Pacifier

// Isabelle \\

I simmered, i shook my head.

"Sorry Van," I said softly.

"Why are you trying to fight me Izzy?" he turned away from me then, hammering another nail into the wall. Holding up one last board to block out the last of the night and the light leaking in from the still early morning street.

I felt a shiver run down my spine. I chewed my cheek.

"What if you hadn't woken up..."

I had the feeling we weren't really supposed to talk about it. I had the feeling that when people shot at us in the night, smashed the windows with a shower of bullets, when people tried to murder us in our sleep, we were supposed to pretend it hadn't happened.

I knew Camille would have been able to do just that.

Camille would have rolled over, pulled the covers over her head, pretended that she hadnt noticed the noise. The shattering of glass. The blood on the bedsheets.

"I did wake up," he said, as if that was an answer.

"No but..."

"Isabelle," he said cutting me off, his voice too firm, warning me once again. "I did wake up." he said but he hadn't answered my question, hadn't settled my nerves and he could tell.

"But you might not have done!"

"No one sleeps through machine gun fire," he said it so dismissively that I almost felt stupid.

"What if they'd shot you before you'd had a chance to wake up..." he turned to me then over his shoulder, saw my sullen sulking eyes and smirked. He dropped the hammer to floor and when he approached I felt my insides flip.

"Isabelle you're being pedantic," he said crouching down before me cupping my cheek with his hand.

He was kneeling at the side of the bed, i was lying on my tummy head held up by his hand. His eyes were level with mine, blue like troubled water. A tumultuous tide of emotion twisted up like whirlpools around his pupils. I could have drowned in them but he blinked. Broke my gaze and almost walked away.

"Why did they do it?" i asked again, biting down on my bottom lip when his jaw clenched.

"I told you darlin, there are a lot of people who want me dead..."

"Because you keep killing their families..."

"Because if I don't they'll kill mine." he snapped back, voice a little dead, jaw set and sharp. He starred me down, he was angry again. "Youre too young Izzy, stop asking questions because you won't like the answers." again he tried to stand, again I caught him before he could, snatching at his shirt collar, holding him there opposite me, forcing him to look me in the eyes.

"They were shooting at me too," i said my words sending his blood running cold. He swallowed a lump in his throat, still angry, his cold eyes still locked with mine. He was stubborn, he was fierce. His expression trembling with enmity.

"Because you were in my bed," he said, "That is what happens when you get too close to me... That is what I meant when I told you this was dangerous..."

It hurt for some reason, knowing that he didn't want me to get too close. Knowing that he would have rather I left him there and then. There were tears in my eyes when I looked back up at him.

"If it wasn't for your war with the Reids I wouldn't have been sleeping in your bed..." Now i spoke with gritted teeth too, now I was getting upset.

Van let out a sigh, he caressed my cheek with the back of his hand and then he snatched it away.
When he turned back to the boarded up windows i thought our conversation was over.