Chapter 35 Not Alone
Aiyana's P.O.V
Jerome watched Noah the way men watched sunsets they didn’t believe they deserved.
I noticed it that evening, after Noah had finally been coaxed into bed with promises of stories and tomorrow. The house had gone quiet in that peculiar way it always did at night—guards switching shifts softly, distant doors closing, the hum of generators low and steady.
Jerome stood by the hallway, arms crossed, eyes fixed on the direction Noah had gone. He didn’t move even after the door shut. Didn’t look away.
It wasn’t the sharp, calculating stare I was used to.
It was bare.
“You okay?” I asked gently.
He looked at me then, really looked at me, like he was measuring whether I could be trusted with something fragile. For a moment, I thought he would brush it off the way he usually did with one-word answers, a nod, a change of subject.
Instead, he gestured toward the sitting room.
“Sit with me.”
My chest tightened at the tone of his voice. Quiet. Unguarded. Heavy.
We sat across from each other at first, the space between us polite but tense. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, hands clasped together so tightly his knuckles paled.
“You’ve noticed Noah.” He said.
I nodded. “He’s… attached.”
A ghost of a smile touched his lips. “That’s one word for it.”
He inhaled slowly, then exhaled like he was bracing himself.
“He doesn’t attach to people,” Jerome continued. “Not like that.”
Something in the way he said it made my heart ache.
“He didn’t even look at most people when he first came here,” Jerome said. “Wouldn’t speak. Wouldn’t eat unless I sat with him. Wouldn’t sleep unless the door was open.”
I stayed quiet, afraid that any interruption would make him retreat.
“With you though” He went on, eyes lifting to meet mine, “he decided you were safe in less than a day.”
My throat tightened. “Kids are… intuitive.”
“Yes,” he agreed. “But this wasn’t intuition. This was survival.”
He leaned back slightly, one hand coming up to rub his face. For the first time since I’d known him, Jerome Black looked tired in a way that had nothing to do with lack of sleep.
“He’s my sister’s son.” He said.
The words landed softly, but their weight was immense.
“My only sister…” He added. “My only family.”
I felt something shift inside me. The way Noah clung to him. The way Jerome hovered just close enough, never smothering, never distant. It all made sense now.
“She was younger than me,” he said. “Too kind. Too hopeful. She believed she could live a life untouched by the things I was already knee-deep in.”
His jaw tightened.
“She married a good man, tried to build something small and quiet. Thought distance would protect her.” He stopped and stared deeply into nothingness as if seeing something I wasn't
It didn’t.
I didn’t need him to say the rest. I could see it in his eyes, the memory replaying, sharp and merciless.
“The mafia didn’t just take them.” Jerome said, voice low. “They erased them. Made it a message.”
My breath caught.
“They wanted me to kneel, to show me I wasn’t untouchable.” He continued with a sigh.
His lips curved into something bitter. “They miscalculated.”
I shifted closer without thinking, the instinct to comfort him overriding caution.
“Noah was there… that little child.” Jerome said quietly. “He saw too much. Heard too much.”
My hands curled into fists on my lap.
“He survived because one of their men hesitated.” Jerome went on. “Just long enough for my people to get there.”
Silence stretched between us, thick and suffocating.
“I buried my sister with my own hands, and I made a decision that day.” He said, looking at me then with dark eyes. Fierce, and unbearably wounded.
“If the world was going to come for the people I loved…” he said, “then the world would learn to fear me more than it ever thought of respecting me.”
I swallowed hard.
“That’s why the men don’t question me,” He said. “Why they don’t test boundaries. Why they obey without hesitation.”
A pause.
“I don’t want respect.” he said simply. “Respect doesn’t stop bullets.”
Fear does.
I reached for his hand then, unable to help myself. He stilled at the contact, eyes dropping to where our fingers touched. He didn’t pull away.
“Noah is all I have left, and he knows it.” Jerome said with his voice cracking, not loudly, not dramatically, but just enough to betray him.
“That’s why I’m careful, why I don’t let him grow close to people easily.” He continued.
He exhaled slowly.
“And that’s why…” His gaze lifted to mine again. “I needed you to understand.”
“Understand what?” I whispered.
“That when he looks at you like that,” Jerome said, “it’s because he feels safe. And when he feels safe, I can breathe.”
My eyes burned.
I didn’t realize I was crying until a tear slipped down my cheek.
“He lost his mother,” Jerome said. “And I lost the last person who ever knew me before all this.”
Something in his voice broke completely then, slipping past the iron control he wore like armor.
“I don’t know how to be both for him,” he admitted. “Uncle. Father. Protector.”
My heart ached so fiercely it felt physical.
“I don’t know how to raise him without turning him into me.”
That did it.
I moved without thinking, closing the distance between us and wrapping my arms around him.
He stiffened for half a second, out of pure reflex as he didn't expect that I would initiate any touches, then sagged into the embrace like he’d been holding himself upright by force alone.
His arms came around me slowly, carefully, like he was afraid I might vanish.
For the first time since I’d met him, Jerome Black let himself be held.
His forehead rested against my shoulder. His breathing was uneven, shallow, controlled, but not enough to hide the storm underneath.
I held him tighter.
“I won’t let anything happen to him.” He murmured, almost to himself.
“I know,” I said softly. “I can see that.”
His grip tightened slightly.
“I don’t deserve the way he looks at me,” Jerome said. “Or the way he looks at you.”
I pulled back just enough to look at him.
“You do,” I said firmly. “You just don’t see it.”
He searched my face, something raw and uncertain flickering in his eyes.
“I don’t know how to protect him from the world.” He admitted with a sigh as he looked up to the sky like he was trying to reason with his sister.
I pressed my for
ehead to his, my voice barely more than a breath.
“I don't know how as I have nothing but I'll protect you and him however I can. You're not alone anymore”