Til Her Last Breath

Chapter 4

He returned to the lock. "Reporter?" he asked, picking up the screwdriver.

"Fiction."

"Published?"

Layla hesitated long enough for him to look over at her again, the screw halfway into the door. He looked at her expectantly and she sighed. Why not tell him? she wondered. Who was he going to tell?

"I've had a few books published," she admitted.

"Any I may have read?" he asked, finishing up with the lock. He pushed the door closed and picked the keys up off the floor. Layla waited while he tested locking and unlocking it a couple of times, then closed and locked the door, making sure it wouldn't budge. "One more," he murmured under his breath to himself. He gathered up his tools and the last lock and headed into the living room where the side door was awaiting his attention.

Layla followed, hoping he'd forget their little conversation, but halfway through disassembling the existing lock, he glanced sideways at her. "You never answered me," he pointed out. He noticed her take a deep breath and avert her eyes. "Why don't you want to tell me?"

"It's kind of embarrassing," she told him. "I write fantasy romance."

He stopped then and looked at her. "'Fantasy'?"

She blushed again. "I've had a series published, and a few stand-alone novels, mostly about aliens and vampires."

"No," he said, "I probably haven't read any of them." He smiled at her. "It's nothing to be ashamed of. You provide a product that the consumers want, and they buy it. It puts food on your table and a roof over your head."

"You make it sound so sterile and passionless," she groused. "I happen to enjoy what I do."

"Then why didn't you want to tell me about it?"

"I had some problems with an, um, 'overzealous' fan, a few years ago," she told him.

"A stalker?"

"For a while. It was after my very first book was published, when I used my own name. After that, I started using a pen name, which I guard obsessively. Kent and I were together for almost a year before I finally told him about it."

Nicolas set the old new lock on the floor and picked up the new new lock and turned back to the door. "I can understand that. You don't have to tell me anything if you don't want to."

"Thanks."

When Nicolas finished the final lock, he handed her the keys the set had come with and started to return his tools to his tool box. "That should keep him out," he said.

"I hope so," Layla said softly, eyeing Nicolas' handiwork. The lock gleamed almost merrily in the harsh overhead light. How had this happened? she wondered. Why was she, once again, a prisoner in her own home? The stalker had forced her to live behind sturdy locks, even going so far as to install bars on all her windows, fencing him out, but fencing herself in, too. For almost a year it had gone on, until he turned his attention to some other poor woman. Now here she was, in her little cottage, hiding behind shiny metal again.

"I'll be right next door," Nicolas reminded her. "All you have to do is cry out and I'll hear you."

She frowned at him. "Don't you have a life of your own?" she wondered. "I mean, you're not home twenty-four-seven. And there's no guarantee you'll always be able to hear me."

Nicolas looked over at her and his heart broke at the blatant fear in her eyes. What was wrong with some men that they could do this to a woman who only wanted to be loved? She was so beautiful there, curled onto the chair like a child, and he suddenly needed to touch her, to feel her slender body in his arms, to feel her breath on his skin. Without conscious thought, he crossed the floor to her and took her hand, drawing her out of the chair, pulling her towards him.