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Oh no.
And she hadn’t even gotten to the raspberry ripple scoop. She sniffled. “My ice cream.”
“What? Oh, Mierda!” Alejandro moved her to one hip while he stared down at her ice cream. “I’m sorry, mi Pequeña.”
“You . . . you’re sorry? Oh my God! You’re dying! You’re dying, aren’t you? That’s why you’re meeting me in the garage and you just apologized. You can’t die!”
“Whoa. Whoa.” He moved her so he was cradling her against his chest with one arm under her ass. “I’m not dying.”
“Then the world is coming to an end.”
There was a snort of amusement from behind her.
“The world isn’t ending.”
“Then . . . then . . . if you’re not dying and the world isn’t ending, why would you ruin my ice cream? It was a great ice cream.” She could feel tears welling.
“I’ll send The Scot to get you a new one, all right?” he said. “Just please don’t cry.”
“All . . . all right.” She sniffled.
“Good girl. Come on. We need to talk for a moment. Scot, can you go get her some more ice cream?”
“I thought she wasn’t allowed ice cream before lunchtime anymore after you found out she’d been eating it for breakfast,” The Scot commented.
She glared at him from over Alejandro’s shoulder.
Such a traitor.
“That’s right,” Alejandro said. “I did make that a rule.”
“I apologize for not knowing,” Rafael told him. “I sent a message.”
“You didn’t know, Rafael,” Alejandro said. “And yes, I saw that message later. I was busy with something.”
She pointed at both her eyes and then at The Scot. The other man just grinned back as they made their way to the elevator.
“Hey, Scot, how about I make you this nice no-bake bar?”
“That’s not nice,” The Scot told her.
As they left the elevator, Alejandro turned to them all. “All of you in my office.”
She frowned. Something was going on.
They all settled into the office. Alejandro sat with her on his lap behind his desk. Her hands and face were kind of sticky, but she didn’t mention it.
However, he must have realized this because he reached into a drawer and pulled out a packet of wipes. Grabbing one hand, he wiped it gently.
Maybe she should be embarrassed at him taking care of her in front of the others.
But Cairn and The Scot had seen it plenty of times, and if Rafael was going to be hanging around . . .
“What’s going on? What’s wrong?” she asked.
Alejandro sighed. “I’m probably overreacting. But someone is targeting my businesses. Spray-painting them. Damaging property.”
“Cameras?” Rafael asked.
“They’ve caught sight of the person, but they hid their face well. Slim-built. Could be male or female. Truthfully, we don’t have much at this point, so we’re going to up security. I have Nighthawk working on it, but he’s feeling down at the moment.”
Oh no. Poor Nighthawk. She knew he could swing between highs and lows. But she hadn’t experienced many of his lows.
“Do I need to talk to him? Help him?” she asked.
“Wouldn’t hurt to reach out. I’m also checking in with him regularly. I’m going to have several of my guys do patrols. But it will spread us thin. Cat . . .”
“I’m going to be confined to the house, aren’t I? I’m never leaving again until I’m gray and wrinkly.”
“Just for a few days,” he told her. “And if you do need to leave, I’d like you to have two guards with you.” He shot a look at Rafael, then back to her. “Do you want one of those guards to be Rafael?”
“Sure. I mean . . . if you get me two new guards, I’m just going to have to train them both up.”
“Nobody trains me,” Rafael stated.
“We’ll see.”
“Are you going to tell Alejandro about who you thought you saw?” he asked.
She glared at him. What a jerk.
“Did you think you saw your Mama again?” Alejandro asked in a worried voice.
“No,” she groaned. “That would almost be better.” She sighed as everyone stared at her. “I thought I saw, Starla, all right?”
“What?” Alejandro gave her an alarmed look.
“I know that’s nuts. Just my brain playing tricks on me like when I thought I saw Mama that day in Bismarck. So can we just forget about it? Now, someone mentioned more ice cream?”
“No,” they all said.
Party poopers.
16
Heck.
Was she really doing this? She sat in the walk-in closet in the playroom with Roger and Snuggly. It made her feel safer in here. Not that she was going to be hurt physically or anything.
But what if he was mean to her?
If that happened, she couldn’t tell Alejandro. She didn’t want any blood on her hands.
Nerves filled her. Perhaps she should have built a fort, but she didn’t have time and she didn’t want to chicken out.
A few days had passed since she and Rafael had come to a truce of sorts. He’d stopped following her around all the time, and occasionally he even spoke to her.
