Total pages in book: 165
Estimated words: 154925 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 775(@200wpm)___ 620(@250wpm)___ 516(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 154925 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 775(@200wpm)___ 620(@250wpm)___ 516(@300wpm)
MaeBe had been stabbed. Stabbed.
She was supposed to be safe behind her computer not out in the field where she could get hurt. She was supposed to guide trained agents.
He stood outside her hospital room. He wasn’t allowed to even get close to her door because Michael Malone’s client was in there. Hutch had been allowed in, but the man who cared about her most in the world had been told to sit on his freaking hands because he couldn’t endanger Michael’s op.
So here he was stuck in the damn waiting room while Michael played spy games with a former Hollywood actress.
Mae loved Vanessa Hale’s movies. She was probably in there right now talking to the actress who might or might not be scamming Julian Lodge and asking her all kinds of questions about that horror movie she’d made him watch four times.
He was going to give her such a fucking lecture. When he got in.
“Should I sedate you, man? You look crazy right now. Security is going to show up any minute and take you to the floor where they soothe a dude with heavy meds,” a deep voice said.
Excellent. His uncle was here, and Kyle had a couple of things to say to him, too. He stood and turned. “She is not supposed to be out in the damn field, Ian.”
His uncle wore workout clothes and had likely come over from The Club where he had a weekly therapy group that masked itself as a basketball game. It was a bunch of old guys talking through their shit while pretending they could still play.
Kyle had been invited. He found lots of ways to avoid that particular meeting.
His uncle shook his head and sat back in one of the seats. “It’s always Uncle when he wants something and Ian when he’s about to be unreasonable. You know she’s an adult and can make choices and was not in any way forced to take this job, right?”
“She’s also submissive and eager to please the only family she thinks she has.”
Ian’s eyes rolled. “She’s not that submissive. Oh, I’m sure she would be in very specific places, but Mae can take charge when she needs to, and she doesn’t hesitate to negotiate. She’s been eager to do fieldwork, and this was an easy job.”
“Then how did she get stabbed?”
“The same way she could have been stabbed on the train or walking down the street. She got stabbed because she saw something terrible about to happen and she intervened. She’s a good person and she’s not afraid to stand up when she sees an injustice,” Ian said with a frown. “She’s a lot like your mom and your aunt. I’m going to give you some advice. Don’t smother her. If you can’t love her for who she is and not who you think she should be, walk away now. And stop going behind her back trying to make decisions for her when you don’t even have a real claim on her. Honestly, don’t do that when you do have a claim on her. She might not know how to properly deball a man, but she has friends who would love to help her out. When you get in there, take care of her. Treat her like your friend and coworker and not some porcelain doll you need to protect. It’ll go better for you in the long run.”
He wasn’t trying to smother her. He was trying to keep her healthy and whole. At some point he fully intended to convince her to go and work for Adam because Adam Miles would never send her out into the field to get her ass kicked. If she was working for Miles-Dean, Weston and Murdoch, she wouldn’t be lying in a hospital bed. “How about you let me worry about my…about MaeBe.”
Ian pointed his way, a gotcha look on his face. “You were going to say sub, but she’s not wearing your collar. I knew you thought of her that way.”
His uncle was so old-fashioned and a bit hypocritical. “There’s more than one way to practice BDSM.”
It seemed like every head in the room swiveled their way because he should have kept his voice down.
Ian sighed and sat back. “I worry you’re not practicing anything but evasion.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“It means you’re never going to be ready for her if you don’t confront what happened with Julia Ennis.”
He paced, his voice going low. “I don’t have to because it’s over. I can utterly ignore it because she is no longer on this earth, and I can move on. I’m ready to move on. I do not get why you and all those people who run out of Kai’s office feel the desperate need to live in the past, but I don’t. I’m better. I’m happy. I’m not leaving.”