Total pages in book: 59
Estimated words: 55606 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 278(@200wpm)___ 222(@250wpm)___ 185(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 55606 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 278(@200wpm)___ 222(@250wpm)___ 185(@300wpm)
Jasmine allowed it, and he understood that. She was a formidable woman even when he wasn’t recovering. But she didn’t fight him on it, simply let it go.
“We should get going.” The man had a deep, graveled voice.
“Jazzy said she was going to play the game with me while you talked. You barely talked. This man isn’t a problem.” The younger one gestured at Lance. “Besides, he came up from the bedroom wearing only his boxers. He and Jazzy are fucking.”
A bark of laughter slipped from Lance and everyone glanced in his direction. He shrugged without shame. “What? Kid’s right. We are fucking.”
He flexed his fingers into her side and somehow pulled her tighter against him, turning so he could still keep an eye on the unknown male. Lips to her temple, he gazed over her head to find the man watching with a hint of humor and warning in his dark eyes.
“See. Jazzy, you owe me a game.”
“All right, young’un, you seem desperate to get your ass beat.” She patted Lance’s stomach and moved out from the protective circle of his arms. He stared at her as she shimmied over the floor to where the young man fist pumped the air before he bolted to the couch and leaped the back to land on the cushion.
Lance watched Jasmine do the same thing as the young man and soon they were seated by each other, some racing game pulled up on the television. He swung his focus from them to the adult male still lingering in the small kitchen with him.
“Who the fuck are you?”
The mocking grin didn’t ease any concern.
* * * *
The television had some multiplayer shooting game that Den, short for Camden, played. He was playing by himself but didn’t seem to be all that put out by the fact. The volume was low, as were the lights. Evening was upon them, and while the boy played in the living room, Lance sat at the table, his left knee pressing into her right. He had been over-the-top protective since he woke. He’d tugged on a dark blue pair of workout pants but had forgone a shirt.
Mark was across from them, the remnants of their dinner scattered on the speckled tabletop between them.
“Where does that leave us?” Lance’s question was one on her tongue as well and she shrugged, unsure of what the actual answer would be.
Rocking forward until his chair legs hit the floor, Mark rested large forearms on the table, brushing aside the fast-food wrapper before him. “It’s your call, Smoke.” A single shoulder rose and fell laconically. “If it were up to me, I’d dump his ass and let him figure it out on his own. You don’t owe him anything. Helping him puts you in more danger. I still don’t know why you don’t just become a PI. You can move around as much as you like, take the cases you want. Do this, what you do now, but get paid well for it and not be in so much danger.”
Lance’s leg pressed harder against hers but he didn’t speak. He watched. Her. Not Mark, who she focused on.
“You know I can’t leave him to this on his own. They already almost killed him.”
Lance pushed harder. “You both know I’m right here, right? I can hear you. Stop talking about me like I don’t know what mess of shit I’m in.”
That’s the problem, Lance. I don’t think you do know what you’re in. Not fully. Not completely. And definitely not honestly. His subconscious was right, he didn’t know how deep the shit creek he was in ran. Not if he was going to be truthful with himself.
She tore her gaze from Mark’s and met the blue-green gaze of her detective. Jasmine missed the icy green of his natural eye color. “I told you about the setup. How they went to the address they thought you were at and would have killed you had you been there. The decision is yours. You want to pursue this and make them pay for trying to have you killed, I’m here to help however you want.” She angled toward him a bit more, knee sliding against his thigh. “You want to leave and walk away, I’ll help you do that.”
“Do you know Robert is in on it?” A shift in his seat. “Like for certain?”
She recognized it in his voice. A thin thread of need to believe that his years of being undercover hadn’t been a waste. That this clusterfuck hadn’t been but his imagination misinforming him that he had been out on his own, that those he should have expected to protect him were actually a danger.
Jasmine fisted a hand to keep from reaching out to him. “One hundred percent? No. Because his device could have been bugged, I don’t know. But he was the last one I talked to and then the men went to kill you.”