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Kai came around the peninsula into the kitchen. “Just now.”

“How long does it take him to get here from there?”

He pulled me into his arms. “An hour. But you don’t have anything to worry about. He won’t get to you.”

I rested my cheek against his chest. “I know.” I placed a kiss on his cotton-covered chest. “Trust me. I know.”

“This will work,” I told the three men standing in front of me.

“I don’t like it. We don’t know what he’s capable of,” Kai said for the umpteenth time.

“You’re the one who told me, he told the guy in jail that he was pissed that the truck driver tried to kill me.” I turned to Roan. “Isn’t that what he said?”

Roan nodded. He was grinning. He thought I had a good plan. It was Simon and Kai I still had to convince.

“That doesn’t mean he doesn’t plan to hurt you,” Kai pointed out.

“Have you seen a picture of the man?” I scoffed. He was teeny-tiny.

“Marlowe, that doesn’t matter. If someone is mad, and they’ve planned ahead, they can hurt you,” Simon pointed out.

“What can he possibly do to me while the three of you are in hiding in the house, waiting to pounce if he makes one wrong move?”

“Marlowe—” Kai started.

“Look, you two,” Roan said. “If the three of us can’t protect her, I’d say we’re a piss-poor security agency. Especially since we have a fifteen-minute head start, surveillance equipment, and it’s three to one-half.”

I giggled. He was right about the one-half.

“I still say he could talk to me instead,” Kai grumped.

“For the love of God,” I burst out. “This is a good plan, and it will spike his wheels once and for all. Just get all your little spy shit, plant it around the living room, and let me confront the weasel. I want this over with.”

Kai stepped up to me and put his arms around me. “Okay, we’ll get our spy shit, and place it all around. You go get him, Tiger.”

I grinned.

“We’re going to need popcorn, you know that, don’t you?” Roan said over my receiver.

“What in the hell are you talking about? Marlowe could get hurt, and you’re making it sound like we’re going to see a show.” The man was getting on my nerves.

“Marlowe’s like my Lisa,” he responded. Roan was on the east side of the house, at the window that was slightly open to the living room. He had a gun trained on the center of the room.

“And my Trenda,” Simon chimed in over my receiver. Simon was in the back bedroom.

“What does that even mean?” I grumbled into my mic. I was in the kitchen pantry. I had a gun trained on the center of the living room as well.

“It means your woman has smarts and guts. She’ll do fine,” Simon explained.

“I don’t want her to have to do fine. I want this mess to be over with, so she can just sit in her porch swing, drink iced tea, and get ready for the school year.”

“Don’t we all,” Roan sighed. “Life doesn’t always work out that way, that’s why they’ve given us women who have balls and brains.”

The doorbell rang. Marlowe took her time getting up off the couch and going to the door. She looked through the peephole and asked who it was.

“Can any of you hear what he’s saying?” I asked the men.

“Negative,” they both said in unison. That was a problem. I hoped for the sake of the plan, we could hear them once he was inside.