Total pages in book: 150
Estimated words: 148434 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 742(@200wpm)___ 594(@250wpm)___ 495(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 148434 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 742(@200wpm)___ 594(@250wpm)___ 495(@300wpm)
They’re all turned towards this table like my ass on this hot seat is a nine o’clock blockbuster. And they’re viewing it for fucking free.
“Thatcher Alessio Moretti,” Eliot says with the raise of his wine. He knows my middle name. It’s a public fact. But his drawn-out, embellished delivery snakes a chill down my spine.
I stare him down. Remembering the night I picked his drunk ass off the floor—Eliot is destructive. Most of her brothers are like ticking bombs on the verge of explosion.
Just don’t set one off.
If he were my nineteen-year-old wild-hearted brother, I’d rip the bottle out of his hand.
Jane shoots out of her seat and careens forward. “Eliot. You promised you’d be better about this.” She tries to steal the wine.
He yanks back. “I’m not drinking in excess, Jane.”
She reaches further.
He lifts the wine over his head and gasps. “Why so edgy? We’re all just talking. For now.” He winks at me.
I’m not scared.
But I also can’t tell if he’s bluffing. There could be nothing but smoke behind the curtain. For as intensely as they’re studying my stern features, I’m guessing they can’t read me any better than I can them.
Jane snaps at Eliot in French. He responds with less heat in the same language, and while they argue, Charlie tears the wine out of Eliot’s hands.
“Brother,” Eliot glares.
Charlie ignores him and puts the bottle to his lips.
Comms sound in my ear. “Take the wine from Charlie,” Oscar instructs. “He’ll appreciate it.”
Copy that. I listen to Charlie’s bodyguard and extend my hand towards the Merlot.
Charlie scrutinizes me for a long oxygen-caging second. He wipes the corner of his mouth with a finger, his intrusive eyes crawling down me. And then he passes me the wine.
“You have to drink it,” Oscar says.
I almost stiffen. Don’t freeze up like a motherfucking shitbag.
I try to kick my ass into gear, but a nagging voice growls, stay sober. Adding to the mess upstairs in my head, Eliot and Tom’s Epsilon bodyguards start spewing shit on comms.
“Stop helping Thatcher.”
“This shouldn’t be easy for him. He fucked the team.”
They want me to hear their complaints. Or else they’d forget the radio and just turn to Oscar who’s beside them at the bar.
Guilt hammers my ribcage, but I shove it down. I’ve got an objective to see through.
Make a choice.
I swig the wine, and then I lower my radio volume a notch before handing the bottle to Jane.
“Thank you,” she says softly to me and takes the heftiest gulp. Scratch that—three gulps, and just when I think she’s done, a second from taking the bottle, she holds up a finger and swallows more wine.
She has a high tolerance. She’s not approaching drunk. Probably not even buzzed, and I’m glad one of us can down that much right now.
I curve my arm around her chair. Waiting for when she’s ready.
She finally shoves it in my opened hand. “Liquid reinforcements,” she whispers to me, wine trickling down her chin. I wipe the red liquid off with my thumb.
She blushes, and our eyes attach deeper.
Blood pulses in my cock, and I could kiss Jane. I’m a millisecond from dipping my head down—
“Do you have anything to say?” Beckett asks, stealing my attention. He blows a filmy line of smoke upward.
I nod a few times.
He’s calm, but I can’t discount the threatening look in his eye. They’re all protective of their older sister. And I understand how they’d want to guarantee no harm invades her life. Fuckbags after targets after shitheads surround her on a daily basis, and if they need me to prove that I’m not one of them, they don’t even need to command me to jump.
I’ll already be off the ground.
“Yeah,” I nod, about to start talking in length. “Look, I love Jane—”
“That’s funny,” Charlie cuts me off. “Considering a week ago, none of us thought you were even attracted to her.”
It throws me back. Not physically.
I’m mentally wrenched to a moment I shared with Jane.
To the night she told me her brothers and little sister wanted her to “open herself up” to love, and subsequently heartbreak. Because they thought her feelings were one-sided, un-fucking-reciprocated, and that I’d never be interested in her sexually or romantically.
She gushed all of this to me.
And then as I was tying my boots, she said, “I can’t blame them, really.”
I knotted my lace. Thinking she’d mention how I wasn’t easy to read. That I was too stoic for her siblings to conclude anything but disinterest on my end. Or at the very least, that I was a professional bodyguard and I would’ve forced my dick down during the fake-dating op.
But she said, “Your type doesn’t usually fall for my type in popular culture.”
It struck me hard. Painfully. I sent a narrowed look over my shoulder. “Why wouldn’t my type be into you?”