"Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around."

-Leo Buscaglia.

Reese's POV.

"I'm going to be just fine, I promise and now that you've given me this phone, I'll call you every hour if possible," Irene says pulling her long brown hair into a ponytail. It's been about two weeks now and there's been no trace of Alex trying to track us down except for the first letter that we got three days after the restraining order was officially accepted by him too. The only thing it said was,

You can't run away from me forever. Good luck with trying to start afresh.

-Alex.

And Alex isn't a person who gives up easily so there's a huge possibility that he's just gotten busy with work but is still plotting something against Irene. The bottom line, it's still not safe for her to go out and start finding a job.

"I'm coming with you and you stick with me during the photo shoot today," I finally state with no intention of changing anything in what I said. "But Reese..."

She turns to face me and I silence her with my finger as I wrap an arm around her waist, pulling her closer, "Don't make me lock you up at home," rolling her eyes, she sighs in defeat.

I take a look at her outfit, a dark blue dress just hugging her at all the right places with no makeup and her hair pulled into a ponytail, "You look so beautiful," nuzzling my face into her neck, a smile spreads across my lips.

She didn't need extras to look pretty and this beautiful girl was entirely mine. Pulling my face to hers, she kisses me making me almost trying to reassure me that it's going to alright. Kissing her back, I restrain myself before I ruin her dress.

Pulling back, I place a kiss on her forehead, "You could just work with me,"

"You know that I'm still going to work with you even if I bag this job, it's a freelance job so I'll still have a lot of time on hand," her hands smooth out my white shirt of all the creases while I just stand there with my arms around her waist.

"You're right, it's just that Alex is still out there and I can't afford to let you walk right into his trap,"

"I know and that's the reason I'm just taking up the work from home sort of a job," she says and I nod. She's just been accompanying me to all the photoshoots as an assistant. To be honest, we work well and I mean stay sort of professional most of the time apart from when I choose to steal kisses from her. But I also get how important it is for her to do something apart from being my assistant, she needs to feel independent again.

"Let's go, we're going to get delayed," she says looking at the clock, oh damn 9:30 am already. Just an hour left, "Let's go and please just grab those ham sandwiches you made, I'm hungry,"

"Aye Aye captain," she says giggling as she makes her way to the kitchen after she puts on her heels. She still didn't look the way she did when Alex forced her around to be a model.

She leans a little to get my attention and blows a kiss which I pretend to catch before capturing it in my heart. A smile makes its way to my face before I move around to grab both our bags and my camera equipment, "Got the sandwiches and we've got to grab some coffee on the way,"

Irene talks her way out as she holds the door open for me to walk out before grabbing two bags out of my hand since I was already carrying five because of all my equipment. She makes sure the door is locked properly before following me down the stairs, "Hey Ms. Norman," Irene greets our neighbor.

She makes everything feel so normal, Ms. Norman always dropped by to give a casserole twice in a week, and then she met Irene whom she immediately connected with. Funny how I always found it awkward to speak to her but Irene who's anxiety usually hits the roof with new people most of the time just managed to have a pretty good conversation with her. Might I mention, I had to give up on my share of nachos and cheese because Ms. Norman had it while having this conversation with Irene.

Placing my equipment carefully in the cargo bed, I get to the driver's seat as Irene settles down in the passenger's seat, "I need coffee," Irene tells me with a small pout which I react to with a quick kiss before starting the car.

A smile settles down on her lips as she grabs the bottle of water to sip on, "Mom invited us over tomorrow to spend the whole day with them,"

We've had a pretty awkward dinner with my parents last week which surprisingly resulted in my mom admiring Irene. Well, its Irene we're talking about, of course, my mom would love her and dad, well he's always skeptical with my life choices but that's just him.

"You sure your parents don't hate me?" I let out a small laugh at her question.

"No silly, mom loves you and dad's uptight and all but I'm sure he approves of you," As I said, a lot has happened in these two weeks that didn't involve Alex.

"Let's just hope that you're right," she says as I turn into the drive-in order station. Once Irene calls for our coffee she settles back into the seat before her hand makes its way to mine as our fingers entwine, "I love you,"

"Love you too," I replied kissing her hand. This was perfect, better than what we imagined our lives together would feel like at this point. Did things progress too fast? Yes but I don't think anyone can ever predict the pace at which life moves.

"Here you go," Irene hands me my latte while the car behind us starts honking. Sighing, I let her hold the cup and start driving, "Did you speak to Mia?"

"Yeah, she's going on a trip with Lucas on a trip to Bali next week so we'll probably be meeting only after a month again," we managed to get in touch with Mia once the restraining order was all set. The day Irene met Mia, I could see her mood just elevate and that was proof enough that she missed this happiness with Alex.

"Okay and what about our date tonight?" I ask her with a smile dancing on my lips. She gives me a surprised look before her lips break into a cheeky smile, "We're going on a date?"

Her excitement is like a kid's who finally got the opportunity to go to Disney World, "Yes love and mind you, it's nothing fancy,"

She rolls her eyes at the word fancy, of course, she hates fancy stuff, "As long as its just you and me without having to think about anything else, I'd be happy even at home,"

"But that's not exactly a date if we stay home, is it?" she looks at me giving a thoughtful expression before speaking again, "We could go to the beach!"

"Oh that sounds nice but I already have our date already planned out so stop getting yourself all worked up," she gives me a quick kiss on my cheek with a bright smile as we enter the gates to the building where Irene's interview is, I show Irene's phone which has the code to be permitted into the building. I drive right into the parking lot and look for an empty slot for my huge car before parking it. Shutting the engine down, I turn to face Irene who's shaking with anxiety.

"Hey, you've got this," I tell her grabbing her by her shoulders forcing her to look at me. I pull her into a gentle kiss while caressing her cheek in attempts to calm her down, her lips form into a small smile as she kissed me back.

"I'll be right here whenever you need me. Now go, get that job," smiling at my encouragement, she leans over just enough to give me a hug which was barely a hug because of this cup holder in between us. "Thank you,"

"Don't thank me, love, you deserve to do things you always wanted to," I tell her reassuringly as I grab her bag before we both got off. Luckily we managed to get her a laptop last week which makes her work more efficient.

Hugging me tightly, "I might need some ice cream if I don't get through the interview," a small laugh escapes me before I kiss her forehead.

"Of course," she gives me one last peck on my lips before walking away to the elevator. Damn, I hope she gets this job, she needs it to get her confidence back.

Meanwhile, apart from constantly checking my phone for Irene's messages, I'll plan out the date. Oh yeah, I didn't plan anything, I just wanted to surprise her with something. Let's hope I manage to plan out a perfect date.

~•~•~•

Putting back the last part of my equipment in the cargo bed, I close it before turning to Irene who's resting against the car, "Tired?"

"A little but did I ever tell you, I hate wearing these fancy heels?" I laugh grabbing her by her waist pulling her close. The sunset is perfect and all I want to do is kiss her, she got the job and then the welcome back photoshoot for the army guy turned out to be perfect. His wife decided to have a surprise party and I think it was really sweet.

Its 6 pm and just enough time to still give my girl her simple yet satisfying date. Grabbing the collar of my shirt, she pulls me into a kiss making me pull her closer against my chest. We kiss through the smiles dancing on each of our faces, it was a great day so far. It's the day, Irene realized she can be independent, and to make it even more special, I've got the perfect date planned.

~•~•~•

Hey guys! I hope you're enjoying the book so far! I recently wrote a short story called "Finding Memories" for the new #loveintragedy Wattpad romance contest and its only 3000 words. If you can, please do give it a read and let me know what you think. 

Have a great day/night!

Love ya'll,

Ana...