by Nana Malone
Neela…
I wish I could say I felt better after the conversation with Bipps, but I didn't. At the end of the day, I still felt powerless. Completely manipulated with zero options. But they all made a mistake underestimating me. I didn't just have to take it. I didn't just have to accept what was happening. My whole life had been accepting what was happening to me.
No more.
Back at the house, I marched straight through the door. I ignored Jax, who was back with Mayzie and feeding her lunch. He started to speak, and I just shook my head at him. I stooped to give Mayzie a kiss, and she gave me a sweet drooly one in return.
I’d only had her a few short weeks, but I would do anything to protect her now. She was mine. And protecting her meant getting these yahoos out of our house. To do that, I needed my team.
I headed out the back door. Jax called after me, but I ignored him.
Once I was in the guest house, Bex and Adam both looked up. Bex always took an earlier lunch and Adam preferred a later one, so I could almost guarantee to find them both at twelve thirty.
Something about the look on my face must have told Adam that something was up. "What's wrong?"
Bex's question was a bit more straightforward. "Who do I kill?"
I sighed. "It's been a long morning. I'm sorry. But basically, those yahoos inside, primarily Jax, are not nannies. They’re security."
Adam chuckled. "Well, I could have told you that."
Bex lifted a brow. "Well, I mean, when you said they were nannies, I was like, ‘They look like no nannies I've ever seen.’ Now that you say they're security, it makes sense. But what are they guarding?"
"That's just the thing. They say they're guarding Mayzie. They say they're guarding me. But right now, I trust no one."
I glanced over at Bex's desk where she was pulling out various letter openers from the drawers.
"What are you doing?"
"Armoring up."
I rolled my eyes. "Bex, we're not armoring up just yet. We need to fight them in a way I know how to fight."
This excited Adam because he knew exactly what I meant. "We're going to fuck with their taxes and basically put the tax man on their asses for the rest of eternity?"
"Close.” Damn, they were vengeful. “We're going to do the one thing I've been unable to do so far.” I pulled the ledger out of my bag and held it up. We're going to crack this. When we crack this, they'll be able to find out who the hell is after me and Mayzie, and then they can get the hell out of my house."
Bex studied me. "Okay. So where are you on it?"
"Besides realizing it's a ledger and not a journal, nowhere."
Adam stuck out his hand. "Give it here."
I handed it over and he quickly thumbed through it. "I assume you have already gone through all the typical language-base searches."
"Yeah. It's the first thing I did. I can't find the common language at all, and it's making me insane."
"Okay, I'll see what I can do with it."
"It's all hands on deck. Bex, you too."
"Hey, I'm a baby with this stuff. You guys are the real geniuses."
"Maybe, but you’re great at seeing patterns. It's all of us on this now. I don't want to live in Fort Knox."
Bex leaned closer. "So that guy, Jax, he's like a real-life action hero? For real?"
"Yeah, for real. I mean, look at him. I was an idiot if I ever thought he was a nanny."
Adam snorted. "Well, I mean, the good news is he's there to protect Mayzie, right?"
I nodded. "That's what Bipps says. But Bipps also said that he didn't really know what Willa was up to, but I get the impression that he's in up to his neck. So right now, from this point forward, we only trust the three people in this room. Tweedle Dee out there will get nothing from us.” I hitched my thumb toward the house.
Bex and Adam slid each other glances. I didn’t care what they thought at that point. I needed to protect myself, Mayzie, and my company.
Jax and his team had fucked with me, which meant they needed to go. I had a zero-assholes policy, and Royal Elite was currently persona non grata. But first things first; I had to figure out the ledger.
Adam began to make copies. Bex took my hand and pulled me outside, not toward the courtyard but around the side of the guesthouse by the pool.
"Are you okay?"
"Yep, fine."
"Look, you marched in there and told us those guys are security. That must be affecting you in some way."
"It's fine, Bex. I'm fine. Everything is fine."
"Yeah, because your hair is on fire. And you look… hurt."
"I'm not hurt. It's just that I'm tired of living like this. Waiting for the other shoe to drop. Waiting for the next person in my life to hurt me."
"Well, you have me and Adam. We would never hurt you."
"I know. Just... Willa, her family, Richard, Jax… Honestly, it’s enough to give a girl a complex."
"Just because they are dickheads it doesn't mean everyone else is, okay? Adam and I, we got you. The three of us, the Three Musketeers, we’ll figure out this ledger, and then we'll get everyone out of your hair. Okay?"
I nodded. I could feel the tears pricking behind my lids, but I would not let them fall. Jax Reynolds, if that was even his real name, would not make me cry.
Yeah, sure. I was a complete idiot for falling for those soulful eyes, his hot touches, the heated glances… I'd fallen for that. Believed they were real. Believed that he could care about me.
That was my bad, and I was going to make sure it would never happen again. What’s done was done. The sooner I got rid of Royal Elite, the better off we'd all be.
Three
Jax…
So, this was the game we were playing now.
Neela wasn't talking to me. And I had to pretend that I didn't see her not talking to me. It was ridiculous.
Once I put Mayzie down, I squared my shoulders as I stood outside her room. I knocked gently, but she didn't say anything, didn't come to the door.
And what did you expect, that she'd talk to you?
The thing was, I could hear her moving around in there. She went completely still when I knocked. But after she thought I had walked away, she started moving again. "Neela, I can hear you."
Finally, the footsteps approached the door and she opened it. "What?"
"I just want to—"
She put up a hand and cut me off. "Is this about Mayzie? Is she sick, colicky? Hungry?"
I frowned and shook my head. "No, she's down. She's asleep."
"Then we have nothing to say to each other." She tried to close the door again, but I wedged my foot inside to stop her.
"Look, I know it feels like I betrayed you. Believe me, I wanted to tell you."
"But somehow you managed to not do that and still sleep with me."
She has a point there, wanker. "That wasn't supposed to happen. You know that. I tried to—"
"What? You tried to not fuck me?"
I winced. "That's what you think it was?"
"What else would it be? It's not like you have any real feelings for me. Or like I have any for you, for that matter. You were just a hot body I happened to use."
I knew it was bullshit, but it still stung. "I know you don't mean that."
"You don't know me at all. Just like I don't know you, apparently."
Direct hit. "Look, all I'm trying to tell you is the stuff with you and me wasn't supposed to happen. But the moment you walked into that office, I knew that staying away from you was going to be impossible. And—" I ran my hands through my hair. "I tried. God knows I tried. Then you sent that text and being with you was all that I could think about. I wanted you so bad I finally broke. There was no staying away from you."
It was her turn to wince. "I would rather not be reminded of my mistakes. Or in this case, Bex's."
"I'm not trying to do that. I'm just trying to... explain, I guess. The mission was to protect Mayzie. Protect you. Say nothing. Mai
ntain the cover. I wasn't supposed to fall for you. It wasn't my intention."
"Was any of it real? Anything you said to me?"
"Everything I said to you was true."
"Except for the part where you told me you were a manny."
"For this mission, I am a manny. I just also happen to be a bodyguard."
She glowered at me. "Semantics. You really think you're going to get away with pretending that you did not lie for your own purposes?"
"You think I wanted to lie to you? Do you think I wanted to see that hurt and betrayed look on your face? It's killing me to see it. Knowing I put it there. Knowing I could have stopped it. I begged Ariel to tell you the truth. I thought you could handle it. But you aren't the client."
She winced again. "So I keep being told. Bipps is. And believe me, I would not choose to be the client."
"I understand. I get it. This isn't how you wanted this to happen. Trust me, the last thing I wanted was to tell you this or have you find out this way. And you and I... I didn't plan that. It wasn't supposed to happen. I didn't know it could happen. I was pretty much dead inside. And then in you walked, you and that baby. I started to feel things I was never supposed to feel."
She shook her head, put up her hand, and walked away. "I'm done."
I marched in after her. "Fine. You don't have to talk. I'll talk. I told myself I didn't want any ties. I didn't want a family any more. I didn't want any of it. After what happened the last time, I was just finally starting to get my life back on track. Get my shit together. Coming out of the fog of having everything ripped away from me. You weren't expected. I didn't want to fall for you. Everything I've been working for would be in jeopardy if I did."
She wasn't listening. She was folding Mayzie's clothes, completely ignoring me. But I had to continue.
"Your love and generosity, the way you look at Mayzie, the way you stand up for what you think is right, all those things are what drew me to you. You are strong and stubborn and so damn sexy, and I am honored to even be in your presence. That's how I feel about you. I wish I didn't. I wish I could make it go away. I wish it had never happened. But there it is, the truth. And you can do with it what you will."
She still didn't turn around to face me, but I knew she'd heard me. Her shoulders were stiff and tight and bunched up around her ears. Oh, she'd heard me all right.
What she did with it was up to her. But for the first time since meeting her, I’d told her the complete and utter truth.
Neela…
That thing they said about things looking better in the morning… that was a lie. Nothing looked better in the morning. I still had a gaping hole where my heart should be. I still was no closer to the answers in the ledger. And I still had a goddamn security detail.
Except, now it was worse. One of the other guards, Jameson, had kitted out the second guest house with surveillance equipment and was also staying there.
And I’d made the mistake of letting Jax speak to me. The low rumble of his voice as he told me everything I’d ever wanted to hear from him, or any man, was a recipe for disaster as I’d tried to sleep. Not only because what he said confused me and I didn’t know if I could believe him or not, but also because now that he’d touched me… I was a little addicted.
I needed it. The night before, with him in my doorway smelling like clean spices, I’d almost broken and just kissed him. As it was, I hadn’t been able to sleep. I’d tossed and turned until finally, I’d dragged out the one vibrator I had to my name and put it to good use.
Twice.
Only then had I been able to fall into a fitful sleep with dreams of Jax to keep me riding the edge of need. I’d woken up cranky and irritable and was convinced he could tell exactly what I’d been up to last night. With every glance or accidental—or maybe not-so-accidental—brush of his body that morning, I could see the heat flare in his eyes.
Despite what he’d done, I still wanted him.
My brain tried to perform an intervention: None of it was real.
Had his plan been to sleep with me all along? To make me more malleable?
Libido: But it felt real.
This was what happened when I let my libido drive. This was what happened when I took risks.
My eyes stung, but I refused to cry. I would not cry, for the love of God. I’d messed up, but I sure as hell didn’t need to have a pity party. I had work to do.
Bex met me at the door. “There you are. I was going to mount a search—” She stopped abruptly. “Did he say something to upset you?”
Yes. “No. Let’s get to work.”
I should have known she wouldn’t let it go, though. “Honey. I’ll believe nothing is wrong the moment that I believe Richard has a big dick.”
I shook my head. “Not today Bex. Just… not today.”
She quieted. “Did that fucker do something to you last night?”
In a matter of speaking. “No. And maybe that’s the problem. I love you, but I need you to drop it, okay?”
She frowned at me. “Okay, fine. You don't have to talk about it right now. But you can’t hold it in. No one expects you to fix everything. You are not supposed to. All you can fix is what you can control.”
Adam came in with a wide smile. “Hey, boss lady. I’m still working on the ledger. I have a program trying to work it out.”
“Thanks, Adam.” I hurried into my office and dropped off my bag before either one of them looked too closely. I grabbed my laptop and then I was back out the door again. "Bex, you’re with me at the gallery, right? I want to see if there are any clues in there that will help us figure out that ledger."
Her voice was soft when she answered. "Yeah. I've got a plan for the inventory. Just to make sure we didn't miss anything. Willa was pretty organized with this. I want to see if she's got anything in there that will help me identify who the clients are. She only used numbers and some kind of complex voodoo to ascertain who they are, because deliveries were made, as far as I can tell. But it’s hard to tell what’s what."
Adam slid me another gaze. “While you two do that and the algorithm is running the ledger, I’m going to handle re-pitching some of the clients that left us to go with Richard. We’re almost at one month. We had to let them go, but if they’ve since fired him, we can woo them back.”
Shit. Now I was really going to cry. What the hell had I done to deserve these guys on my team?
“Thank you. Both of you.”
Bex squeezed my hand. “You got it. Now let’s go to the gallery and see what we’re dealing with.”
I cleared my throat. “About that. We’re going to have some company.”
She frowned. “Who?”
“You’ll see.”
The blond woman, Tamsin, was on duty in the foyer, and she stood as soon as we came out.
"How did you know we were coming out?"
She tapped her phone. "You forget we’ve got cameras in there?"
I sighed. "That's going to take some getting used to." I turned to glare at Zia. “Let’s go.”
Bex did not move.
Bex managed to keep her mouth shut about the cameras until we were in the car, but she kept shooting me her wide-eyed, holy-fuck face. When I ignored her, too caught up in my own holy-fuck-I slept-with-a-total-liar spin out, she leaned forward and spoke to Tamsin. "So, let me get this straight. You're just like… a bodyguard." She eyed her up and down. "But you're like… hot."
Tamsin grinned. "Thank you. But just because I'm blonde with perky tits doesn't mean I don't know my way around a gun."
Bex waved a hand. "I know. That's not what I meant, but I don't know. What made you want to, you know, guard bodies? For real though, you guys are like the hot bodyguard agency. I knew there was no way you guys were nannies.”
I could see Zia roll her eyes in the rearview mirror from the driver’s seat, and it brought a small smile to my face.
Considering my mood, I was amazed I was capable of feeling anything besides fury. Not just at
Jax, but at Willa for making any of this necessary.
We were at the gallery in no time. I looked at the gallery, and it was much the same. Zia was in charge of the car, and Tamsin took us inside.
Her head was on a swivel, constantly paying attention. Bex and I went in, and Tamsin took her post. The first place Bex went was straight for the inventory room.
Bex was efficient as hell once she got over the fact that cameras might be everywhere. She was like a little buzzing bee, all over everything. She started at the very tip top and moved her way through, explaining to me which pieces were which, which pieces made no sense, and which ones she couldn't place. There were three or four we couldn't place. Vases and sculptures mostly, and one of them rattled a little inside, making me worried a piece had broken off.
She opened her phone. "I've been trying to track the original artists listed next to each piece. That’s another puzzle all together.”
“Let me do that, actually. I want to feel useful.” I’d brought the journal along to take another crack at it. But I still had no basis for the code, so I was just spinning my wheels.
I dug in, trying to make sense of the current year’s sales. At least they should be easier to track down. That part made sense. The numbers, the dates, the organization. Little puzzle pieces falling into place. Not the mish-mash of bullshit that had become my life of late.
A crash in the inventory room had me on my feet. I ran toward Bex, and she was shaking her head. “Shit. I didn’t mean to. I mean, I picked it up and the damn thing just crumbled out of my hands. I swear to God I—”
I held up my hand to stop the stream of consciousness pouring from her mouth. She’d dropped a sculpture. But amongst the debris was something else. I kneeled down in the mess and brushed the big chunks away.
There was a scroll. I lifted up the stiff paper, slid my thumb under the adhesive and popped it open.
There were more symbols… just like the ones in the journal.
Bex leaned over. “Aren’t those…”
“Yeah, they sure are. This is the code that I need to decipher the text.”
