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“Any news from the department?” I asked her.
“Not yet. They’re keeping watch. No one will get in or out of my place tonight.”
“I’m just glad you’re not there,” I said. “If something…”
“What?”
“Nothing.” I handed her a glass of wine and then took a sip from my own. “You want to sit in the hot tub? I need to relax.”
“Yeah, as a matter of fact. Relaxing sounds great.”
After we’d shed our clothes and donned robes, we headed out into the cool night air. I took the cover off the tub, and the steam rose up around us. We took off our robes and got in. I inhaled, remembering our times in Jamaica under the stars. Even though we lived in the country, so many more stars had been visible in the Caribbean. I inhaled the night air.
“Sometimes I wish we were still in Jamaica,” I said, “without a care in the world.”
“Jamaica had its own issues,” Ruby replied.
“Damn!” I stood and sat on the edge of the tub. “Can’t we relax? Can’t we just remember the good times? I’m so sorry about those two girls. I really am, Ruby. But my life has taken a one-eighty since we got back, and I just want to relax. To remember.”
She stood as well, taking my hand. “Get back in the tub, Ryan.”
I obeyed, sitting down next to her, her wet skin against mine. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay. I want to relax too. You have to understand, though, that I haven’t really relaxed in the last seventeen years. I even fought it in Jamaica, and then, after Juliet and Lisa…”
I turned toward her, cupping her cheeks. “We had some amazing times. Even after Juliet and Lisa.”
She nodded, though she didn’t smile. “We did.”
“Can we concentrate on those times this evening? So much has happened, and all I want to think about is you. You. Here. Safe. There was no way I was letting you go to your apartment tonight.”
She opened her mouth, but I shushed her.
“Let me finish. I know you can take care of yourself. I get it. You’ve been doing it forever, and you’re a cop, and you’re armed, and you know self-defense. I get all that, Ruby. I do. But goddamnit, let me protect you. I need to.”
I did. Talon had protected me all those years ago, and though I’d lay down my life for my brothers and my sister, a new surge was rising within me now. The need to keep Ruby safe was stronger than the need I felt toward my siblings.
That scared the hell out of me.
And that trust thing? When she’d given my siblings my hair for the DNA test without telling me? My love was stronger than that. We’d work through that issue. Together.
“I don’t need—”
“Christ, Ruby, did you hear anything I just said?”
She sniffled. I didn’t think she was crying. It was probably the heat.
“I did hear you, Ryan. I heard every word. I just can’t abide the idea of not protecting myself. It seems…unnatural to me.”
“Well, get used to it. You’re mine now to protect.” I grabbed her and smashed our lips together.
She opened immediately, accepting my kiss, though perhaps not my offer of protection. We’d work on that.
I needed to keep her safe. Needed to keep her with me.
I wanted her with me all the time. She’d have to move in. She was no longer safe at her apartment anyway. Someone was clearly after her, and someone else had sent that warning.
She’d have to—
