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“I’ve got you. I’m right here,” Brett said.
I felt his hands come down onto my hips as my office door clicked shut in the distance. He massaged my hips, slowly pulling them up and elongating my back. He helped free my diaphragm so I could breathe, so the world didn’t tilt and spin with the fury coursing through my veins.
“That man. I can’t… I can’t stand that man,” I said lowly.
“Who? What man?” Brett asked.
His hands kept up their movements, swiveling my pelvis slowly as I bent my head forward to the ground.
“Daniel. He wants to do… dinner with us,” I said.
“With us,” Brett said.
“I told him I wasn’t getting together with him without—”
Brett’s hands started massaging my lower back as I closed my eyes.
“Without what?” he asked softly.
“Without the man I was seeing,” I whispered.
“So, you want me to come meet your father.”
“That man isn’t my father,” I spat.
“Okay. Then, you want me to come have dinner with you and him. That’s fine. When?” he asked.
I slowly lifted my head, pressing my forehead into the wall. Brett’s hands worked themselves up my back as I relaxed underneath his touch. I felt him move forward and come closer to me. He slipped his arms around my waist and pulled me upright, sliding his hands around to my stomach.
“Breathe from here. With me,” he said.
I felt his chest expand, and I breathed with him. And when he let it out, so did I. I focused my breaths against his hands, pushing my stomach out against his palms as he guided me back down from my ledge of frustration. I leaned into him, seeking his comfort and his warmth as my swirling mind slowly came back down from its voracious high.
“When are you free?” I asked weakly.
He kissed the top of my head. “I’m free Wednesday night. We could go meet him after work together.”
“Thank you so much,” I whispered.
“It’s not a problem. I know you’d do the same for me, Olive. I can’t imagine how difficult this is for you. And I don’t know what he said to anger you, but I’m here if you want to talk about it.”
I closed my eyes. “He’s been in Seattle all this time.”
“What?”
I nodded against his chest. “Yeah. This entire time, he’s been in the same damn city as me. And he’s only reaching out now.”
“Then, why the hell is he staying a hotel?”
“Exactly. I don’t trust him. He’s hiding something, but I don’t know what.”
“Then you’re definitely not going alone.”
“He’s got ulterior motives. I can feel it in my veins,” I said.
“And you’re not. Going. Alone.”
He spun me around in his arms and held me close. I fell into him, my bare feet curling into the carpet of my office. I wrapped my arms around him as he swayed me side to side, kissing the top of my head every so often. The two of us needed to talk. About what this was. About what we were to each other. I was falling into a comfortable rhythm with him. A comfortable pattern. And I didn’t want to set myself up for heartache again if this was all a massive misunderstanding.
It could wait until after dinner, though.
It could wait until he was done holding me in my office in his warm, tender, strong embrace.
18
Brett
I held Olivia’s trembling hand as we headed over to her father’s hotel. I wasn’t sure why we were meeting him there. Maybe we were going to that same restaurant that was attached to the place. Either way, I knew Olivia was nervous. I felt it in the way she gripped my hand. In the way she trembled. In the way her breath shook every time she drew it in. I wanted to wrap her in my arms and soothe the nervousness away. I wanted to turn the car around and protect her from all of this. I didn’t want her going through this. What this man was putting her through. She’d had dinner with him and got to say what she wanted to say. What more was there?
If he wanted to see her again after that, it was obviously a selfish endeavor. And I wasn’t going to let him take advantage of her.
No one would do that so long as I was around.
We pulled up to the front of the hotel in my McLaren convertible—sleek black, chrome accents, one of my cars I loved showing off. Maybe it was a little abrasive of me, but I wanted her father to know that she was in good hands. Not only was she taken care of by me, but she was protected by me in any way she needed. I wanted him to know he’d never be able to give her what I could. He’d never be able to step up into the position in her life I held. Just because his DNA ran through her veins didn’t give him a right to her. And I wanted him to make sure he knew that.
