AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“That you’ll stay safe. That you’ll stay with me.”
Suddenly I wished I had that master plan and checklist, because I didn’t even know what I was asking for. Still, I nestled against Wes, needing his assurance.
But although he continued to hold me, he never answered.
Chapter 3
Wes
Li Na Zhao is back. I swear to God, I am going to gut her, once and for all…
I wasn’t in shape to go after her yet, but I vowed to get ready. Then I tried desperately to think about something else so I would talk about something else. I didn’t want to push poor Hannah over the edge. She’d been through enough already.
Because of Li Na.
My hands curled into fists, but I pushed the thoughts from my mind.
I played with Hannah’s hair as we sat outside, not talking. Scrambling for something to say to break the tension, I sat up a little. “Hey, I forgot—I have a surprise for you.”
She perked up immediately, blue eyes sparkling in what was left of the sun. “What?”
“C’mon, let’s go back to the house. It’s just a little something.” I just wanted to show her that I appreciated her and everything she’d been doing for me for the past few weeks. She’d been taking care of me like she was family.
She was starting to feel like family, too, which scared the hell out of me. When I’d started working at Paragon, there’d been a string of different men, mostly sporting trendy beards and collarless leather jackets, showing up like clockwork in their Range Rovers to whisk Hannah out to lunch or dinner at various Silicon Valley hotspots. I never saw her go out with the same guy twice.
Things had been going good with us before the attack—so good. But we were in uncharted territory, my defunct ass was living in her sister’s house, and Hannah was stuck waiting on me…
I got back in the godforsaken chair, vowing to get rid of it ASAP. I’d just have to push it harder in physical therapy.
Hannah wheeled me through the house, toward our wing.
“We’re heading to our room for a while,” I told the guards.
“No problem.” Brian nodded. “We got you covered.”
“Don’t you think living with all these guys is sort of weird?” Hannah asked, keeping her voice low as we maneuvered through the long hallway to our suite, located on the western side of the house.
“No, but that’s because I was in the military. And because my brother’s been my roommate forever.” A Special Ops marine, my brother Ellis wasn’t home much because he’d been deployed overseas, but that was about to change.
“Will he be home soon?”
“Yeah. He’s officially retiring from the service—I still can’t believe it. He’s going to start working for Betts Security at the beginning of the month.”
Levi Betts and Ellis had gotten friendly while my brother had been home, visiting me in the hospital. Ellis had over a decade of experience with the Special Forces, and Levi had jumped at the chance to bring him onto his security team. Ellis had been thankful for the opportunity, but I still couldn’t believe he was leaving the military.
“Are you excited he’s moving home?”
I shrugged. The topic made me uncomfortable. “I have mixed feelings about it.”
“Why?”
“Because I feel like he’s giving up his career for me. He said he didn’t want to be so far away anymore, after what happened. But I’m fine.”
“Wes.” Hannah stopped pushing my chair and came alongside me. “He misses you and wants to be closer. I’m sure he was scared to death when you got hurt—but you shouldn’t feel guilty. He loves you and just wants to be here for you.”
“I know that, but leaving the service is pretty extreme. Ellis is all military—I honestly can’t even picture him as a civilian. I don’t even know what he’s going to do with himself.”
“Levi will keep him busy. He said their business is growing exponentially because all the tech CEOs in Northern California want to increase security.”
