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I scrubbed my hands over my beard. “I’m trying. I really fucked up. But I swear to you, Brax. I’m trying to make it right.”
“Apparently not hard enough, or you wouldn’t have to disappoint her this weekend.”
“I’ll make it up to her,” I assured him.
I waited until he was up the stairs and inside the jet before walking back to my Jeep. As I drove away, I couldn’t help looking back in the rearview mirror, and I tightened my hands around the wheel.
I would make this up to her. This, and all the other shit I was keeping from her, I’d make it right.
Somehow.
???
I drove into Georgetown and pulled up outside the Ritz-Carlton with barely five minutes to spare before my meeting was supposed to start. Driving Mia and Braxton to the airport had eaten up a lot of my time that evening, but there was no way in hell I wasn’t seeing my girl off personally.
Tossing the keys to the valet, I jogged in and went straight to the elevators. Punching the button for the top floor, I waited impatiently for the doors to close on me and the other six people in the metal box.
When the doors finally opened for the penthouse suite, I straightened my black button-up and hit the doorbell. Seconds later, a bald man who was just as tall as I was, dressed in faded old jeans and a Demon’s Wings T-shirt, opened the door.
Jesse Thornton thrust his hand forward. “You’re Seller’s stepson?”
Gritting my teeth, I nodded. “That’s me. Nice to meet you, Mr. Thornton.”
“Call me Jesse.” Grinning, he stepped back, waving me in. “Come meet the rest of my brothers.”
Walking into the living room of the suite, I saw three other men sitting around watching ESPN. I took a second to assess them. The two on the couch I knew were biological brothers, Drake and Shane Stevenson. They looked so much alike, even with Drake’s long, dark hair and Shane’s buzzed short, that they could have been mistaken for twins at first glance.
Drake was Nevaeh’s father, but he also had three other daughters and a son with his wife, Lana. Shane was married to the owner and editor of one of the biggest magazines in five countries, Harper Stevenson, and had a daughter and a son.
The man sitting in a chair across from the other two stood, pulling my attention straight to him, and I forced myself not to tense. He was the reason I was there.
It was because of him I was keeping so much shit from the woman I loved.
Nik Armstrong stepped forward, holding out his hand. “Charles Barrick?”
I nodded, shaking his hand. “Mr. Armstrong.”
“How is she?” were the next words out of his mouth.
“She’s good, sir. I just put her on Mr. Steel’s jet to New York with your niece, and she seemed excited to see her cousin.”
“You have someone with her?” He motioned for me to sit. “Cole is a good guy, don’t get me wrong. But he’s old as fuck and lets the girls get away with shit that will get them into trouble.”
I took the other couch and sat forward, giving him my full attention. “My cousin is an operative too. He’s with them, and I assure you neither will be let out of his sight the entire weekend.”
Armstrong nodded. “Good, good.”
“The bigger concern we have,” Thornton said as he sat on the other end of the same couch I sat on, “is that Mia doesn’t suspect anything.”
“She doesn’t. Between me and my cousins, we have eyes on her all hours of the day and night.”
“The other cousin, that’s the roommate?” Shane asked with raised brows.
“Yes, sir. Lyla is one of the best. I would trust her with my life. She and Mia have become fairly close over the past weeks.” And she hated lying to Mia about her role in all this shit just as much as Braxton did. Just as fucking much as I did.
“Just out of curiosity, how exactly are you staying so close to Mia without her suspecting anything?” Drake asked, his blue-gray eyes drilling into me.
I clenched my jaw but looked Mia’s father straight in the eye. “Seller told me none of you were opposed to me getting close to her. I assumed that meant you didn’t object to me dating her.”
