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“I’ll walk you out,” Rupert said, reaching me in two strides.
The second the door closed behind us, I turned to face him. “Stay here. We know where we’re going. You have… business to attend to.”
Rupert’s brow furrowed and he looked to Minty.
“I’ll look after her, I promise,” she said.
“Take my security,” he instructed. Minty nodded and I could tell she was picking her battles. If she’d tried to bat the order away, this was one battle she wouldn’t win. Rupert stared at me intensely.
“I’ll wait in the lobby,” Minty muttered.
Rupert closed the gap between us and wrapped a hand round the back of my neck possessively. “Don’t move from Minty’s, do you understand?”
“Where would I go?” I shrugged. “Besides, the people who wanted me dead are dead themselves. You don’t need to worry.”
He tugged me to within inches of his heaving chest. “I am going to worry, every day of my damned life. You are everything to me now, Vivian. And Sinclair and Ossian might be dead but that doesn’t mean others don’t want to hurt me, hurt us. Please just do as I say, at least until I can sort through all of this mess. Promise me.”
I marvelled at how someone’s face could plead and threaten and look terrifyingly beautiful doing both. “I promise.”
He pulled me into him and took my breath away with a vicious kiss. It took only seconds for my knees to weaken and my core to melt for him, despite him being inside me less than three hours ago, twice.
“I want you back in my bed tonight, Vivian,” he said in a low growl.
My head spun from the kiss so all I could do was nod.
“Stay with Minty,” he warned. I turned and walked numbly through the remaining corridors to the lobby.
Minty looped her arm through mine and exhaled. “That was intense.”
“Yeah,” was all I could manage after that kiss and those eyes and the promise of more that night. My mind was swimming in such an erratic whirlpool, I didn’t notice Minty yanking my arm before it was too late.
“Well, well, well.”
I looked up and froze while my heart lodged itself firmly in my throat.
“My husband and son die in the same day, and I come home to find you on my doorstep.”
“She had nothing to do with their deaths,” Minty said, with more guts than I had in that moment.
Iris looked Minty slowly up and down. “Who asked you?” she said slowly, the judgment dripping off her tongue. “Shouldn’t you be behind a bar serving drinks to people who have more class in their little finger than you have in your whole body?”
Fury burned behind Minty’s lashes and I sensed her holding everything back. She smiled sweetly. “It’s my day off.”
Iris panned back to me. “Why are you here?”
I squared my shoulders, remembering the time she waltzed into Sandpiper Cottage and hand-delivered an invitation to Rupert’s wedding, I towered over her slight figure then, but the threat Ossian held over my head made me subservient. Now, no such threat existed.
“I came to see Rupert.”
“And his new wife?” She cocked her head. “I trust he made his new position clear?”
I smiled inwardly. “Something like that.”
Suddenly, she leaned towards me, cloaking me in a cloud of strong, overpowering French perfume and pursed her lips. If I blinked, I could see Ossian in every one of her features. “Get the fuck off my island,” she hissed.
I didn’t know what Rupert planned to tell her, or do with her, so I didn’t want to blow our cover so quickly. So, I flicked my hair over my shoulder and gave a smug smile. “I’ll leave if and when Rupert tells me to.” Then I skipped to Minty and we both ran down the stone steps giggling like teenagers.
“I can’t believe I used to be so scared of her,” Minty said as she started up her car.
