I listened carefully and frowned at her particular instructions, picking up the water and standing there with a towel wrapped around my waist.
“Water at the base into the soil for Ms. Prim. She’s the pink flowered one. Just so the soil gets a bit damp, please.” I did as I was told.
“Great. Now, Mr. Bos is the little tree, and you need to pick him up and just put water in the tray. After ten minutes, we’ll dump the rest so we don’t overwhelm his roots.”
I did exactly as I was told, making note of how to handle it in the future. “How often do you do this?”
“Once a day for Ms. Prim and twice a week for Mr. Bos.” She chuckled softly. “I don’t know whether I should be scared or turned on with you listening and doing this right now.”
“Both, probably,” I told her.
“Yeah, I guess I should be scared of a lot that goes on around here.” She glanced out the window and started rambling. “I know the risks. I always just feel like someone’s watching. Which they probably are. You are who you are. So, I get it. But tonight, I felt … We could have died. And then Franny would have …” She hiccupped, and tears filled her eyes again. “She’s okay, right?”
Her concern wasn’t for her life, but for my daughter’s.My heart broke open with that knowledge, and I knew then I wasn’t going to leave her alone in this room, no matter how emotionally tied to her I became. I set the pitcher down and commanded, “Move over, Darling.”
“What for?”
“I’m lying beside you tonight. Just to hold you. Just to sleep.”
“I don’t know if that’s a good—”
“You’re right.” I left the room and went to get some sweatpants. When I returned, she sat up in surprise.
“What are you doing?”
“Sleeping next to you.”
“We just agreed that wasn’t a good idea!”
“No, I agreed it wouldn’t be good for me to sleep next to you … without clothes on.”
“Speak for yourself.” She crossed her arms. “I’m not going to do anything.”
“Yeah, but I will, baby. No chance in hell I get in bed with you while I’m naked and fall asleep tonight. Now move over. It’s either that, or I sit and watch you all night to make sure you’re okay. Pick your poison.”
“After I just said I feel watched?” she huffed. “Sleepover, it is. But don’t think for a second you’re getting lucky tonight.”
I hummed and yanked her across the mattress so that her ass was right up against me. She gasped at the feeling of my body up against hers, but I didn’t do much else other than whisper in her ear, “I’m already lucky, darling Mia, to have you by my side all night.”
Jameson
IWOKE UP EARLYenough to watch the sunlight kiss the face of a woman I didn’t know how to protect, though I wanted to with every fiber of my being. I had to shield her from my life, from danger, from me.
I should have been planning to let her go.
And yet, I knew as I stared at her dark curls against the white cotton sheets, the soft rise and fall of her pajamas, and the peace across her flawless face that I wasn’t going to. I was keeping Mia Darling.
I went to greet Cal in the study and told him, “That was a direct attack on all of us last night. All the women we care about.”
“I know,” he said solemnly.
“They’re done.”
“They’re working with someone else, Jameson. Most likely the cartels.”
“I don’t give a fuck.”
“Paolo backs a lot of companies.” Cal had moved the pieces into place, and he knew exactly where I was going with it.
