Inwardly, I add,because I don’t know what I’d do without you.
Which is so dangerous.
“You are not to worry about me,” he rumbles against my lips. “It’s my job to worry about you.”
I hold his face, drawing in a trembling breath. He can’t help me if he doesn’t have some facts. I turn my face from his, as I sink deeper into his lap. “I have something that I need to tell you.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
Rush
Her words pushevery button I have.
The protector first. Is there a dragon I need to slay? But then the worry I can’t seem to shake that she isn’t who she seems eats at me again.
I’m always and forever trying to prove myself. I don’t want Gigi to be my big mistake.
Her eyes flutter closed, her cheek coming to mine. “As your assistant, I think it’s my job to take care of you.”
One corner of my mouth turns up in mock amusement. While her words are humorous, I have the feeling they aren’t what she’s concerned about at all.
It might be time for me to use some of the trust we’ve built to start digging. “You are not my assistant in this moment. You are my…” I pause and her head lifts.
“What am I?” she asks, her touch like feathers along my skin.
I’m not much for commitments, but I want it to be clear that this is an exclusive relationship. Another man touches her and I will break every one of his fingers. “You are mine.”
The corners of her mouth turn up as she lets out a breath. “We established that yesterday. I remember.”
“Good. I’m glad you do. Because I want you to tell me if I have to worry about Emma’s father appearing?” If I’m being honest, Emma feels like mine too. Maybe it’s the way Killian dotes on the girl, or how even over the last few days, I’ve watched her bloom in the building that I created. She’s happier here in my world with me.
Gigi’s face shudders, going pale. “No.”
“But I thought your ex was a problem.”
She looks away then, pain etched all over her features. “My ex-husband isn’t Emma’s father.”
My head whips back. “What?”
Her fingers curl into my shoulders. “I didn’t want to tell you because I worried you’d change your mind about me. But when my father died, my college boyfriend came to the funeral. We’d broken up because I’d gone to UChicago and he was out in California. But I was so sad and I felt so alone, that when he came…”
Fuck. I already know. Fucker took advantage of her grief and slept with her. Got her pregnant. “Does he know about Emma?”
Gigi shakes her head. “When I went to tell him, he…uh…he had a fiancé. He was engaged.” A tear tracks down her cheek. She swallows. “I went back to Chicago where I’d already dropped out of school and taken a job as a paralegal, but I was so alone and scared and pregnant and that’s when I met my ex.”
The facts wash over me. Gigi is the sort of beautiful that would make a man beg, borrow, and steal.
In fact, I wonder if her old boyfriend would have married her instead if he’d known about the baby.
Not that I’m telling him. But the guy that she married, the one who bruised up her face… “Let me guess. After only a fewdates, you came clean about being pregnant, and he proposed, promising to take care of you and the baby.”
“How did you know?” she asks, looking at me with wide eyes.
I sigh. Beg, borrow or steal. “Lucky guess.”
She shakes her head. “The point is that while Emma’s father won’t turn up, my ex knows that Emma is the most important thing in the world to me and I…”
I pull her against my chest, wrapping my arms around her. Because her lies, what she’s done, she’s done to protect Emma. And she’s learned not to trust men with her truths too soon.
