“Oh, Theo, no—” she starts to protest.
I squeeze her arms. “Please. Let me help you. I can’t do much, but Icando this.”
“Okay,” she reluctantly agrees.
“If you don’t get your fucking hands off my woman and step back at least twenty paces, I’m going to knock you on your ass,” James growls behind me.
I chuckle, not stepping back and not dropping my hands. What can I say? I’m a mischief maker.
“Good morning to you too, snookums,” I reply, turning around and draping an arm across Raven’s shoulder as I give him a wide grin.
James pinches the bridge of his nose. “Pretty girl? Could you help me out here? I really don’t want to get arrested for beating my best friend to a pulp.”
Raven giggles, gives me a quick squeeze, then skips over to him. “Your overbearing tendencies still have no bounds, do they, pretty boy?” she teases.
“When it comes you? Absolutely-fucking-not,” he replies, brushing a strand of hair out of her face, then bends down to kiss her.
Finally coming up for air, he turns to me and says, “I can’t wait for the day you find your own woman… payback’s a bitch, and you’re gonna get it tenfold,” he says jokingly, but I can hear the underlying threat in his tone.
“You wouldn’t dare?” I exclaim. Thoughts of Blake being anywhere near him are about to send me into cardiac arrest. The resulting smile I get doesn’t fill me with much hope.
“I think Caleb has a little payback of his own to dish out as well,” he muses, tugging Raven into his side.
Fuck!
“Fine, alright,” I huff, my hands coming up in a placating manner. “I’m sorry. I won’t do it again.”
“What are you doing here so early anyway?” he asks, walking to the coffee pot, Raven still firmly tucked to his side.
I tilt my head in Raven’s direction. “You know she isn’t going to magically disappear if you put her down for two seconds, right?”
“Yeah, I know. I just don’t want to,” he says with a shrug.
Raven glances up at him, a soft smile playing on her face and all the love in the world shining in her eyes. For once, it doesn’t make me nauseous, it doesn’t make me wish I had that, and it doesn’t make me feel sad. It makes me feel good, like I’m finally getting that for myself. I just need to get James on board first.
“I need to run something by you. It’s an… investment of sorts.”
Fuck, I hate asking for things. I hate asking foranyhelp. I’m always the first one to offer my services, but when it comes to me? Absolutely not. But if I want what I want to happen, then James is my only option. Okay, he’s not myonlyoption; he’s just the one I trust not to laugh at my idea.
“I’m in,” he says, leaning back against the counter with Raven’s arms wrapped around his waist and his arm tightly clutching her in return.
“You don’t even know what it is yet,” I say, my eyebrow raised. “I could be asking you to kill someone for me.”
“Done.”
He loves me.
“Okay, my needy ass needed to hear that,” I reply, the warmth in my chest rising to my cheeks and making me blush. “But I have a business proposition for you.”
Kissing the top of Raven’s head, he says, “Let’s go to the office, and you can show me what you have. The answer will be the same regardless.”
Damn it, I willnotcry.
“I’m heading out,” Raven says, looking toward James. “I’ll see you later?”
He hums his agreement. “Is Leo driving you?”
“Yes, Daddy,” she sasses, a smirk pulling at her lips.
