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I watched Emmy pick up her phone and scroll through her texts as I shoveled in eggs and bacon. “Em, you need to eat something.”
Instead of picking up her fork, her jaw dropped as she read something on her phone. Her reaction sent me into high alert. “What is it?”
She bit her lip and sent me a chagrined look. “This is probably a bad time to mention it, but I have a concert this week. On Friday.”
My jaw tensed. I scrubbed my hand over my face. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me. You can’t go to that. It’s way too dangerous.”
“Oh, Emmy, you can’t do that,” Hannah said, echoing my sentiments in a much tamer way.
Emmy’s face scrunched, as if she was surprised by this much push back when a literal maniac wanted to kidnap her. Well, another maniac wanted to kidnap her. “I’ll be in a room with hundreds of people. How dangerous can it be? It’s not like they want to assassinate me.” She then turned to me and said with absolute sincerity, “If you’re there, I’ll be safe.”
My chest felt like it would cave in with how much trust she was putting in me. What the fuck had I possibly done to deserve it? I shook my head. “No, I don’t like it. If Armstrong wants to take you, he has the resources to do it.”
“He’s a businessman. I mean, he has a public face, right? He can’t just grab me off the stage without people knowing about it. I know you can get enough people to protect me,” she wheedled, her big sapphire and topaz eyes imploring me to let her play at the show. I hated that it was working on me.
“Emmy,” I said sternly, hoping it would shut her down.
I trailed off as she took my hand and held it to her chest. “Please, Ivan. Music is so important to me. We’ve practiced these pieces for weeks and I love performing. Even that triggering Mozart concerto. It’s exactly what I need to get back on track with all this other stuff going on. I need it.”
“Emmy…” How was she doing this? How was she stripping me of my resistance?
“Ivan, you can’t let her do it,” Hannah squeaked, seeing that I was caving like an absolute pussy-whipped asshole.
Emmy shot Hannah a quelling look and pinned me with her sad, pleading eyes. “Please. It would mean the world to me.”
My mind floated back to how overwhelmed she was last night, how sad and exhausted and angry. I knew music brought her peace and comfort and happiness.
“Fuck,” I muttered. I was a fucking goner. “You better do everything I say. I mean it, Emmy. You follow every direction and if we decide to pull you, you go without complaint.”
Emmy squealed and threw her arms around me. I pulled her into my lap and tightened my hold on her. “I’m serious.”
She nodded her head solemnly. “I understand. I swear I’ll follow every direction.”
I knew she probably didn’t mean it, but that vow to follow direction came out sounding sexy as fuck. She leaned in and whispered in my ear, “How about after breakfast, we go back to your place, and I practice following your orders.” Okay, maybe she did mean it.
I groaned and leaned my forehead on hers. “Jesus, you’re going to give me an ulcer.
Nikolai hooted. “Welcome to the fucking club, Ivan.”
Chapter 46
Emmy
As I helped Hannah clean up the kitchen, I heard Ivan peppering Nikolai with questions about the apartment building, specifically about the security. I glanced over and saw Ivan nodding his head, apparently liking whatever information Nikolai was providing.
Hannah nudged me. “It looks like there’s a move in your future. It’s going to be so awesome having you in the building!”
My face heated. “Ivan is interested in the apartment. It doesn’t necessarily mean he’s going to ask me to move in.”
Hannah shot me a deadpan look. “Are you for real right now? Even if he didn’t plan to move you in—which, for the record, you’d be crazy to think—even then, there’s no way he’d let you live anywhere but with him while this thing with Armstrong is going on.”
My chest flooded with warmth at her words because I actually believed her. It was a reflex to downplay my expectations, but I knew Ivan didn’t want me to be away from him. Not now with all this stuff with Armstrong, and maybe not ever. This startling realization made me unable to keep a goofy grin from breaking out across my face.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” Hannah snarked.
“Okay, it’s settled,” Ivan said, breaking into our conversation. “I’m going to talk to Nikolai’s guy and buy an apartment here. He said there’s a vacancy.”
This was an unsurprising development considering the conversation I’d just had with Hannah. “When’s the move?”
