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To that, Ayanna gave his back a small smile, loving his dedication to his wife and child, even as her own relationship and hopes for her future fell away.
"Hey," she said as Huck walked off down the hall to find Harmon. "You alright?" she asked.
"Thanks to Saskia, yeah," I said, nodding.
"She strikes me as a ride-or-die type of woman," Ayanna said, nodding.
"Yeah," I agreed.
"Now you listen to me, you handsome asshole, you," she said, holding a finger up at me. "If she decides you are the one, you make sure she never doubts that she is the one to you too."
Before I could even say anything to that, she was walking into the living room, dropping down on the couch, and reaching into her bag for her laptop.
"Che," Teddy called from the kitchen. "Here, you look like you need it," he said, passing me a mug of coffee.
"Thanks. How has she been?"
"Asleep. For about an hour now," he said.
"She needed it," I agreed, taking a long swig of the coffee.
"You need it," he shot back.
"I can sleep when we're all safe again," I said.
"You were shot last night, Che," he reminded me.
"It wasn't so bad."
"I'll repeat. You had a bullet tear through a part of your body. You need to recover from that."
"We need to deal with the..." I started, trailing off. "We need to go hang out," I said, just barely remembering to give Teddy the plausible deniability he said his lawyers told him he would always need with regard to the club. He could only help us if he had no idea what was really going on.
"Yeah, hanging out is important. So is not opening up your stitches and bleeding out."
"I'll be okay. Just keep an eye on Sass for me," I demanded.
"This convenience marriage of yours," he said, clicking his tongue, looking for the right way to continue. "Maybe it isn't just all paperwork after all."
"It was never just paperwork. I've always liked Sass."
"Liked," he repeated.
"She was a kid back then."
"She was an adult."
"She was a child," I shot back, shaking my head. "We all were at eighteen and nineteen."
"She's a full-grown woman now," he said, shrugging.
"It's... I don't know what it is," I admitted. "It's a lot to handle all at once. Her appearance. Her problems. Our problems. This connection that is different than it used to be."
"So figure it out," Teddy suggested. "Figure it out, and then let her in on it. Then commit to it. And keep committing to it. If I have Saskia on my couch with Ayanna, eating ice cream and watching historical dramas, I will hire someone to kick your ass," he declared.
"How'd you know about Ayanna?" I asked.
"Please, I can see the signs," he said, waving toward the TV where Ayanna was buying a digital version of Sense and Sensibility.
"The ice cream, though?"
"It's always ice cream," he said, rolling his eyes as he moved into the living room to sit across from Ayanna.
"Hey," Huck said, making me jolt, realizing I'd been falling asleep standing up with a hot mug of coffee in my hands. "Yeah," he said, raking a hand down his face. "I know the feeling. I was thinking of texting the others and suggesting we all crash for a few hours. We will be much more useful if we get three or four hours."
I couldn't disagree with that.
"Sounds like a smart plan. Who knows how long it'll be before we can get some sleep once we get shit rolling."
"Exactly," he said, reaching for his phone. "I'll tell them to crash at Booker's office, then meet here in four hours."
"Alright," I agreed.
"Go on. Go crash with Sass. I'm heading in with Harm once I tell Teddy, McCoy and Ayanna the plan."
I didn't need any more encouragement than that.
Putting my half-drank coffee down, I moved toward Sass's room, knocking softly. Getting no response, I let myself in, closing the door, then kicking out of my shoes.
Unlike usual, Sass was curled up in a tight ball at the far side of the bed, leaving me plenty of room to climb in, turning onto my good side when my stitches pulled.
I knew it wasn't right, that I was crossing a line we hadn't discussed yet, but as I pulled the covers over us, I also slid behind Saskia, knees cocking under hers, her head nestled under my chin.
It felt better than it should have to hold her, to feel her softness after such a hard fucking day. It was something I could get used to.
But before I got too used to it, I was out cold.
Chapter Ten
Saskia
I woke up really warm.
But not in that uncomfortable, sweaty way you would when the air conditioning wasn't set cool enough.
It was the comforting sort of warm.
It took a long moment before I understood where the feeling was coming from. Not just the comforter pulled up over my body, oh no, but the man spooning me.
