It had been a whole month since Antonio and I had returned from Anguilla. My time with him had been surprisingly calm and I suppose as normal as things could get in my situation. He had been working a bit more than before so my days usually consisted of mundane activities. We would always eat dinner together but other than that I didn't see much of Antonio in the day.

I knew that he was still sleeping in the same bed with me but he always came later and woke before me. The only evidence that he was even there next to me through the night was the trace of warmth he left. I often found myself gliding my hands over his side of our bed and even rolling over to get closer to his scent. I was missing him. Odd as it seemed, I was defiantly growing towards Antonio. I felt a constant attraction towards him, as weird as it was.

Due to his absence my days were spent by reading books that I had been given. I was confined to my room, except for when I was bought by a guard to the dining room for meals. Antonio had assured me that it was for my own safety and he wasn't trying to keep me prisoner. He said that he had a lot of people filled with hate towards him and that for those reasons I could be in danger. His business was in a rough time and there were several problems. It wasn't at all unlikely for someone to attack the mansion. I believed him. He'd been working more and left that night after our wedding. However Antonio had never really liked to inform me about the details of his work, not that I minded. I figured it was better for me to be oblivious than paranoid.

I had just returned to our room after dinner with Antonio. I didn't know who his cooks were but they were absolutely amazing. The food here was like something from a top restaurant that would cost you hundreds to eat at. Tonight we'd been served some amazing salmon and for desert I devoured my lemon tart. Every bite was a literal flavor explosion for my taste buds. Antonio had also spoken to the kitchen about what I liked, he knew me so well by now. He could read my every thought and action like I was an open book.

I suddenly let out a tired yawn but upon glancing over at my bedside clock, I saw it was only eight in the evening. It wasn't as if it mattered what time I went to bed here though. Antonio didn't seem to mind and I was in desperate need of a goods night sleep. I had been trying to stay awake lately, to avoid the nightmares. I'd ask for coffee to be delivered up to my room a couple of times a day and then usually fell asleep at around one in the morning. Antonio was never back even at that time. His work must have been getting very heavy. Then I'd jolt myself awake again at around four or so. By then Antonio was asleep in bed and I would lie awake before boring myself back into an uncomfortable slumber. My sleeping schedule was tedious, maybe sleeping more would be better than not.

I sighed and pulled myself into the closet to change into some pajamas and then to the bathroom to get ready for bed.

When I came into the bedroom Alice was already asleep in bed, as she should have been. I had an emergency that I had to deal with. A few weeks ago Alex and I received a threat from another gang. Usually we would demolish them in an instant but they just happened to get their hands on our location and that meant things were more dangerous. We still had no idea where they were based so they had an advantage. We were now picking apart their men, one by one, hence why I had to meet Alex at three in the morning. The man we had killed told us that we would be attacked within the week, it was uncertain if this was true but I couldn't take the risk of ignoring it.

I pulled off my clothes, leaving my boxers, and climbed into bed besides Alice. She looked so beautiful in her sleep, peaceful and flawless. Her lips were slightly puckered as she took in deep breaths, causing her chest to rise and fall. Her skin had a refreshing glow and her brows were set in a frown. It wasn't until I saw her mouth moving as if she was saying something that I noticed that she seemed to be having a nightmare.

She took in a sharp breath, as if in pain, which was closely followed by a moan of agony.

"Please stop."

Her plea was quiet and whispered as she spoke in her sleep. I felt a pang in my chest as I couldn't help but think her nightmare was about me. She seemed as though she was warming up to me, maybe even a bit happy, but than again you never can fully understand what someone else is thinking about.

I wanted to wake her and reached out my hand, ready to shake her gently, when she abruptly shot up into a seated position. There was a small trace of cold sweat on her forehead as she tried desperately to steady her breathing. She began to let out small, pitiful cries and turned her head over to my side.

She gasped when she realized that I was awake.

"I-"

She was as shocked as I was, eyebrows furrowed and all. Had I really been the villain of such a nightmare? It was possible, I'd done such awful things to her.

Neither of us said anything for a while, instead we just stared at each other. Eventually I broke our eye contact when I lifted my arms over and around her small body, holding her close to my body in a tight grasp.

"Tell me about it."

As the words left my mouth I just stared ahead at the wall, I couldn't bring myself to look at her as she told me all about her bad dream, which I presumed was about me. My mind was whirling with all the possibilities and scenarios that she could have dreamt of. Was it the kidnapping, rape, abuse?

"It wasn't you Antonio if that's what you're worried about."

I felt a considerable amount of worry and guilt being lifted from my body. She wasn't scared of me.

"You can tell me Alice."

Only silence followed. Until she hesitantly came clean about the nightmare.

"Ryan.....I er, I was dreaming about this one time.... I had spilt some wine on him so he smashed the glass against my head and then did the same with the bottle. Fuck it hurt..."

I felt my blood boil with rage. I despised that piece of shit for hurting her but that anger was quickly substituted for guilt when I remembered that I wasn't much better than he was. I'd hurt her too.

"Are they regular?"

She only nodded in her wordless response. How had she been dealing with this every night without me realizing it?

"Do you want to talk about him?"

I shifted our position in order to see her delicate face. She only shook her head in response.

"He doesn't deserve the recognition."

I nodded in understanding and was taken a back when Alice pulled my face towards her own and kissed me. Her kiss was desperate and sloppy, as if she urgently needed it. Understanding what she wanted, I carefully climbed over her and caressed her cheek as we kissed so passionately. God this woman was going to be the death of me.

"Morning."

I stared down at Alice who was waking up, when she heard my greeting she seemed surprised.

"Don't you have work?"

I was putting off this conversation but after last night I felt that it was even more important to protect her.

"I do but I needed to speak to you first. I'm having breakfast sent up."

With perfect timing there was a knock on the door so I quickly put on a pair of joggers and answered it. On the other side of the door was waiting a maid who held our food on a tray. I briefly thanked her and took the breakfast over to the bed.

I'd ordered pancakes for us both, syrup and berries for Alice because I knew that it was her favorite.

"What did you want to talk about?"

I lifted up the bottle that I had picked up early this morning. It was currently around eleven but I'd got up early to get them from my doctor.

"First thing's first, I got these from my doctor earlier. They will help you sleep."

She thanked me and took the pills, glancing over it's label while assessing the medication.

"Alice how would you feel about returning to your old apartment? It's not forever, I have no intentions of letting you go. I wouldn't be able to go with you but I still have that tracker in you, remember. Don't even try to escape, it won't work."

I didn't want to scare her or seem aggressive but if she did try to leave me than I'd lock her away and she'd never leave this room again. I'd bar the windows and guard the door, I wasn't letting her go.

"Things here are getting dangerous, we are being threatened and I don't have time to spend with you anyway so I figured you could go back. You can sort out your stuff, anything you want to bring back home with you."

When I looked back to Alice she had a huge smile on her face. That made me smile too.

"Yes!"

She could have knocked me over from the force of her running up from the bed and into my body, embracing me in a tight hug.

"Thank you."

I just wrapped my arms around her too, enjoying the moment.

"Ok, you probably will only be gone for a few days. You know the rules and we've gone through everything important. Ok?"

I was dropping Alice off at the airport but couldn't justify the time to actually be on the flight with her. A flight from Italy to the US was long enough let alone another one back, just to see Alice into her home.

She, the air stewardess and the pilot were the only people on the plane and I'd already arranged for one of my men in the US to pick her up and drop her off once she landed. Other than that she'd be completely alone and unsupervised for the duration of her little trip.

The rules were simple enough. I wasn't particularly worried anyway, much to my distaste, Alice was too scared of me to ignore my words. Although I suppose that on occasions, such as this, that fear did come in handy. She wouldn't dare defy me. She knew the consequences. Alice was well aware of her tracker and it was impossible to remove it without top surgeons due to it's location. It was too close to important veins to be cut out by any random person. I'd already had my people fill her place with food and necessities so she wouldn't even need to leave. The phones had also all been cut and any electronics removed, she'd have no contact to the police or anyone else who she could tell about me. Finally, I'd thrown out any drugs or medicines that she could overdose on. I didn't want to take any chances.

"Yes I remember everything."

I nodded and went to get back into my car but was stopped when Alice dropped the handle of her suit case and ran towards me. She all but threw her arms around me and kissed me. I only responded to her affection, not at all displeased by it.

"Will you be ok?"

She asked, looking down at the ground once we pulled away. She was worried about me. My intention had never been to panic her about what could happen to me back home but I had to admit that I loved it. She actually cared.

"I'll be fine."

Of course there were many risks and it was possible for me to be injured or killed. We didn't know when we would be attacked or how many people it would be by. But I was confident that we'd win and I'd have Alice back in my very much alive arms before the week was up. Besides, I didn't want to stress her out anymore.

She nodded in response to my answer and bought her face up so she could gaze at me right in the eye.

"Promise?"

My lips tugged their way up into a smile.

"Promise."