Page 40 of Newly Tied

His brows furrowed, but he didn’t let go of me. “She said she would be very upset with me if I hurt you in any way.”

I chuckled. “She’s worried about you breakin’ my heart.”

“Which is ridiculous.”

My scoff was probably a bit too loud.

“What? Why would I—I would never do that.”

“Not on purpose.”

“Not for any reason,” he insisted, sounding defensive. He moved his arm, side-eyeing me as he put some space between us.

“You get bored awfully fast,” I reminded him.

“That’s different. This is different.”

I shrugged.

“It is!”

“Don’t yell,” I cautioned him. “People will think we’re havin’ a fight out here.”

I could hear the frustrated growl under his breath.

“I’m awful glad you told your mom. I could not be the one to ever jeopardize your relationship with her.”

“My mother would never let something like who I love come between us. That could never happen. And I wasn’t worried about that when I told her. I just wanted to hear what she thought.”

I didn’t even comment on the whole who-I-love part because he had been focused on talking about her and nothing else. “What exactly did she say?”

“That before I started anything with you, I should be sure about what I really wanted because you’re my best friend and my partner, so if I messed up, I’d be setting both my personal and professional life on fire.”

I nodded.

“I hate this.”

“Whazzat?”

“Explaining this to you.”

I tried not to smile. “She really is worried about you stickin’ with somethin’, or someone, ain’t she?”

“Apparently so,” he grumbled. “I have no idea how I got this reputation of being some kind of…”

“Manwhore?” I offered.

The slow turn of his head with the accompanying scowl was priceless. “I’m sorry, what?”

“No? Don’t like that one? How ’bout player?”

“I don’t need you to⁠—”

“Cassanova?”

“Nobody says that any⁠—”

“Philanderer?”