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Fuck.
I lean against the arm of the chair opposite her and sip my drink. “We’re heading for Italy in the next few days. Moving the wedding up. Guests have been informed.”
“But what if—” She bites her lip.
“If they can’t make it?” I laugh and shake my head. “I’m fucking Nikolai Wilder and you’re Rose, a must see in her own right, the woman who got me to the altar.”
A love match, not an arrangement.
Her hands cup her drink, and she lifts the glass to her mouth but doesn’t sip it. Instead, she seeks out my gaze. “What’s going on, Niko?”
“Nikolai.” I straighten, cross the room to the window and look down at a cyclist whizzing by in the bike lane. “Rush has been released. No charges.”
It could change, because Adelaide’s FBI and nothing’s fucking worse than someone who wants to climb the ranks. Too many years have passed, and I didn’t pick up any kind of torch, but even fifteen years ago, she had an ego with a delicate, greedy shell.
I can see her twisting me, ending things because she chose the opposite side of the law, instead of me being done because I was bored. She has narratives, ambitions, and she could take what I’ve given her and change the goalposts. Italy is the better place to be until this is done.
“I told you there’s shit happening, Rose, some I’m trying to work out, and—”
“We work together.”
“Partnership, yes.” I pause. “But I wish to fuck that partnership was you playing your role from the backseat when I need it.”
“That’s not partnership. It’s Niko rules.”
Rose sets down her drink and comes to stand in front of me, smoothing her hand down my shirt. Anyone else… Fuck, what if I’m losing my edge?
“There’s room for me and room for change. I’m not asking you to give me a gun and make me your right-hand woman. Tony’s got that part down.”
My mouth twitches. “He’ll be so pleased to hear that.”
She rolls her eyes. “You know what I mean.”
“Rose.”
She narrows her eyes and crosses her arms. Fuck. “I think you’re more than capable, but I can’t—I don’t want you in danger.”
“I’m a ride shotgun kind of girl.”
“I’m fucking trying to say I don’t care about many people. You and Rush are it, and—”
“Nikolai.” She takes my face in both hands. I’m so fucking shocked that someone, even Rose, is touching me like this that I stop talking. “Like it or not, you’re stuck with me. Rush isn’t helpless; you raised him right.”
I snatch her hands from my face and hold them in mine. “And you, Rose?”
“All grown up and a fast learner.”
I nod, taking a swallow of my drink as I steel myself. “You’re all I have. You and Rush. But you, Rose? Shit, you make me weak.”
“Nikolai Wilder isn’t weak.”
I breathe in. “I fucking mean look weak. You’re my vulnerability.”
I don’t know what the fuck to do with that.
There’s only one answer, and I can’t shake the feeling I’m not pushing it hard enough because I’m selfish, because I like the answer: no matter how weak I feel or seem to others when it comes to Rose, she’s safest with me.
“So we deal with it. You trained me, gave me a gun. We’re partners, Niko, and I call shotgun in your life, when it counts.”
