So they’ve seen the report on Emma that our family’s private investigator put together for me while I was plotting how to escape from my security detail.
Or else Hayes ordered his own report from his own people.
Movement at the side of the house catches my eye, and there they are.
Hissecurity team.
Which means mine’s probably also nearby to rotate in and out.
I need a little more protection than Hayes and Begonia do. Now that he’s no longer single and prominently involved at the top of Razzle Dazzle’s management chain, he gets to live a pretty quiet life.
As he prefers it.
“Aren’t you supposed to be at summer camp?” I mutter to Begonia while she tugs harder. The two of them together manage Razzle Dazzle’s summer camp division.
And they love it. Begonia because she loves everything, Hayes because nobody’s beating down his door to demand updates on how the camp is impacting the bottom line for Razzle Dazzle and its stock price.
“Your mother threatened to come live with us if I didn’t take early maternity leave,” my sister-in-law reports.
“I would’ve had to actually murder her if she’d murdered Begonia, and I’d rather be around to watch my kids grow up,” my brother adds.
I suck in a breath.
I have missedso muchof my son’s life already.
I know how it happened. I know why it happened. But if I’d been here sooner—
“Too soon, honey,” Begonia says brightly. “C’mon, Jonas. You need to look and smell human again before you can charm the pants off of your lady friend.”
Emma’s watching us.
Not only can I feel it, I catch movement in one of the upper windows.
“I want to meet my son,” I whisper.
“You will,” Begonia insists. “But shower and food and not getting arrested first.”
She’s incredibly optimistic on that first point. She’s also completely correct on the other three.
I follow them around the house to an SUV parked next to the garage and duck in quickly, hoping the neighbors haven’t seen. Between the twisty roads and the boulders and the pine trees, there’s a good amount of privacy in Emma’s neighborhood.
But I still want to make sure she gets security cameras installed.
“You seriously slept with her and didn’t say goodbye?” Hayes mutters to me as Begonia chats with their lead security agent about a craving while the other agent steers us around the sharply curving mountain roads.
I wince. “Wasn’t the plan.”
“Whatwasthe plan?”
“For Mom’s minions to not show up and drag me away in the middle of the night.”
He snorts.
Begonia glances back at us.
Hayes reaches across the space to pat her knee. “Just pineapple, or did you want kiwi and guava too?”
Her nose wrinkles. “Actually, I think I want fresh tortillas. Like the ones Françoise perfected when I was craving burritos.But only tortillas. No beans. Or lettuce. Although, I think I could eat pineapple on the tortillas. If it’s cut the way Françoise cuts it.”
