Protect Her

Chapter Sixteen

Camryn

"She's perfect." I said, watching as Mrs. Leonard played a matching game with Riley on the floor in the living room. "You've really thought of everything."

Derek smiled, slipping his hand into mine and giving it a tight squeeze. Just his touch sent electricity throughout my body and left me aching for more.

This was wrong. I was just a few days out of a miserably failed relationship and nowhere near the headspace to be getting attached to someone like Derek. He was almost too good to be true, and even though I knew he was nothing like Robby, I couldn't put myself in that situation again. A situation where I let a sweet talking man sweep me off of my feet and make all kinds of promises to me I knew he could never keep. This was fun, but Derek had a very established life back home—one that Riley and I weren't a part of—and at some point, he was going to have to go back to that.

Even I could recognize how unstable I was right now and how irresponsible this was, but I just couldn't seem to resist it. I felt safe with Derek; I felt at home, and a sense of peace I hadn't felt in years. He'd been a perfect gentleman about all of this, taking the chemistry between us in stride and moving excruciatingly slow. I knew I needed that, though. That was the only way this could ever work. I had to work out so many things before I could commit to Derek in any kind of way, and we both understood that.

"I'm glad you feel comfortable with her. I think this will be great for both of you. You've been focused on surviving for so long, but Riley needs her mom to be healthy just as much as anything. It's time to take care of you."

"You're doing a pretty good job of that." I smiled, running my thumb along the back of his hand.

"And I fully intend to take care of you. In every sense of the word." He smirked, but then his expression changed slightly. "Cam, I have to go back to New York for a couple of days."

My stomach dropped. "Because of Robby?"

"No." He said definitively. "I just have some other things happening at work that I have to take care of. I promise you guys will be in expert hands here, and I'll have a security team that will be with you every hour of the night and day."

I hadn't expected Derek to stay with us the entire time anyway, but now I felt slightly terrified at the prospect of being without him. "Okay."

"There's an alarm on every single door and window to this place, and you have to enter two access codes to even get up here. You're safe here, Camryn. I promise. I wouldn't be leaving if I thought otherwise."

"I know." I nodded, but none of those things are you. I didn't say the last part out loud. This was exactly why I had to keep some space between the two of us. I couldn't grow to depend on him for everything. He had his own life and his own job and things to worry about. Whatever was going on between us was most likely temporary, and he was right. I needed to prepare myself for when it was just Riley and me again.

Maybe that was part of the reason for his impromptu trip as well. Maybe he could sense that I was getting too dependent on him and he didn't want to string me along. Maybe he was having second thoughts, and this was a good way of letting me down easily.

There was definitely chemistry between us, but circumstances can bring out feelings you wouldn't normally have for a person. The last thing I wanted was to be clingy, like I didn't even know how to act like an adult without a man there to lean on. That was the way Robbie wanted me to feel, like I needed him, and it was time to kick that thought process.

I could do this.

It seemed like there was something else on Derek's mind, but he didn't say it.

"It will just be a couple of days, and you can call me whenever you need to." He added.