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“What are you doing here?” Cash asks.
I open my mouth to reply, but Hannah saves me the trouble.
“What do you mean, what is he doing here? You were the one who set him on me.” She shakes her head, her hair brushing back and forth. Fuck, she is so gorgeous. “You told him he has to be my bodyguard, remember? And to teach me self-defense? Or have we moved past that? Finally, might I add.”
Hannah’s snark dissipates some of the tension, and Cash sighs. “You’re learning self-defense.”
“Yeah,” I say. “I’m teaching her.” Fuck, it wasn’t the only thing I was teaching her. I feel a tinge of guilt, but just a tinge. It’s nothing compared to how I felt about this before. Cash is important to me, one of the most important people in my life, but Hannah is…
Fuck, she is Hannah.
And I’m starting to think I can’t let her go now that I’ve had her. And that if Cash doesn’t like it, well, he’s going to have to fucking deal. I might owe him, but he can’t tell his sister what to do.
“Right,” Cash says. “I was actually coming by to ask if you wanted me to come with you.” He says to his sister. “June is in the mood for a vacation, so we could come with you to New York, help you get settled into your hotel. Alex would like to stay with Ganny for a while and?—”
“I don’t know how long I’m going to stay for,” Hannah says. “And no offense, but this is something I need to do on my own.”
“Hannah, when are you going to let this go?” Cash asks. “You’re obsessed with proving that you’re independent and that you can do stuff, but why do you want to do any of that when you have people to look after you?”
“Because she’s a grown woman who makes her own choices,” I say.
The words are out before I think about them. I want to keep Hannah, especially because the last time I left the woman I loved alone, she died.
The woman you… what?
“What do you know about it, Savage?” Cash asks, pulling a face. “This is family business.”
“Savage is family,” Hannah says.
My chest aches at the words.
“And I don’t need you to come with me.” Hannah places a delicate hand on her brother’s arm. “I appreciate the sentiment, but I’m good. I can manage on my own.”
He grits his teeth and grumbles. He’s always been a grumpy bastard, and that’s part of the reason we get on so well. We’re both assholes, but he needs to take his asshole down a couple notches when he’s speaking to Hannah.
I don’t want her to go alone either. It’s driving me fucking insane, the thought of her in trouble or without help, but I’ve got to be a man about it. Sometimes, that means letting go, which turns out to be the hardest thing in the world.
“You good?” Cash asks me, over Hannah’s head.
“Just waiting to get started on our self-defense training,” I say.
But Cash isn’t going to let this one go. “I’ll see you at the potluck this weekend.”
“You will.”
Hannah watches the tense exchange, then sighs and walks to the sofa. She flops down, grabs the box of donuts, and opens it. “Anybody want something to eat?”
Thirty-Five
HANNAH
It’s only two weeks until I leave for my trip, and I should be excited, but there’s a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach this morning that I can’t shake.
I sit upright in bed, staring at the cutesy bluebells that decorate the pale cotton duvet. I pick at a hole in it, wriggling my nose left to right.
It’s the potluck today, and everyone’s going to be there. Which is great, except Savage is going to be there too, and my doubts about leaving are growing by the day. I want him to ask me to stay. Even scarier, I want to stay, and if he does ask, I don’t know if I’ll be able to leave.
And I don’t want that either.
