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  “Three months.” I can feel the blood drain from my face. “And they have a plan. Surely they do.”

  “The FBI knows what’s going on,” Blake assures me. “They aren’t deaf, dumb, or stupid.”

  “And Blake is one of the best hackers alive,” Kara quickly adds. “He and Eric together will find out what’s planned and head off any attacks.”

  “Who does something like this?” Guilt stabs at me, a blade that twists and grinds. “I did this.” I turn to Grayson. “I fell for everything he threw at us and I left you exposed.”

  “He would have found a way to come at me no matter what, baby. You know he would have.”

  “He’s right,” Blake says. “I found proof that he hired the Dungeon before he ever set Grayson up and got rid of you. That’s how long this has been going on.”

  “Got rid of me,” I whisper and my gaze is now locked on some fruit arrangement on the table. I don’t really know why hotels are obsessed with fruit. I don’t know why I’m thinking of fruit. I guess it’s easier than where my head is going otherwise. But I go there anyway, and I don’t mean to say it out loud, but I do. “He might have been better off if I’d stayed away.” It’s out before I can stop the words, and I don’t even have to wait to know Grayson will not like this answer. I turn to him. I turn to him, and he’s already turned to me and the air is charged, the nerve I’ve hit between us raw and real.

  We’re oblivious to our audience. It’s just me and him. It’s us. And I’ve weighed us down with the very baggage we’re trying to leave behind.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Mia

  Grayson catches my arms. “Don’t do that,” he orders, his voice gruff in a way Grayson is rarely gruff. “He wins if he tears us apart again. Listen to Blake. He had a plan even before they came at you and me together.”

  “Maybe breaking us up would have been enough. Maybe it would have been enough. Now, your family business, your father’s heart and soul, your heart and soul, is at risk.”

  “Everyone who needs to know, knows,” Blake says. “And the bad players, as you called them, don’t know we know.” Grayson sucks in a breath, his broad chest expanding and when he releases me, his hands don’t return to me. I want them on my body, but they’re now on his legs, his fingers pressing into hard muscle.

  “Grayson is not going down,” Blake continues. “The bad players are. And the most important thing you can do is act like this is behind you. We need them to think that we’re oblivious. This is why we wanted to meet tonight. You and Grayson together tells the world good things will follow. Show off that rock I’m seeing on your finger. Enjoy your life. We got you. We got this.”

  “We do,” Kara says. “We have this and you.”

  I nod, but I’m aware of Grayson not touching me and not looking at me in such a deep, gut-wrenching way, that that’s all I have to offer. I listen as Blake covers the plan. Open security until the press dies down. Then Walker will go covert operation on us. They’ll watch us. We’ll communicate our steps with them, but no one will know that we’re still protected.

  “We’ll leave you two to your night,” Blake says, and he and Kara stand. Adrian does as well and Smith steps into our circle as Grayson and I push to our feet.

  “We’re in the next room over,” Smith says. “We being me and Adrian, but we’ll likely rotate in some other men. Don’t go anywhere without us right now.”

  Grayson gives him a nod and Kara catches my attention. “Lunch this week?”

  I like her. We connected easily when we first met. And I trust her. “I’d like that.”

  “It’s a date then,” she says. “I’ll call you tomorrow. Oh, and we brought you a couple of suitcases full of things. Sorry. I know that’s kind of an invasion of privacy.”

  “Thank you for doing that,” I say quickly, but she’s right. It is. It’s weird but still appreciated.

  “The bags are by the door,” Blake offers.

  A few more words are exchanged between everyone and Grayson walks them all to the door. And he does so in that controlled way I know well. His spine is extra straight. His stride extra measured. He’s owning the moment. He’s forcing his control. He’s angry. He’s really angry.

  I sit down. I grab the cushion from beside me and hug it to me. I toss the pillow away. I cannot sit here a minute longer.

  Rounding the table and couch, I walk to a large half window behind the living area and stand there. I know the minute Grayson returns, and not because of his soundless footsteps. I feel him. My skin tingles. My belly flutters. Don’t ask me why, when he’s angry and I’m upset, but my sex clenches. And then he’s there, his hands on my body a blessed relief, turning me around to face him. “We are either forever or not at all. Decide now.”

  “Don’t do that, Grayson.”

  “Do what? Ask you to marry me? Ask you to spend the rest of your life with me? Because that is all I’m guilty of right now.”

  “I don’t want to hurt you. I don’t want to be the reason you, you who are such an amazing person, suffers.”

  “I suffered without you. I suffered just hearing you say I might be better off without you. I can’t do ‘maybe’ with you. If that’s where we’re headed, you need to tell me right now. If you weren’t ready, if I pushed—”

  “You didn’t. God, no. You didn’t.”

  “And yet, those words came out of your mouth. Those words I never want to hear again.”

  Somehow in that moment, he’s the refuge I seek and everything I’m running from. He wants to protect me. I want to protect him. I can’t be his destruction, but as I stare into his green eyes, the shadows there drenched in torment, I know that I am his refuge, too. His soul fills my soul as mine does his.

  A tornado of emotion rips through me, the debris of a year of heartache and hell leaving me bleeding inside in ways that I won’t survive without this man. I throw my arms around him. “I’m sorry. I’m scared. I need you and love you.” I pull back to look at him. “I’m sorry.”

  “Do you want to marry me?”

  His voice is low but somehow intense, his eyes shadowed, and I feel a pinch in my chest. “I can’t believe you’re asking me that. More than life itself.”

  “Then that means there is no obstacle we don’t go through together. Understand?”

  It’s not a question but a demand. “I want to be the best thing that ever happened to you, not the worst.”

  “You are. Ri was the problem. He still is. You didn’t do this.”

  “I let him—”

  “We let him. We’ve talked about all the ways we let that happen. It’s behind us. If that can’t happen—”

  “It can. You’re right. I’m not myself right now. Something happened at the airport.”

  His hands frame my face. “Because there can’t be an earthquake without aftershocks. You were attacked, baby. You’re human. You’re going to feel the shock and the aftermath.”

  He’s right. I know he’s right. But it’s not just me feeling the aftermath. It’s him, too, and his company, and I’m terrified about just how bad those aftershocks might be when they hit. I don’t say that, though. That’s not what he needs to hear right now.

  “And my cure is you. And Chinese food. I think we both need Chinese food.”

  He rewards me with a curve of his sexy lips and with it, the air shifts, our moods soften. For now, we will enjoy each other. Tomorrow, we’ll fight for each other.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Mia

  Grayson and I order food and then organize the bags Blake and Kara brought us. For me, I decide as I hang a few garments up, the discomfort of having only what someone else packed us is not rooted in a lack of privacy. It’s about the reasons we’re here. It’s about Ri. A memory of that stairwell, of Grayson standing in front of me and Ri behind me, punches at my mind, and I forcefully shove it aside. When I turn away from the closet and find Grayson setting up his side of the sink, that horrid moment is washed from my mind, at least for no
w.

  Fifteen minutes later, we’ve laughed at the one razor I’m going to steal from him, and changed into our sleep clothes that are really our “before we get naked clothes.” For me, that’s boxers and a tank. For him, it’s sweats and a T-shirt. Grayson flips on the television in the bedroom to his favorite true crime channel. We have always watched the cases and each played prosecutor or defender as we litigated it as if it were our own. Tonight, the talk is of someone being shot, it’s nerve-wracking.

  There’s a knock at the door and Grayson heads in that direction to grab our food. I snap up the remote and change the channel to the one spot I know will be safe: Hallmark. Grayson returns and we settle onto the comfy hotel bed to prepare to chow down, as my father would say. It’s not home, but it’s cozy, and we’re together, playing house until we’re actually in our house, which is actually an apartment. Once my plate of lo mein is open and tempting my watering mouth, I sigh. “I missed this place.”

  He opens the egg rolls and offers me one. “When was the last time you had it?”

  I happily claim a crispy eggroll. “Last year. With you.” I wet my lips, suddenly dreading and somehow craving his reply to the same question. “You?”

  “The same.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah,” he confirms.

  I am pleased with this news and warmed in ways that I shouldn’t be warmed. He shouldn’t have had to give up things he loved because I stupidly left. But he did. And I did. “I didn’t do any of our things when we were apart. Those things made me need you too badly to survive.”

  “Well, I wish you would have done them then.”

  I tilt my head and study him. “You do?”

  “Yes. Then maybe you would have hurt too badly to stay away.” He takes a bite of the eggroll and gives an approving nod before indicating the TV. “Is this the one where he proposes on a horse or at an ice rink?” His eyes twinkle with mischief, absolutely no judgment in him for my channel change.

  “At the lighthouse,” I amend. “It’s the one with the perfect proposal.”

  The air sizzles, and he says, “Is that right?”

  “Yes. The girl finally got smart and came home.” I eye the hotel. “To her man. And she doesn’t even care that they’re now living at the Ritz.” Unbidden, there’s a pinch in my chest, some tiny part of me fearing that I’ll never really get back to our real home. That stupid, self-defeating part of me that I barely know as me and that keeps returning to that stairwell.

  Grayson must read between my lightly spoken words, because he leans over, nuzzles my neck and whispers, “You want me to tell you how the story ends?”

  I ease back to stare into those simmering green eyes. “How?”

  “The heroine eats Chinese food, gets naked with her future husband, and then later marries her fiancé at the lighthouse. In the original dress she ordered for the first wedding, or any dress she wishes.”

  “Because he saved her dress. He held onto it because he held onto me.” Heart swelling, I reach over and touch his jaw, as I add, “And she lives happily ever after, with the most incredible man any woman could ever love.”

  He kisses my fingers. “After they eat Chinese food, right?”

  “Yes.” I laugh. “After they eat Chinese food.”

  And so, we do. We eat. And laugh. And watch the movie, both of us betting on when the peck of a kiss Hallmark will allow, actually happens. When finally we climb into bed, it’s naked. When finally we sleep, it’s with his big, wonderful body wrapped around mine. And I don’t let myself lay there and think about the day ahead or the reasons we’re in the hotel room. I shut my eyes and think about the lighthouse, my dress, and the moment I get to say “I do.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Mia

  Morning comes with a knock of reality. Grayson and I are back together, but we can’t just go home. I’ve never needed home quite so badly. Grayson feels it, too. I see it in the sharp lines of his handsome face, and the silent intense way he presses me into the corner of the shower and takes me hard and fast. I know this man. He’s on edge, and that worries me. Just how deep in trouble are we?

  Fortunately, Kara has managed to pack my favorite pale pink silk blouse, and my lucky black skirt and jacket. Lucky because I won my first case in this very outfit. I dress with one goal in mind: standing by my man and finding our path to a better place—no, our path home. Together. I walk into the living area of the suite to find coffee and pastries on the coffee table, and my man dressed to kill in a gray pin-striped suit with a light blue tie. He’s also standing with Adrian and Blake and I’m pretty sure no one has heard the tomato joke because they aren’t smiling.

  “Morning, Mia,” Blake says, while Adrian offers me a nod.

  I murmur a reply but it’s Grayson I’m focused on. “What’s wrong?” I ask, stepping in front of him.

  Blake and Adrian head for the door, and my stomach knots. “Grayson, what’s wrong?”

  He catches my waist and pulls me to him. “You know how much I love you, right?”

  I swallow hard, my voice rasping from my throat. “What’s wrong?”

  “There was a hit piece done on me this morning.”

  Grayson isn’t rattled by hit pieces, which is why I ask, “And?”

  “The reporter, who was clearly set-up by Ri’s hacker hires, has photos of me with any woman I had contact with when we were split up.”

  “Women that you slept with?” The question rasps like blades from my throat, painful and sharp.

  “No. Actually, I didn’t sleep with any of the women they put in the article. Two were clients. One I went on one date with and couldn’t stop thinking about you. There wasn’t a second. I now have to call the clients to apologize. Mia—”

  My hand comes down on his chest. “Stop. I don’t want to hear about it anymore or see it, for that matter.”

  “Even TMZ picked it up, baby.”

  I inhale and let out a breath. “Okay.”

  “Okay?”

  “It’s done, Grayson. You didn’t cheat on me. And even if these women were bedmates—”

  “They weren’t.”

  “I believe you, but even if they had been your bedmates, I left you. You didn’t think you’d ever be right here with me again and neither did I. Let’s just go get this next week or two behind us.”

  “Which is why I have a proposal for you.”

  “You already gave me the greatest proposal of all.” I hold up my ring. “Twice, and honestly, Grayson, after I let Ri beat us, sometimes I don’t think I deserve to be back here with you now.”

  “Don’t do that,” he says, pulling me hard to him. “We let it happen. And we are not going to let it happen ever again.”

  “That’s right,” I agree. “Let’s go face this down. Together.”

  “I want to grant an interview to a high-profile reporter. I want us to grant the interview. I want the world to know—”

  I push to my toes and kiss him. “I don’t care about what the world thinks. I care about you and I care about us.”

  His hand flattens on my lower back. “There was a time when you feared the world would think you slept your way to the top.”

  “And then there’s today when I don’t. No one who knows us believes that’s true.” I push past the knot in my belly. “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. He doesn’t get to win this time.”

  His hands come down on my face. “I love you.”

  “I know you love me. And you know I love you. It’s enough, Grayson. It’s more than enough. It’s everything. I can handle this. Trust me not to let you down.”

  “Mia—”

  I press my lips to his and this time his hand cups the back of my head and his tongue strokes mine, deep and sultry.

  A few minutes later, we’re in the hallway with Blake in front of us and Adrian behind us. Once we’re all in the elevator, Blake starts handing out instructions. “The press hasn’t found you here. We’ll be fine exiting th
e side door, but once we’re at your offices, all bets are off. The press is everywhere.” He eyes Grayson. “Reese Summer is going to meet you here tonight.”

  I look between them. “Why are we meeting with a criminal law attorney that doesn’t even work for our firm?”

  “Because he’s the best of the best and I trust him,” Blake replies.

  “Why do we need him?” I counter.

  “We’re not giving the FBI a chance to twist anything Ri has done into guilt that lands in the wrong place,” Blake says. “And we want someone who has no conflict of interest and a reputation for only defending the innocent.”

  “The innocent?” I demand. “Grayson was attacked. He’s a victim the FBI should be protecting.”

  Grayson slides his arm around me. “Relax, baby. We’re making sure this doesn’t just end. It ends our way.”

  I’ve done everything I can to block out Ri holding me at gunpoint and then dying right in front of me. But it’s not his death haunting me now, it’s the evil in that man that still lives on.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Mia

  Nerves I don’t want to feel jump around in my belly as we load up in the black Escalade with us in the back, Adrian behind the wheel and Blake in the passenger seat. Grayson and I are side by side, his leg pressed to my leg, his hand on my knee, just beneath my skirt. His hand is warm, strong, possessive, and after fearing I’d never feel his touch again, wonderful. What’s not wonderful is the prison of press and past history that seek to control this day, but the sooner we’re past this awkward stuff, the better.

  The drive is short, and good Lord, when we turn the corner to our destination street, the building that houses the offices of Bennett Enterprises is swarming with reporters. Adrian pulls us to a side entrance where Grayson exits and helps me out, and to my shock, we enter the building without much trouble, and with relief, we head upstairs in a service elevator. The space is small to share with three large, testosterone-loaded men, and Grayson is quick to pull me in front of him and hold me close. Tension radiates off of him and it’s then that I realize just how much pressure he’s under. He’s literally got an empire on his shoulders, the FBI breathing down his throat, and TMZ and the gossip rags won’t even allow him to just be secure with us. I need to be the person who eases his stress, not adds to it.