“I love Tamsin too. You don’t think this is a little … intense?”
“I do. We’ve got to talk at some point. My brothers over our father. He is crossing the line with Tamsin. Can you believe he’ll make her move cities? She loves this place. I don’t see that happening any time soon.”
Emma waited as he loaded and prepared each gun.
Taking the band out of her hair, she turned her back toward him. “Will you help me out of this dress?”
“Yes.”
He put the guns down and walked toward her.
The moment his fingers touched her skin, she closed her eyes, relishing the contact. He lowered the zipper down, and helped her push the dress from her body. His hands wrapped around her, lips on her shoulder. “He didn’t hurt you, did he?”
“No, it’s fine.”
“It’s not fine. I’ll deal with him.”
“He’s too dangerous for you to deal with. We have to be careful about this, smart.”
“I will. I’ll fucking kill him.”
She turned in his arms, wrapping hers around his neck. “No, you won’t.”
“Why not.”
“Because … you can’t.”
This made him pause, and she hated how much she knew about his father. It wasn’t like she went out of her way to find stuff out. It was always just there, readily available. All it had taken were a few little sneak peeks for her to find out everything she knew.
He cupped her cheek. “You know things.”
“I do.”
“Tell me what you know.”
“Maddox has some kind of bounty on his head. I don’t know if it’s called a bounty, but he has a thing in place where, if it’s found that he’s died in any other means other than natural causes, there’s an instant price of over ten million dollars on that person’s head.”
“That’s a lot of money,” he said.
“Your dad has a lot of enemies.”
“How did you find this?”
“Special files. I stole the key and checked. He also has files on all of you and your women. Apart from you and Tamsin. He didn’t know who your woman was.” She didn’t doubt he’d made up a file.
“So he can’t be killed.”
“He can be killed. You can’t be the one to do it.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t want you to die, Gideon. I like having you around.”
“You like having me around. Am I like a pet?” he asked.
She sighed. “I don’t know. We’ve become, like, a team right now. I fuck up and so do you.” She forced a smile.
The truth was, since returning to the Denton household, she’d felt like her days were numbered. The look in Maddox’s eye confirmed it.