“I wish I’d passed by sooner,” he says calmly. “But from what I saw, you did just fine.” He glances down at the guy with distaste. “Want me to take care of this garbage for you?”
Tony looks ready to pound the guy into mincemeat right there on the street, and I’m tempted to let him do it. I, however, have a better idea. “He’s been loitering around the Stark Century. I say we let Damien handle it.”
Tony laughs. “Nikki,” he says with a grin. “I like the way you think.”
* * * *
I bend forward, my eyes locked with Damien’s as he moves inside me. I’m straddling him, watching the fear and fury slowly ease from his face.
He came the moment the hotel called, and once the attacker was off the premises and with the police, he aimed me upstairs.
“Nikki.” The word seemed ripped from him as we entered our suite, and it still hung in the air when he pushed me back against the wall and claimed my mouth with his.
He’s said nothing else since, but I know what he’s thinking. What he’s doing. He’s thinking he could have lost me. And he’s facing his fear the way that Damien does. By grabbing tight. In this case, to me.
I rock my hips as I feel the tension build inside both of us, recalling his anger when he learned that my attacker had been turned down for a job as a front desk clerk. He’d seen me with Damien, realized who I was, and decided to work out his frustrations.
Tony, thankfully, had just left the redhead. He’d been walking to his own hotel when he saw me break away and start running.
“If anything had happened to you—” Damien says now, flipping us over so that my back is to the mattress and my knees are bent. He’s deep inside me. Claiming me. Facing the core of his biggest fear—losing me.
The thought both humbles and excites me, and I cling to Damien, urging him deeper, harder, until we are both lost in the motions of making love. Of claiming each other and burying our shared fears in passion.
Our orgasms come fast and hard, and afterwards, we lay twined together. “I’m so sorry, baby. I should have been there.”
“I’m fine. I was scared, but I’m okay. And luckily Tony was around to catch him. Not a guy I’d like to know was running loose in Paris.”
“Agree. I’d give him a raise if he worked for me.”
I laugh and snuggle closer.
“I’m so proud of you,” he whispers, brushing my temple with a kiss. “You were amazing.”
“Thanks. And thanks for this trip. I’ll never lose myself in that bubble again, and that’s okay. I want to live in the real world, and not worry about all the dark clouds.”
“You’re not afraid anymore?”
“I’m not saying I’m one hundred percent, and I’ll still go to counseling because it helps. But fear isn’t going to get the better of me anymore. I’m stronger than I think I am, and a lot of that is because you’re always with me, even when you’re not.”
“I am,” he says. “Don’t ever forget it.”
“I won’t. The truth is, I’ve always known it.” I meet his eyes. “Thank you for bringing me here and reminding me.”
* * * *
I have no idea how long I sleep, but I’m dreaming of the kids and breakfast when I wake, so disoriented I can smell bacon and hear the laughter of my girls.
Except…
I roll out of bed, tugging on the hotel robe that I’d thrown across a chair. I hurry down the long hallway and find my girls and Damien seated at the table by the window in the sitting room, a room-service catered buffet lining the opposite wall.
“Mommy!” Both girls cry out in unison, and Lara jumps off her chair and races toward me. Anne follows on her much shorter legs.
I bend to them and swoop them into my arms, kiss them fiercely, then raise my face to Damien, who looks ridiculously proud of himself. “Thank you,” I say. “But how?”
He just grins as footsteps approach from behind us.
I turn to see Jamie and Ryan enter the room. “Best babysitting job ever,” Jamie says. “Definitely count us in for schlepping your kids anywhere on the globe. So long as Damien provides the transportation.”
“We flew on the jet, Mommy,” Lara tells me. “Anne slept mostly, but I got to sit in the cockpit.”
“You did. With Grayson?”
“No time to get Grayson there and back again,” Damien tells me. “But we’ll all go home with him together.”
I grin, loving the sound of that.
“Can we ’splore, Daddy?” Lara asks, taking Anne’s hand. She means explore, and it’s her favorite thing to do in new places. I think she believes she’ll find a secret passage to Narnia. And in one of Damien’s properties, that kind of magic might be possible.
“I haven’t been to Paris in ages,” Jamie says, snagging a piece of bacon as the girls scamper. She uses it to indicate Ryan. “And even though he says we only did it as a favor to Damien, I saw him researching sex clubs on his phone during the flight.”
“I think you’re confusing my browser history with yours. Shall we compare?”
Jamie crosses her arms and stares him down. “Are you trying to tell me that you aren’t interested in a sex club?”
I meet Damien’s eyes; he looks as amused as I am.
Ryan’s lips curve in the hint of a smile. “Kitten,” he says, “I don’t need to research.”
She smacks him lightly on the shoulder. “All I can say is your knowledge better have been obtained before you married me.”
He laughs, holding his hands up in surrender.
I raise a brow. “You guys are like an X-rated Ricky and Lucy.”
Jamie cocks her head. “Funny. What about you two? Got any recommendations?”
I allow myself a small grin and a sideways glance at my husband. “We’ll talk.”
Chapter Ten
Damien leaned back on his elbows, his face to the sky. The sun was shining, flowers were blooming, his wife’s head was resting on his stomach as she napped in the sun, and his two little girls were chasing each other around the picnic blanket and giggling like fiends.
He was soaking up the sun in Paris surrounded by his family, all happy and safe.
On the whole, life was pretty damn good.
He intended it to stay that way.
They’d come to the Tuileries after he and Ryan had squeezed in one more meeting with Antonio. “Your wife’s an incredible woman,” he’d said. “She didn’t deserve that.”
“No,” Damien had agreed. “She didn’t.”
“But from what I saw, she was amazing. How’s she doing now?”
“Good,” Damien assured him. “Shaken, but fine.” He’d smiled to himself when he’d added, “She’s stronger than she seems. And stronger than she thinks.”
“Most people are,” Antonio had said. He’d paused, looking like he wanted to say something, but didn’t know where to start. Damien gave him time, waiting until Antonio finally looked between him and Ryan and said, “Listen, Stark. Hunter. I like what you’re doing, and you both seem like good guys. Dallas and Quincy vouch for you both, and that says a lot to me. But I can’t sign on. Not now. I’ve got—well, I think you both know I’ve got things to do. But don’t write me off, okay?”
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Damien had said, glancing at Ryan with a subtle nod, at which point Ryan took the ball.
“Any time you change your mind, you say the word and you’re in,” Ryan told him. “And if you need help, Stark Security is there for you. Anytime. Anything.”
Antonio leaned back with a chuckle. “Nice offer, but I won’t hold you to it. You two might not have been listening to me when we met the other day. Let’s just say that I want answers, and I don’t mind cutting corners to get them.”
“Do you think we don’t understand that sometimes you have to push the envelope?” Damien asked. “Anytime. Anything. That’s a promise.”
“Okay.” Antonio had said the word slowly, then extended his hand to both of them. “I’ll be
in touch.”
Damien hoped he would. Stark Security needed people who weren’t afraid to break the rules. Who knew how to get answers and how to help.
Ryan had left him after the meeting to pick up Jamie. They were off to explore the city before heading out for a tour of Versailles in the morning. Damien didn’t envy them two days of walking. At the moment, he was more than content to relax on a blanket under the Parisian sky with his wife while his children ran and laughed and sang silly songs.
Today, the Stark family was hanging out, being lazy in the shadow of the Louvre. They deserved it.
He reached down, running his fingers through Nikki’s golden hair, listening to her soft sighs.
“This day,” he said. “If I could package this day, I’d make a fortune. But I wouldn’t sell it.”
Nikki turned her head, lifting a hand to shade her eyes. “Because you already have a fortune?”
“I do,” he said. “But I still want more.”
“More money?”
“More of this. I’d keep it bottled up so that I always had this day. With you. With the girls.”
Her smile lit her face. “Will you share the bottle with me?”
“Always.”
“Good.” She stretched, then sat up as Lara called from near the duck pond, “Mommy! Mommy, we want apple slices!”
“Duty calls,” she said, then kissed him lightly before standing and rummaging in the wicker picnic basket that the hotel kitchen had packed for them.
He watched as she headed toward the pond, then sat with the girls. As Anne pointed at the ducks and Lara kept up a constant chatter, Nikki distributed apple slices, hugs, and kisses.
As for Damien, he simply watched, mesmerized by his family. By the swell of his heart when he looked at them, the pride he felt that Nikki was his—that this family was theirs—outweighing everything else he’d accomplished in this world.
He wondered if she fully understood what she was to him. If she realized that she was the core of his strength, even as she was his greatest weakness.
She came over to him, a teasing smile dancing on her lips as she offered him an apple slice. “You look like you’re thinking deep thoughts. Everything okay?”
He took the fruit, then tugged on her wrist until she gave in and collapsed, laughing, into his arms.
He quieted her with a kiss, long and deep and deliciously sweet. “I’m great,” he whispered when they broke the kiss. “How could I be anything else with you by my side?”
“Sweet talker.”
“Truth teller.” He studied her face, then took her hands in his. “Let’s renew our vows.”
She leaned back, clearly surprised. “Mr. Stark. Are you proposing?”
“I suppose I am. I thought about what you said. About how the yard at the Rodin Museum would be perfect for a wedding. I’m not saying we should do it there, but somewhere, and this time not just us.”
“Regrets, Mr. Stark?”
He could tell from the curve of her mouth and the tease in her voice that she knew damn well he had no regrets around their elopement. But he didn’t tease her back. He just said simply, “None.”
She studied him, her eyes moving slightly as if she was reading the truth on his face. “What brought this on? Just the museum?”
“I think that planted a seed. Remembering the night at the club helped it bloom.”
“À la Lune?” She sounded understandably confused.
“Don’t worry. I want our renewal to be clothed. And G-rated,” he added with a nod to the girls, who were twirling with their arms out, making themselves dizzy, then falling to the ground. “But I liked what you said.”