“Isn’t this al a bit much?”

He shook his head.

“It had to cost a fortune, who paid for it?” I went on.

“Most of the equipment is kept in stock. Any extras were purchased according to the Rock Chick they were meant to protect.”

Oh dear.

“What does that mean?” I was afraid I knew the answer before I asked the question.

“I paid for it.”

I closed my eyes. That was the answer I was afraid I knew.

Juno woofed in approval.

I opened my eyes.

Juno located the bed, trotted up and down stairs, made it to the bed, jumped up to it, settled on her bel y, put her head on her front paws and watched us.

“How did you get it done so quickly?” I asked, not knowing anything about alarm systems and surveil ance equipment but this seemed a pretty extensive set up to put in place in two days.

“Vance is good and he’s fast, lots of practice. Monty too.

They prioritized. Hank, Eddie, Nick and Vance al need windows instal ed, they’re staying at The Castle until the windows are replaced and the clean up done. That meant Vance and Monty could focus on Lee and Indy’s duplex and Lee put in a sophisticated alarm system a few months ago so they just had camera work. Same with Luke and Ava’s loft, it already has high security so they just needed the cameras re-instal ed. The bulk of the work was needed here.”

I wasn’t sure how much more guilty I could feel but I figured I was just about at my guilt limit before my body spontaneously combusted with it.

“How did you arrange so much cover with the cops?”

“Indy and Al y are cops’ daughters, Lee’s a cop’s son.

Hank and Eddie are cops. To them, this is a family affair.

You’ve been adopted. And Sid is responsible for a lot of shit in this town. Everyone wants to see him brought down but no one wants col ateral damage especial y if it’s in the family.”

Sheesh.

Wel , lucky I’d been “adopted”.

Okay, one last thing.

“I’ve got gigs this weekend, Friday and Saturday nights and Sunday afternoon.”

“I know. We’ve talked to the club owners. We do a sweep before they open. We got men assigned on the inside and no one gets in without getting their bags checked and they’re wanded, including employees.” Wanded?

They were gonna wand people coming to my gigs?

Shit.

After he was done talking, he waited a beat then got closer.

“Any more questions?”

Yes, like, a million! My brain screamed.

I shook my head.

“Now I got one,” he told me.

“Okay,” I said softly.

“Why’re you shakin’?”

I blinked.

“I don’t know,” I lied. I knew. I total y knew. I was scared shitless.

He got even closer, his other hand came to rest at my waist and the fingers of his hand at my neck gave me a squeeze. For some reason, this made me quit shaking.

“I’m gonna take care of you,” he promised, his deep voice low.

“I don’t want that,” I lied again. I so wanted that. I just couldn’t al ow myself to have it.

Another neck squeeze.

“You should have thought about that before your ‘I want a vote’ speech this morning.”

He was not wrong about that. I should have thought about a lot of things before my speech that morning.

“No, what I mean is, I know I need protection, I just don’t want you to do it. Assign someone else to me.” I thought for a second about my choices and I picked the baddest-ass-looking one of the bunch. “I’l take Hector.” There was an eye flash but this was not unreadable like the other ones. This one screamed “Anger!” from start to finish.

“Two reasons you aren’t gonna get Hector.” Mace’s voice had an edge.

I ignored Mace’s edge and put a hand to one of my hips.

“They are?”

“One, because in about twenty-four hours, he’d have you flat on your back, him on top and both of you would be naked.”

At his words, my body froze, my eyes bugged out, my hands clenched into fists but, either oblivious or uncaring about the shocking insult he just dealt me, Mace kept right on talking.

“He’s itching for it. I can see it in him the way he looks at you. He and I are gonna have words but bottom line, when it comes to you, that’s not gonna happen.”

“You’ve lost your mind,” I breathed.

Mace ignored me. “Reason two is because you’re mine.

End of discussion.”

Not end of discussion.

I decided to start my battle on the first annoying thing he said and advance right on through the rest of it until he got it into his macho, stubborn, effing head!

“I would not sleep with Hector in twenty-four hours!” I snapped.

“Yeah, you would. He’s good. He’s better than Eddie was. Better even than Vance and Vance was a Denver legend.”

I’d lived in Denver a long time. I knew a lot of people, half of them women.

Had to admit, I’d heard of Vance, hel , I’d heard of Eddie (and Lee).

Pre-Rock Chicks, they were al legends.

Focus! My brain shouted at me.

I focused.

“I’m not that type of girl!”

“Kitten, I f**ked you on our first date.” He had me there.

“That never happened before, it only happened because it was you,” I retorted, too swiftly, thus not thinking my words through, as in, not thinking that maybe I shouldn’t say them at al .

He got closer, his hand at my waist slid around my back, his hand at my neck went up and around so his fingers went into my hair and his palm was warm against the base of my neck. The front of his body was touching mine.

Al of that felt real y, really good.

Oh lordy be.

“Yeah?” he asked, eyes warm and smiling.

My heart began to beat a bit faster.

Shitsofuckit!

I real y had to start thinking before I spoke. Or just thinking at all.

“Whatever.” I blew it off as if it was nothing and the smile in his eyes reached his mouth.

Bastard!

“I’m not yours!” I shouted, advancing on to battle number two.

“You are.”

“Am not.”

“Kitten, you are.”

“Nope. Nunh-unh. No way. Never again!” I ended on another shout.

His head dipped, his smile deepened and his eyes got that I’m-gonna-kiss-you look I liked so f**king much.

“God, I missed you,” he muttered and he said it in a way that, again, I didn’t think he meant to say it out loud.