“Daisy,” I took a step toward her, “I think Dad’s got an old desk in the garage. I can get him to unearth that and get it here. We’ll get you a decent desk. Other than that—”

I said no more because Daisy snapped, “What?”

“Oh no, child,” Shirleen entered the conversation. “You got a choice spot here. You don’t move some old desk into it, slap a computer on the top and say ‘I’m in business.’ You gotta send the right message. And that message is you ain’t Rockford. You’re Allyson Nightingale, a fine piece of badass ass with class who can take care of biz-nezz.”

“And the right message is also cherry wood,” Daisy proclaimed.

“Oak,” Shirleen countered immediately.

“Black,” Ralphie stated and looked at me. “It’ll set off The Majestic.”

“Uh… guys, I don’t have any money for carpet, paint, office furniture or fancy paintings,” I shared.

“Sadie will give you a discount,” Ralphie assured me on a big smile.

“Okay, let me amend,” I began. “I have some clothes. Someday hopefully soon, I’ll have an insurance check that will need to be used to buy me more clothes and various and sundry other items, like jewelry, roller brushes and CDs. And whatever paltry sum I have after that I’ll need to use to live on until Daisy and I make a go of this.”

Daisy chimed in, “Me and Marcus’ll—”

“No, honey,” I cut her off gently. “You won’t.”

Daisy’s face fell.

“A minute,” Ren said, and then I found myself dragged into the hall with my hand in his.

I knew what was coming, so the minute he stopped me in front of him, I started, “Baby—”

“You got twenty-five thousand dollars.”

My mouth dropped open.

Then I snapped it shut and closed my eyes.

I opened them and leaned in, putting my hand with the coffee cup to his chest.

“That’s very sweet, honey, but no way. I haven’t even talked to you about paying you back for the year’s rent. I can’t take—”

“You aren’t taking.”

I blinked. “What?”

“I’m investing. We can discuss distribution of your profits when you make them. Until then, it’s an investment.”

“You’re investing?”

“I’m investing.”

“In me?”

“Yes.”

I swallowed, feeling good things, really good things, but unsure.

“I don’t know,” I whispered. “What if I can’t—?”

His hand dropped mine so he could wrap it around the side of my neck and he dipped his face close, ordering, “Don’t.”

“Don’t what?”

“Don’t doubt yourself. Not now. Until this moment, you were sure. Very sure. Be sure. Take the investment, make those offices something that anyone walking into them will trust you’ll get the job done, then be sure and get the job done.”

Well, one could say Ren was succeeding wildly in trying to be okay with me opening a private investigations agency.

Still.

“This is too much,” I whispered.

“It’s investing in your future, which is tangled with my future. How is that too much?” he asked.

I said nothing.

“If I didn’t have a plan and was at odds and you were in the position to invest in something I wanted to do, would you do it?” Ren pressed.

“Absolutely,” I answered.

“So because you’re a badass, you can’t take the same from me?” he pushed.

Seriously.

Totally.

Completely.

How awesome was my man?

To share this with him, I muttered, “Okay, okay. You’ve convinced me.”

“Good, then kiss me and go in there and tell them they got twenty-five K to blow on makin’ my woman’s space right for her.”

I stared into his beautiful eyes.

Then I whispered, “You’re totally the shit, Zano.”

“I know,” he whispered back.

I leaned in and up and kissed him.

He kissed me back, wet and deep.

When he broke the kiss, I didn’t move away, so I could say, “Though, as awesome as it is, you doing this for me and investing in our future, it was awesomer, you giving shit to Dawn.”

Ren burst out laughing.

I pressed close and watched, smiling the whole time.

When he was done, I got up on my toes, touched my lips to his, pulled back and moved away.

But I blew him a real kiss before I walked into my new kickass offices to tell the gang they had twenty-five Gs to blow in making them killer.

And it was with no doubt that Ren heard the shrieks and squeals when I did.

By the way, we decided on gray carpet, gray walls and black furniture.

And when Sadie sent a text picture of The Majestic to me and offered the Rock Chick Discount (in other words, free) with a text that said, Remember. I’m loaded, we decided on that, too.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Never Forgive

I’d found a parking spot three blocks away from the Lucy in Cherry Creek North but as I was hoofing it up to the store I saw Darius’s Silverado parked three cars down from the front door.

Lee and his boys always managed to do that. It was some kind of voodoo but they had parking magic.

It was annoying, especially after driving by Lucy (twice) to find a parking spot that Darius obviously got after me and hoofing three blocks.

Darius was sitting behind the wheel of his truck. I stopped outside Lucy, where Darius and Brody were supposed to meet me, and sent a salute his way to get his attention even though it looked like his wire-rimmed shades were aimed my way.

He lifted a hand and did a full finger curl indicating I should haul my ass to his truck.

Badasses.

Save me.

I sighed and moved to his truck, yanked open the door, climbed in and turned to him.

“I have a full day and I need to shop,” I said by way of greeting. “So if we can multi-task, that’d work in a big way for me.”

“Then it’s good this meetin’ is gonna go fast because my ass is not gonna be in that store,” Darius replied by way of his.

I knew it.

Whatever.

“Is Brody coming?” I asked. “I texted him and he hasn’t replied.”

“He’s neck deep in used energy drink cans, his eyes are bloodshot and he’s glued to the computer. He’s on a mission to find out who’s writin’ those books and he’s runnin’ up against wall after wall. He’s taken this on as a personal challenge. I think the only break he took since this all went down was to go to Luke and Ava’s thing.”