“I’m sorry if this was too much for you. We can skip this board meeting and go home.”
“Where is home, Ducane? And I’ve had this headache for a few weeks. I’m tired. I want to cry and don’t know why.”
He didn’t answer right away. He just reached out, pulled me down into his lap, and wrapped both arms around me like he could hold the tired right out of my body if he squeezed hardenough. I let my head drop against his shoulder and closed my eyes.
“Home is wherever we want that shit to be.” His hand moved up and down my back. “Home is with you and Cadence, but I want to be wherever my family is.” He paused, careful. “I’m not asking you to pick, Skye. I told you that already. Coupeville’s not going anywhere. This is just... more. Both. Can you do both?”
“Yeah.” I breathed it out against his neck, some of the weight easing off me just from him holding me like this. “I can do both. But if we’re doing both, I want a real house in Coupeville. Something that’s ours. Something built for a family that’s all the way here now.”
“Already on it.” He kissed the top of my head. “Lola’s had three properties lined up for two weeks. I just didn’t want to scare you off.”
I lifted my head to look at him.
“You already?—”
“Ready!” Cadence came barreling back in, shoes on the wrong feet, laces flopping loose, tablet tucked under her arm like a football. “I got my shoes on, Daddy. See?”
Ducane looked down at her feet, then back at me, fighting a smile.
“Almost, baby. Almost.”
By the time we made it to the firm an hour later, Cadence’s shoes were tied, my headache had dulled a little, and I hadn’t said another word about the house. There wasn’t time. Lola met us at the elevator with a coloring book already tucked under her arm and led Cadence straight to the receptionist’s desk without either of them missing a beat.
That left just me, standing outside a boardroom door.
“You look good, baby, and we did it again.”
We looked down and laughed. Black suit. Black tie.
I’d gone with black also. Fitted trousers, a silk blouse tucked behind a gold designer belt. Everything was new off the rack in that closet he’d stocked. I wanted to feel sharp, put together, like a woman who belonged in a boardroom instead of one bracing to be dragged into someone else’s war.
“We’ve been doing that since day one. Ain’t once planned it.” He reached over and straightened my collar, unnecessary, just an excuse to touch me. “Guess some things just line up.”
“They do. Are you nervous?” I asked, looking him over.
“Not at all. Just something I gotta do.”
“I’ll be out here when you’re done.”
I’d planned on standing near the door, in case this went the way I thought it might. Cadence was up front with Lola, coloring at the receptionist’s desk, and some part of me had already mapped an exit route in case things got ugly and I needed to get to her fast.
Ducane caught my arm before I made it three steps toward the wall.
“Where are you going?”
“I figured I’d hang back. Let you handle this.”
“Nah.” He grabbed my hand and walked me into the room. He pulled out the chair at the far end of the table, the one across from where he’d be standing, and just looked at me until I understood it wasn’t a suggestion. “You sit right here.”
“Ducane, I don’t need to be front and center for?—”
“Skye.” He said my name, shutting me up. “You’re not hanging back in nothing that concerns this family ever again. You belong at this table. Sit down.”
I sat, and Ducane placed a kiss on my forehead. “Your headache better?”
“A little,” I said as he leaned in to kiss my lips softly. I was so happy no one was in here with us now. Our tongues wrestled with one another until?—
A throat cleared, pulling us from the trance we’d been in.
