TJ was having none of it. “Then go join Auntie in the galley, Uncle. You’re the one who said we needed a man talk. Coop and I can handle this. We’ve both known Kenz for as long as we can remember, and we understand the complexities of her situation.”
A brow rose over Taggart’s icy blue eyes. “Really, so you know what the actual problem is?”
“He doesn’t understand his role as her Dom,” Cooper replied with pure confidence.
He understood it on an intellectual level.
“He’s trying to figure out when the Dom takes over and when the operative respects his partner’s choices,” TJ added.
And they said TJ was mere muscle. Ben pointed his way. “That. That part. You see, how am I supposed to manage her behavior around danger when going into danger is her literal job? I can’t tell her not to do her job.”
“Oh, I assure you that you can, and you should if she does something that could get her killed. I’ve stopped my wife from doing things she considered her job, though I don’t think you’re there yet because you haven’t even played. She’s been crazy about you for a longtime and you’re both into forbidden fruit, but you haven’t spent a damn lick of time actually getting to know each other.” Taggart sat back and looked a lot like a king on his throne.
“We know each other.” But did they?
“Oh, I’m sure you know each other in a biblical sense. I wish I wasn’t. But how many dogs did she have when she was a kid? Did she like school? How close is she with her brothers? What’s her nephew’s name?” Taggart peppered him with questions.
Questions he couldn’t answer. Even though he knew he’d heard the nephew’s name. It started with a C, or was it a K like her and her twin? He was the son of one of her brothers, but he couldn’t remember which one. He was the one who should have worn a condom. He could feel his face heating, but he needed to save this. “We’ve talked. We would have talked a lot longer that night at Top if you hadn’t sent Dare in to distract me.”
He watched Taggart to see if he would admit it.
The man simply shrugged. “She wasn’t ready to tell you, and we had to save her sister.”
“I would have helped,” he insisted. Would he feel differently if she’d reached out for his hand that night and told him her secrets? Would he feel more certain of her? Would he look at these people without suspicion?
“She wasn’t ready.” Taggart’s voice had gone soft. “Not then.”
“What changed?” He was a little worried he knew the truth, and he wasn’t sure how he felt about it. “Was it because Kala was injured and can’t go into the field?”
“You have to understand how careful they’ve been,” Cooper began. “How hard they’ve worked to get to this point.”
TJ sighed, his muscular arms crossing over his equally muscular chest. “What you have to understand is that they’ve pretended to be the same person for so long, I’m not sure Kenz knows who she is. I mean she knows but she doesn’t.”
“You are both a little brainless and extremely aware, TJ.” There was an odd approval in Taggart’s eyes. “He’s right. Look, Kenzie and Kala have always been these odd shadows of the other. They were completely different and also capable of shutting down and becoming one person. I know everyone views Kala as the more difficult of the two, the darker one.”
Cooper’s head shook. “Kala has always known who she is. Kenzie… I’m worried about her being out there without her sister. Kenzie is the bubbly one, the one everyone talks to.”
“Talks at,” TJ corrected. “Everyone unloads all their problems on Kenzie and almost no one knows what’s happening in her life. She’s that woman. The one who seems to be the center of everything but is actually lonely even when they’re surrounded because no one asks the sun how it’s doing. They simply expect her to shine. She doesn’t have a Lou.”
“She’s never had a Lou,” Taggart said quietly. “Kenzie has always had friends around her, but she’s never once had the kind of connection Kala found with Louisa Ward, and don’t think I don’t praise the day Boomer brought that kid into our lives. I would trade all the friends Kenz had before for her to find one half as loyal and lovely as Lou. She’s had her sisters, but she has to share them. I’ve always known Kenzie’s best friend will be the man she falls in love with, but I worry she’s struggling right now and won’t be able to make proper choices and won’t have that one friend who could change her mind.”
He’d had a friend and it wrecked his whole fucking life.
Ben took a long breath. He wasn’t going to let Manny in today. Not now. He wanted to understand the gorgeous woman he couldn’t stop thinking about. “How is she struggling because she seemed competent earlier today. Hence me thinking I’m kind of an asshole for considering spanking her. She did take Gabby down, and she did it without harming her.”
“And you can praise her while you spank her,” Cooper explained. “Look, I would never tell anyone to discipline a woman or man who didn’t enjoy and choose to be disciplined, but after an op, you need a debrief and not merely about the intel collected. If you’re involved, you both need to come down from the adrenaline and talk about how it made you feel.”
Scared. Proud. More than a little hot. Outraged at the chances she took.
He admired her. “It’s hard for me to follow my instincts.”
“Because they were so very wrong once,” Taggart said slowly. “Because you didn’t see the threat until it was far too late. Benjamin, don’t let that man ruin your life. It’s admirable that you want to hunt him down and bring him to justice. But it won’t matter if you lose yoursoul while you do it. Don’t sacrifice something that could be the best thing that ever happened to you. However, you need to actually get to know her. Spend time with her that doesn’t involve national security.”
“You need to watch dumb movies and go to restaurants and share food and sleep in all cuddled up,” TJ said. “You need to know her.”
“I’m worried if you don’t know her, no one really will.” Cooper took a long drag off the beer he held. “Ask about her scars. Ask how she got them. You’ll be surprised, and it will tell you a lot about what she’s willing to do when she believes in something. How far she’ll go for her team.”
Her scars? She had several. They didn’t bother him at all. They were proof that she was smart and she’d survived. She was beautiful, and no marks on her body could make her less.
