Page 63 of Grant’s Blaze

“Well, get inside and wait until we get there,” he decreed. His voice gentled at once as he queried, “How many people are there right now, baby?”

There must’ve been a reason Grant wasn’t using Elijah’s name, but I couldn’t quite figure it out. If this whole mess were in relation to Sebastian Shark, I was sure the bad guys who were after him knew every one of his friend’s names too. Exactly like they’d known to go after Grant in order to get to Bas.

But how did Grant’s abduction hurt Bas? Had the bastards even made a single demand to Sebastian during Grant’s captivity? They’d eventually released him, but had they even contacted Sebastian?

More answers I needed from my tree.

But he and I would deal with that later. This moment was about taking care of my team, and he was offering to help. “I think we have about six or eight on the crew now,” I told him. “I didn’t get a good look before Hannah took me outside to talk to me.”

“This involves Hannah?”

“Yes. Deeply.”

“Motherfuck.”

“Grant?”

“Yeah, baby?”

“You really need to tell me what’s happening.”

“I will. I promise. The minute I see you and we can safely talk, okay?”

“Okay.”

“Now go inside the kitchen and wait until we get there.”

I nodded again and then tamped the urge to call myself a clueless fool. “All right,” I croaked. “Please hurry. Someone besides us has a key to the building.”

“My friend just walked into my office.” Grant was using his obey-me-or-else tone now.

How I wished I was listening to it in any other situation. How I longed to be searching for any reason to sass him, just to sit and grin as he detailed how he’d use his body to discipline mine because of it. How I wished…how I wished…

“It won’t take us long to get to you,” Grant growled. “Go inside, please.”

“Okay,” I said again, though now it wasn’t more than a whisper. “I love you, Grant.”

“I love you too, Blaze.”

I pressed the End button and held my phone against my chest for a couple of seconds. What the hell was going on? How had we gotten mixed up in this? Oh! I almost forgot. Sebastian Shark, of course.

Inside the kitchen, Hannah came over to my desk, and we acted like we were going over some menu options. Everyone else was too busy getting components ready for the lunch service to notice what we were doing, so we were able to talk quietly. I explained that Grant and one of his best friends were on their way over and they would take care of things.

“Just like that?” Hannah asked, getting agitated at a more rapid rate than before. “You just trust them to handle everything? Don’t you think we should be calling the police?”

I pulled my hands down in a calming motion. While my friend couldn’t be blamed for her nervousness, she had a low alto voice that gained volume instead of pitch in her excitement. There was no actual whisper module for this girl, but I needed her composure right now more than anything.

“I trust these men implicitly,” I told her right away. “This is definitely not something the police should be involved with. You can speak with Grant and his friend Elijah when they get here, and I think they will be able to help you understand why that is, okay? Please, Hannah, you have to go with me on this. I’m positive we don’t have all the pieces of this puzzle yet.”

She scowled. “Frankly, Rio, I don’t want to be involved in this at all.”

“I don’t either, believe me. But it might be too late for that. Let’s just go about our normal routine and try to get some food out the door.”

But my rah-rah was all for show. I slapped on a confident face only through supreme force of will. Inside, I obsessed about Hannah’s persistence to take this to the police. How would Elijah and Grant handle it if she kept insisting? Were they willing to do things I didn’t even want to think about?

We were busy helping with lunch preparations when Grant and Elijah walked in the door. Hannah was working on peeling apples beside me at the stainless-steel countertop when I heard her mutter, “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.”

I looked up and couldn’t stop the smile that spread across my face. It was so good to see my man standing there, looking so incredibly handsome. Unbelievably, this golden god of a male was interested in me. How had I not scared him off with all my crazy? How had I not driven him away with all my strange habits, intensity, and passion for the odd things? Somehow, he had stuck by me through the worst time in my life. He saw the dark side of my psyche and still loved me in spite of it. And I hoped like hell he was going to let me return the favor. The new strength of his stare was a damn awesome encouragement. I truly had to be the luckiest girl on the planet.