Then Olive walked around me like no one had any respect for my concern. My daughter shouldn’t be exposed to any of this. It’d bled into her life too much already, figuratively and literally. Olive pulled Jacques in for a hug to tell him, “You’re making this worse for Jameson. We already had planned to surprise Ms. Darling. Now she got two surprises.”
“But who doesn’t like surprises?” Jacques scanned Mia head to toe, and his smirk hid nothing. I didn’t like the hunger in his eyes. I didn’t need complications with someone who was employed in my home.
“She doesn’t.” I shoved him toward the back door. “Go home, and don’t come back here.”
“I’m waiting for a ride. My bike got laid out and I’m injured, remember? Unless you want to lend me that Ducati?”
“Fuck off. You’re fine. Wait outside, and don’t come here for stitches again. If you and Xavier want to spar like children, my doors aren’t open to you.”
That’s when Hades walked in, nostrils flaring like he’d sprinted down here.
After five minutes of Franny and Mia being unattended, his hustle didn’t matter.
“You take a wrong turn?” I lifted a brow at him.
“Rosy and I were discussing the week. Ms. Darling and Franny were supposed to stay put,” he pointedly said at Mia, but then his gaze fell to Pink and Olive. “Figures you two were behind this.”
“Oh no, Hades. I wanted Daddy. I knew he would be down here. I was using my spy eyes and binoculars this morning. I saw Jacques, and you lied about it.” Franny pouted as she leaned into Jacques. “Jacques, when you come to get fixed up, I want to visit.”
“Of course you do, Fran Bran, but you were learning, right? School blows, but you gotta do it.”
“Actually, school doesn’t blow,” Mia piped up, crossing her arms. “And although I’m not sure this is the routine learning space”—she cleared her throat and looked between my daughter and me—“Franny obviously enjoys new,outsideexperiences.”
I tried not to growl in annoyance at Mia. Her pushing me continually still wasn’t warranted. That email was out of line. Her insisting on being at the club was out of line. And her being down here was too. She’d caused another bloody crime scene with her actions, because I’d been done with checking over my damn shoulder at the club after yesterday. She’d be happy to know we’d neutralized the threat late last night. My men dragged O’Connor to one of our warehouses, and I had personally pulled information from him piece by piece before taking his life. We were all wound tight because of it, but I’d acted quickly after seeing my daughter at the country club. Seeing her smile outside, under the sunshine, made the decision quite easy.
Maybe seeing Mia in a different element had made it easier to act quickly too. She’d met me swing for swing on the tennis courts and opened up to me in a way I didn’t expect. I wanted that more from her.
For Franny.
“I do like outside experiences.” Franny nodded vigorously. “I even want to ride Daddy’s motorcycle bike, too, but he won’t let me. Probably because Jacques keeps falling off.”
“A motorcycle?” Mia’s wide eyes ping-ponged everywhere.
I pinched the bridge of my nose. I didn’t need this girlknowing any more about me or my family than she already did. I turned to Hades. “Are you capable of escorting her back to the study?”
“I don’t know. Maybe you should, since you want me to continue to be the prick,” Hades threw back at me. He was running on about an hour of sleep, but I didn’t give a fuck.
“Don’t make me fire you today.”
“We can’t fire Uncle Hades, Daddy. He’s family.”
“Yeah. I’m family.” He chuckled and patted her head like the happiest man in the world. Franny had him wrapped around her finger. “Anyway, I’m guessing Franny actually needs a snack since she barely ate any of the food on the table after calling me a liar.”
Franny huffed. “You said nothing was going on today, but youknewJacques was here. I know it.” She wiggled away from Jacques to stomp her little foot.
“I’ll make it up to you, kid. We can go beg Rosy for more food, huh?” Hades said, his voice full of remorse as they started walking toward the door.
“Oh, I want a snack, too, I think,” Olive announced while Pink considered her options.
“Really? I wouldn’t mind seeing this play out.” She smiled between Mia and me like she knew we were about to bite each other’s heads off.
Mia needed to know her place around here, and the conversation would have to be direct. She couldn’t wander around unattended or follow Franny wherever she wanted to go. She needed to be the disciplinarian along with being the nanny.
“Just get out of my operating room, Pink.”
“Fine. Fine.” Didn’t they know they should fear me just a little?
When Hades hesitated, I told him, “I’ll show Mia back to the study after we have a discussion.”
