SETH
Iwas going to wear Wren down, one way or another. Now that I’ve had her, I can’t get enough. Even before I met her, I could tell she was the kind of woman with walls. Walls were good to a certain extent, but I wanted her . . . all of her. I couldn’t have that if she kept pushing me out. I had yet to see her since last night.
A knock sounded on my study door, and I glanced over my shoulder to see Benny peeking his head inside.
“Do you want to give me a rundown on the meeting with Nikolai?”
I nodded. “Grab Joey and bring him in here so we can talk about it.”
He left and came back a few minutes later with Joey. They stood in front of my desk, and I called my father, putting it on speakerphone so they could hear.
“Good afternoon, son,” my father greeted.
“How do you like the penthouse?” I asked.
My father chuckled. “Your mother and I love it. Thank you for letting us stay here.”
“Anything for you,” I replied. “Feel free to order whatever you want, whenever you want. The staff there know who you are and will ensure you have everything.”
“Thank you, Seth. Your mother and I needed this time away.”
“Where will she be when the meeting takes place?”
He sighed and I could hear the unease in it. “She’s going shopping. I don’t want her to see what her family’s turned into. Diego’s taking her away around two o’clock.”
I looked at Benny and Joey and nodded. “All right. My guys and I will be there around then.”
“Sounds good,” he said, his voice guarded. “Be safe, son.”
“Always am.”
“I fear what’ll happen to this family if anything happens to you.”
“That’s not going to happen,” I promised him.
We hung up and I stood, turning my back on Benny and Joey so I could peer out the window at the mountainy desert.
“I want you two with me in the meeting tomorrow, along with Drake. I’m going to put Wren in a hotel room and have Stefan guard her.”
“Do you think anything will go down tomorrow?” Benny asked.
I shook my head. “Not with my father there. But as soon as we leave the hotel, all bets are off.”
“What if we went back to New York? Nikolai hasn’t been there in almost a year. He’ll be outnumbered,” Joey insisted. “Most of the families support and respectyou, not him.”
“True,” I agreed, “but Nikolai will see me as a coward if I do that. Here, in Vegas, I’m limited. I need to take him out on my own.”
Benny scoffed. “Your brother’s not honorable. He won’t play fair.”
Smirking, I glanced at him over my shoulder. “And who said I would?”
“Glad to hear it,” he said, backing up toward the door.
He and Joey left and I focused back on the desert landscape outside my window. I don’t know how long I stayed staring at the horizon, but then a sound I hadn’t heard before caught my attention.
I walked out into the hallway and listened for it again. Wren squealed and it echoed from her room, all the way downstairs. I’ve never heard her sound genuinely happy like that. Silently, I made my way upstairs and her bedroom door was open. She was lying on her stomach on the bed, dressed in denim shorts and a pink tank top, with her phone out in front of her. Coming from the phone was the soft sound of a baby crying.
Wren had yet to see me, but I couldn’t stop watching her. Her face was lit up with excitement. She was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.
