Page 93 of Shark’s Pride

“What the hell time did you get here this morning? You already have half the list knocked out.”

“I don’t know.” She shrugged. “I couldn’t sleep last night. Just too excited. Seems like we’ve been planning for this day as intensely as the devil himself.”

“Rio.” I nearly growled it in solemn warning. “Not today.”

“What?”

I was tempted—strongly—to turn the growl into a chuckle. Rio Katrina Gibson playing the innocent card was as believable as an altruistic politician.

Instead of pursuing the issue further, I just redirected my attention to the remaining tasks at hand, detailed on the clipboard lying on the countertop. It was best just to ignore her antics. When I really examined Rio’s behavior, it was laughably immature. My sister-in-law was older than me by almost six years, yet she acted like a bratty high school troublemaker at times.

Maybe some music would help ease the tension. I flipped on a local radio station. The morning show gaggle of hosts bantered back and forth about television shows that had aired the night before, interspersed with the usual commercials and local news segments. Just another day in the City of Angels.

Thanks to Rio’s frenetic efforts, we had the food prepped and loaded into the van with ten minutes to spare. We quickly tidied up the kitchen before heading across town to set up for the event. Although we didn’t indulge in the luxury often, we’d hired an outside cleaning crew to come in and handle the more thorough cleanup. We’d both be downtown for the rest of the day and definitely too exhausted to deal with the mess here on top of the stacks we’d have after the ceremony.

Rio drove while I busied myself with catching up on returning email messages that had piled up from the morning. “Hey,” she finally prompted.

“Hmmm? Hey,” I returned. “What’s up? Did we forget something?”

“No… No. Everything’s fine,” she said. “You’re just so quiet today. Are you nervous?”

I chuckled through a heavy exhale. She’d returned to her kind, maternal tone for the comment—perhaps knowing how strongly I needed it today.

“Yeah, I think I am. Just a little. All right, maybe more than a little.” It felt good to admit all that out loud. What felt even better was having my girlfriend back in the same space as me. I really hated it when we weren’t on the same page emotionally, especially on a day as important as this one. “I know how important this is to Bas. I want everything to go well.”

“Of course you do.”

Her reply was still reassuring and gentle. Nevertheless, I crossed mental fingers that mentioning Sebastian wouldn’t send her into a weird place again.

“It’s not just the stress of our part in the event, you know? In fact, that seems like the easy part today. We’ve done this a million times.” I waved my hand through the air like I was swatting at a pesky gnat. “I just get stressed when I think of all the other things that could go wrong. I have this crazy desire to shield him from all the bad stuff. I mean, not that I mean baaad stuff. Just…normal bad stuff. The usual insanity of something like this. You know what I mean, right?”

I forced myself to stop and inhale. I just wasn’t sure how calm I looked about it. The financial district was relatively peaceful, meaning the woman had plenty of chances to rivet longer glances my way.

“Abs?”

Her somber utterance wasn’t exactly the reaction I’d expected—or hoped for. Especially when she finished it off by ping-ponging an incisive look between Figueroa Street and me.

“Hmmm?” I said, having refocused on my phone again. Or pretending to.

“You’re in love with that man.” Her words were from the heart, soft and sincere.

“I know, sister. I know.”

“I’d ask if he really makes you happy, but I think the people in Palm Desert can see your smile right now.”

And with that, I beamed my smile even more.

“Do you understand that my reservations about him are directly related to my protectiveness and love for you?”

“Of course I know,” I murmured, equally as earnest about my assurance.

“Showing emotion appropriately is something I’ve been working on ever since I met that amazing brother of yours.” She eased the atmosphere a little more with her tender smile and wistful head shake. “Why he puts up with me, I will never know.”

“Because he loves you, Rio,” I stated. “You are an amazing woman, deserving of that kind of love. We both are. I will always be right here to remind you of that—even when you act like a total brat.”

“Moi?”

She touched her chest, pretending to be hurt. I reached over and gave her shoulder a playful shove. While doling back a sisterly snort, she signaled to turn into the loading dock for the building next door to where the Edge would be built. We’d rented out and taken over the ground floor of the building as our prep and service staging area for the day. We’d brought in rented ovens, warmers, and refrigeration units a couple of days ago. The servers would have to trek out of that building and down a makeshift walkway to the construction site next door, where the groundbreaking ceremony and celebration were being held. The full staff “dress rehearsal” had included everyone taking practice laps on the walkway, and everyone was going to be wearing custom Shark Enterprises running shoes, so I was feeling good about our chances of getting through this without any major spills or falls.