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“And how exactly,” Aaron says, “do you suggest I come to a place where I can believe you?”
“Beers to go around,” Smith says, walking back into the room with a six-pack in his hand. “I don’t know about the rest of you, but I need one.” He then walks to the couch and sits down. “Not bad for a couch that came with the place,” he says, shifting on a brown leather cushion.
I turn to Aaron. “I know bullets will fly before they pull us out of here, and I still want to sit down with them and talk. That’s how much I trust them.” I wrap my arms around him and kiss him. “Please.”
His hand settles on my hip, just one. He only needs one free hand to pull his gun. “You know—”
“I know,” I say, aware of what he hasn’t said. He could kill them. They don’t believe it, but they’re wrong. He could. He can. He will. “And I still want to sit down with them. So do you or they wouldn’t be here right now but,” my eyes go wide at my realization, “if they could find us—”
“I handled that problem,” Blake replies. “I uploaded a photo to your profile, a photo that looks nothing like you, Ashley. I gave you and your husband a long history and made it look like you were members of the Airbnb site for an extensive period of time.”
Aaron’s eyes light on me. “And he passed the test. Let’s have that beer.”
“I don’t understand,” I say. “What test?”
“The one where he wanted to know we’d put you first,” Blake says. “And we will, Aaron. Because all of us have dealt with some dirty shit and all of us are good guys. We look out for those who are one of us.”
“And anyone who served our country with honor,” Adam adds, “is one of us.”
A sharp dark something flashes in Aaron’s eyes, and I know him. I know him beyond the name change and the lies that surrounded us and him. He wants to believe them. He wants to trust. He wants to belong, but he has not felt as if he did in a very long time. Except with me. I have never been so glad that I chose to stay with him, that I chose to believe in who we weren’t, in what his name was or wasn’t.
His eyes meet Adam’s. “And I will protect those I am loyal to with my life.”
“As it should be,” Adam replies. “And we will be men who deserve that loyalty.”
“Men who will die for you,” Blake emphasizes. “And you, Ashley.”
Smith rejoins us, and Adam and Blake make room for him. He steps close to face-off with Aaron. “If you hurt her—”
“I will die for her and come back from the dead and do it again,” Aaron declares, and while he has been cold, hard, and calculating with these men, his words are guttural, rough, emotional. This man loves me. Passionately. Completely. And I will die for him, too. Something no one in this room wants to hear, but I will say it to Aaron. I will say it the minute we’re alone, which can’t be soon enough to please me, but now—now we must face what is before us.
Now, we must figure out how to defeat our enemies, and I’m ready. I want to fight. I want to win. I want this over. I want whatever version of happily ever after Aaron and I can create together.
Chapter twenty-seven
Aaron
Astorm brews inside me, and the longer and more frequently Smith gets in my face, the fiercer it becomes. He doesn’t seem to get the point. He doesn’t seem to understand that I’m not a man who claims anything for his own except Ashley. He doesn’t seem to understand the significance of this concept. He doesn’t seem to understand that my willingness to bleed and cause bleeding in her name is not a small thing. He also doesn’t seem to understand how sadly matched he is to my skills, or he wouldn’t be standing in my fucking face yet again.
I’m about two seconds from a demonstration when Blake and Adam move him for me. “Beer,” Blake says. “Let’s sit and drink a fucking beer.”
Smith scrubs his jaw and smartly walks away. Blake grabs my attention. “He’s a good man.” He looks at Ashley. “That’s why you called him. Don’t let your man here forget that.” He looks at me again. “Good men are hard to find. Men you trust, and I trust him. You can, too.”
“He doesn’t trust me,” I say.
“But I do,” Ashley says. “He’ll get over it.”
“I think your trust in me is the problem.” I meet Blake’s stare. “He wants to fuck her; he might even think he loves her, and that’s a problem none of us need right now.”
Ashley sucks in a breath and then objects. “He doesn’t—”
“He’s right,” Blake replies, eyeing her and then me. “I’ll deal with him. Right now, I have information you want. And beer.” He holds his hands out to his sides. “What the fuck more could you want?”
Ashley as my wife, safe, fucking me, moaning for me, strolling on the damn beach with me. I want Ashley. The way she defended me only makes me want her more. I pull her close. I will never have her close enough. “Let’s sit.”
Blake nods, and he and his team walk toward the living room. Ashley catches my arm, and I turn to face her, my hands settling on her waist. “I wish you would have warned me.”
“If Smith thought you acted nervous, he’d become a bigger liability than he is right now.”
