flutter.
The curtains. The ones in the bay window were heavy, velvet, pooling richly on the floor. Behind them was a deep, sheltered space between the cold glass and the thick fabric—a perfect, foolish hiding spot.
I slipped behind them, pulling the dense material completely closed. The world vanished into plush, burgundy darkness. I could hear my own breath, could smell the faint, clean scent of the fabric. I hugged my knees to my chest, a giddy, nervous smile on my face. I'd startle him. I'd make him laugh. I'd pull him into this little pocket of darkness and remind him that we were also this—playful, secret, young.
Time stretched. The silence of the house deepened. My legs began to cramp. The giddiness faded, replaced by a slow, creeping doubt. What if he was too tired? What if he was angry? What if this was stupid?
Then, the sound I'd been waiting for. The distant click of the study door. Firm, hurried footsteps in the hall. Our bedroom door opened.
"Arisha?"
His voice was tired, edged with the remnants of tension. I held my breath, pressing a hand over my mouth to stifle a giggle.
The footsteps moved into the room. I heard the rustle as he likely looked toward the bed. A pause. "Love?"
Silence. His footsteps again, quicker now, heading toward the bathroom. The light flicked on, then off. "Arisha?" The tiredness was gone, replaced by confusion.
Back into the bedroom. A drawer opened and shut. Then, nothing. A long, hollow silence. I was about to give up, to push the curtains aside and call out, when I heard it.
A breath. Sharp. Inhaled.
"Arisha!"
It wasn't a call. It was a shout. Raw. Stripped of all control. The sound of his footsteps became a run—a frantic, pounding pace across the room, into the sitting area, back. I heard the balcony door rattle as he checked the lock.
"Arisha!" Her name was a plea, a curse, a sob held in one syllable.
The panic in his voice was a physical thing, clenching around my own heart. This wasn't what I wanted. This was all wrong. My silly plan had curdled into something cruel.
I scrambled, pushing at the heavy velvet, stumbling out from behind it just as he whirled from the balcony door, his face ashen, eyes wild with a terror I had never seen, not even in the courtyard fight.
"Boohh!" I said, the intended playful greeting coming out as a weak, choked squeak. "I'm here, hubby…"
For a fraction of a second, he just stared, his brain refusing to process. Then, the terror shattered, replaced by a wave of something so profound it knocked the air from me.
He crossed the distance in two strides. His arms locked around me, not in a lover's embrace, but in the desperate, crushing grip of a man pulling someone from a precipice. He buried his face in the crook of my neck, and his whole body shuddered.
"God. God, Arisha." The words were muffled, hot against my skin. "Don't. Don't ever."
He was trembling. Great, racking shudders that he tried and failed to suppress. His grip was so tight it hurt, but I didn't dare move. I wrapped my arms around him, my hands smoothing over the rigid muscles of his back.
"I'm sorry," I whispered, horror flooding me. "I'm so sorry, Adrian. I was just… I wanted to surprise you. To be silly. I didn't mean…"
He pulled back just enough to look at me, his hands coming up to frame my face. His thumbs brushed over my cheeks, as if confirming I was real, solid. His eyes searched mine, the wild panic receding, leaving behind a deep, oceanic fear. "You were gone. The room was empty. After today… after what he said…" He swallowed hard, his throat working. "My mind… it just went to the worst place. The darkest, most horrible place. I thought Hale… I thought they'd…"
He couldn't finish. He didn't have to. I saw it all in his eyes—the imagined headlines, the ransom notes, the silence. The cost of the name wasn't just scrutiny. It was this: a mind trained to see threats in shadows, to imagine monsters in every empty space.
"I'm here," I said, forcing my voice to be calm, an anchor. I kissed his jaw, his cheek, the corner of his mouth. "I'm right here. I'm not going anywhere. I was just being an idiot behind the curtain."
A broken sound, half-laugh, half-sob, escaped him. He rested his forehead against mine, his breathing still ragged. "You scared ten years off my life."
"I'll give them back to you," I murmured, leaning into him. "One silly, safe day at a time."
He held me for a long time, just breathing, letting the adrenaline drain away, replaced by the solid, reassuring reality of me in his arms. When he finally spoke, his voice was low, thick with emotion. "That's what you were doing? Hiding? To… cheer me up?"
I nodded, sheepish. "It was a dumb idea."
He shook his head slowly, a wonder dawning in his still-damp eyes. "It was the best idea anyone has ever had." He kissed me then, a soft, lingering kiss that tasted of salt and relief. "My brave, ridiculous, perfect wife. Trying to fight my monsters with a game of hide-and-seek."
He led me to the bed, not with passion, but with a exhausted tenderness. He pulled me down beside him, wrapping himself around me so thoroughly I felt enveloped. His face was once again buried in my hair, his arms a vise-like band across my ribs.
"No more hiding," he murmured, the words a vow against my scalp. "Even to be sweet. Just… always be where I can see you."
"Okay," I whispered, stroking his hair. "No more hiding."
We lay in the dark, his panic slowly subsiding into a watchful, weary calm. The share of love I'd intended—playful, light—had instead been this: a raw sharing of his deepest fear, and my horrified understanding of it. It wasn't the moment I'd planned. It was heavier, truer. It was the weight of the name, and the even greater weight of the love that had to carry it.
"Addie?" I whispered into the dark.
"Hmm?"
"I love you."
His arms tightened almost convulsively. "You are my air, Arisha," he breathed, his voice thick with sleep and certainty. "Don't ever let me forget how to breathe."
And as his hold finally relaxed into the steady rhythm of sleep, I knew my role had shifted again. I wasn't just a wife, or a shield, or a beacon. In the quiet, scared heart of this powerful man, I was simply the reason he remembered to take his next breath. And that, perhaps, was the most terrifying and precious responsibility of all.