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"This is on me, Kane," I say, blowing out a breath. "I should have been doing my fucking job instead of enjoying the show."
"This isn't on you," he disagrees with a sharp shake of his head. "You were sitting front and center by that stage. If anyone tried to get to her, they would have to go through you. You can't guard her and the dressing room at the same damn time."
"We need to step up security at her shows."
She and Maya are locked in Clive's office right now, waiting for us to finish documenting and cleaning up this mess. I don't want her to see it again, but I don't want anyone else touching it, either. If there are fingerprints on any of these photos, I want them preserved.
"Yeah, no kidding." Her brother rattles off a string of curses, snatching up a photo from the desk. "You don't leave her fucking side. I don't care what she says, you're at her side unless I am."
"Not a problem. I have no intention of leaving her side."
He meets my gaze, his expression sharp, assessing. "Is there something going on between you and my sister, Carmichael?"
"If you're asking if I'm sleeping with your sister, that's between me and her," I say. "But if you're asking if I have feelings for your sister, that's a different answer. Which is it?"
"Jesus Christ," he mutters. "I fucking knew you were catching feelings when I saw you watching her on stage tonight."
"It doesn't change the fact that I'm the best man for this job, Kane. If anything, it guarantees I'm the best man for this job. You think I'm going to let anything happen to her when I'm pretty goddamn sure I'm falling for her?"
"You're pretty goddamn sure?" His narrowed eyes tell me that isn't the answer he wants to hear. "We're talking about my baby sister. If you're sleeping in her bed, you better be real fucking sure, Carmichael. There's a reason I've chased off every man who comes sniffing around. They don't deserve her, and they aren't worthy of her."
"No one is, Kane. Especially not me," I say frankly. "I never have been and never will be. There isn't a motherfucker on this planet worthy of her. But that doesn't change the fact that you won't be chasing me off. She needs me, and I'm not going anywhere. No disrespect to you, but she's the only one who gets to decide what path her future takes and who she shares it with. I plan to be that man. Get used to it. If you break her heart, it'll piss me off."
"And if you break it, they won't even find pieces of you," he growls.
"I can live with that." The last thing I'm going to do is break her heart. Once she gives it to me, I plan to guard it like the treasure it is. She won't ever have to worry about me destroying it. "Just so you know, she's terrified of falling in love. She's afraid of losing someone else she cares about like you guys lost your dad."
"Shit," Kane says, raking a hand through his hair. "I'll talk to her."
"No need. I'm working on it. I just thought you should know that she's been carrying that since he died."
Kane jerks his head in a nod. "Appreciate that. They were close." He sighs. "Our Ma kind of fell apart without him. I guess I get why she's so fucking afraid to risk it. Some people, you never get over."
"Yeah," I say quietly. I'm beginning to get that. I think Kane's wife might be one of those people for him. Kenna is for me. If something happened to her, I wouldn't move on. I wouldn't get over it. She's been in my life for such a short time, but she's already left such a massive impact.
Fuck. I have to find whoever is threatening her. There is no other choice. Because if anything happens to her, I'm going to lose my goddamn mind. And so is the man standing beside me.
"I guess we can rule out her fucking manager," I mutter, pulling on the gloves Clive Rucker gave me. I use them to pull several photos off the wall, tape and all, and then slip them into the Ziploc bags Kane holds out to me.
"Guess so," he grunts.
It couldn't have been John because he was at the table beside us all night. He didn't leave or excuse himself to the bathroom until he stormed out. There's a back entrance to the bar, but he would have had to circle all the way around the block to get to it, and that isn't a short walk. It's nearly a mile. There's no way he would have had time to get to the entrance, hang all of these photos, and get out in the few minutes it took for Kenna to finish her song and us to get back here afterward.
He didn't do this.
Which means we have no fucking suspects at all. Because no one in the bar acted suspicious or odd in any way. They were just country music fans enjoying the music and the woman singing it.
What the fuck am I missing?
"You okay, Sparrow?" I ask, watching as Kenna floats around her living room like a ghost haunting the place. It's breaking my fucking heart. She hasn't been able to sit still since we got home.
"You guys were right about John." She spins to face me, her eyes wide in her pale face. "I saw the way he looked at me tonight when I took you up on stage tonight, Gideon. You were right about him."
"It wasn't him, Kenna."
"You don't know that," she whispers. "He was really angry. He looked at me like he hated me."
"No, he looked at me like he hates me," I correct, striding toward her. "You did nothing wrong."
