Page 290 of Sexting His Assistant

I look up. “Where?”

“Out.”

“That is not an answer.”

“It is the only one you are getting.”

I stare at her.

My mother walks to the front of my desk and adjusts one of the flowers in the vase because apparently even while delivering suspicious information, she has standards.

“I need your men for the day,” she says.

That gets my full attention.

“My men.”

“Yes.”

“How many?”

“All of them assigned inside the house.”

“Where are you going?”

She looks directly at me. “None of your business.”

I blink. It’s not often I’m surprised in my own study. My mother seems to enjoy it.

“None of my business,” I repeat.

“Yes.”

“You live in my house.”

“I gave birth to you. I outrank the house.”

“That is not how security works.”

“That is how mothers work.”

I lean back in my chair and study her face. She looks innocent, which means she is absolutely not innocent.

“What are you doing?” I ask.

“Something useful.”

“Mother.”

“Luka.”

We stare at each other.

She wins, because she always does when she decides to stop behaving like a reasonable person.

“I will leave exterior guards in place,” I say. “Gate, perimeter, cameras. No one enters the property without clearance. You may take the interior detail.”

She smiles. “Good.”