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I sit and start eating some of everything, relieved when it all stays down and the tea helps settle my stomach.
Ransom and Malice come in a bit later, already dressed as well.
“Are you ready?” Malice asks Vic, who is loading the dishwasher in his precise way.
“Five minutes.”
“Wait, where are you going?” I ask.
“I made a list of people who might be able to help us with the Olivia situation,” Vic says. “We’re going to try to recruit them today.”
“Then I want to come,” I say, stuffing a piece of toast in my mouth. “Just let me—”
“No,” Malice cuts in. “You’re staying here.”
“But—”
“No buts. You’re not coming.” He folds his arms, and I glare up at him.
“I can still do stuff, you know. I’m not some helpless flower just because I’m pregnant. We didn’t even know I was before, and I was still doing stuff. It’s not like I’m that far along yet.”
“It’s not safe,” Malice insists.
“Are you just worried I’ll slow you down?”
He shakes his head. “No, it’s not about that. It’s about the fact that your fucking crazy grandma wants you dead. We were trying to keep you safe before we found out about the baby, and that hasn’t fucking changed. Olivia is still out there, planning to kill you.”
I hate that he’s right, and I sit back in my chair, trying not to pout about it. Because he is right. And I can tell that he’s not going to budge. As much as I hate feeling coddled and cooped up, I do like the fact that he cares so much.
“Fine,” I mutter. “I’ll stay here.”
“Good girl,” Malice says. He comes over and threads his fingers into my hair, pulling me up to my feet so he can kiss me. It’s not a soft goodbye kiss either. It’s hard and biting, the way Malice always seems to be. The heat of it washes through me, and I have to swallow hard when he pulls away.
“We’ll be back before you know it,” he whispers in my ear. “You behave.”
I give him a little shrug when he draws back, and he slaps my ass lightly in warning, making me grin.
Once he and Vic are gone, it’s just me and Ransom left in the penthouse.
“If it makes you feel better, they’re going to be insufferable out there together,” Ransom says when he catches me staring at the door after them. “Vic’s going to want to do it his way, and Malice is going to be Malice, and they’ll be bickering constantly.”
I laugh, finishing the last of my tea. “That does sound like them, you’re right.”
“I know my brothers,” he replies with a shrug.
With everything that’s been going on lately, I’ve turned into a stage five clinger. I really hate having any of my men out of my sight, the same way I know they feel about me, so time seems to move extra slow while Malice and Vic are gone.
Ransom spends some time maintaining their weapons, cleaning guns and sharpening knives, and after checking the programs Vic has running to alert him to any unusual movement or activity from Olivia—monitoring her bank accounts and the security feeds around her place, things like that—I kill time reading one of the romance novels from the pile I’ve been working through.
“Is it a good part?” Ransom asks, waggling his eyebrows when he comes back into the living room a while later and sees me with my nose buried in the book. “What’s the brooding hero up to now? Has he ripped his shirt off yet?”
“I don’t know what you think I’m reading,” I say, shaking my head. “No one’s ripping any shirts.” Then I reconsider and add, “Although he did rip her panties off once.”
Amused approval gleams in his eyes. “Fuck, yes. Now I see why you like these books so much.”
Leaning on the back of the couch, he reads over my shoulder. I wait for more teasing to come, but instead, he actually seems to be intrigued by it.
“Okay, this is actually better than I was expecting it to be,” he admits.
