by Regan Black
“Dad, please stop. This has already been an upsetting day. I’m with Liam now. I don’t need any more stress.”
“Do you want to leave your son without a mother?” Raul asked, his voice harsh. “If you don’t listen to me, that’s what’s going to happen.”
She’d had enough. “You sent me a bodyguard,” she reminded him, refusing to give him the satisfaction of letting him know how much his choice of men bothered her. “How about you just let him do his job?” She ended the call, turning to find her son standing uncertainly in the doorway, watching her with wide eyes, his lower lip trembling.
“Mama?” he asked, his expressive little face crumpling in reaction to her harsh tone, about to break out in sobs at any moment.
“Shh, it’s okay, sweetheart,” she soothed, picking him up and cuddling him close. She caught a glimpse of Kara leaning against the wall playing on her phone. When the nanny realized Eva was watching, she shoved the phone into her pocket and started forward to no doubt retrieve Liam.
“It’s okay,” Eva forestalled her. “I’ll call you if I need you.”
Kara nodded, drifting away, and disappeared in her room, glancing sideways and fluttering her eyelashes at Jesse as she passed him.
Carrying Liam downstairs and into the kitchen, Eva settled him in his high chair and got him his favorite snack, along with his sippy cup and milk. This cheered him up immensely and he happily occupied himself with his snack.
Exhaustion settling over her, Eva turned and eyed Jesse, silently standing just inside the entrance. As always, he managed to look dangerously sexy, without even trying.
“That was my father on the phone,” she said.
He smiled. “I figured as much. How is Raul?”
“He wants me to come home, back within the bosom of BOS,” she said, not bothering to keep the bitterness out of her voice. “He thinks I’ll be safer there, with all the Brothers watching out for me.”
“He has a point.” Jesse’s steady gaze met hers. “How do you feel about that?”
“You know darn well how I feel about it.” Her sharp tone made Liam frown. She took a deep breath, trying to settle herself down. “My father says my life is in danger.”
Jesse’s eyes narrowed. “Raul is usually right about stuff like that. You know he loves you. If you do as he asks and go back to the club, you won’t have to worry about protection.”
“Is that what you think I should do?” she asked, surprising herself. But then again, whatever had happened between the two of them, Eva knew she could always trust Jesse. He and she might stand for different things, but he’d never once lied to her.
“Do you really care what I think?” he asked, crossing his arms. “You haven’t spoken two words to me since I got here, until today.”
Dipping her chin, she acknowledged the accuracy of his remark. She thought of Drew, of the way he’d jerked backward when the bullet hit him, right before he fell. Though she’d been waiting to feel something other than shock, she still felt empty inside. Dry-eyed, as if her new reality didn’t seem real.
Even though she’d asked Drew for a divorce and he’d turned her down, threatening to take Liam if she tried, she knew she ought to feel something. Sorrow, that his life had been cut too short. Worry, that someone had murdered him in cold blood and might be after her and her son. Something, anything other than the echoing hollowness that had crept through her blood, making her grow more numb day by day.
Could she even come back from that? She had to, for the sake of her son.
Inhaling, she met and held Jesse’s gaze. “Tomorrow I’ve got to go see about making funeral arrangements. I’d like to leave Liam with Kara. Will you make sure there’s extra security here at the house? I can’t risk someone trying to get to him.”
“Consider it done,” Jesse replied. “I just need to make a few phone calls.”
“Sounds good.” She turned her back on him, hoping he’d go take care of whatever he needed to do. She didn’t like the way Jesse was the only person who could cut through the numbness. Especially since he could never ever be part of her life again.
Copyright © 2021 by Karen Whiddon
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ISBN-13: 9781488071324
Colton’s Dangerous Liaison
Copyright © 2021 by Harlequin Books S.A.
Special thanks and acknowledgment are given to Regan Black for her contribution to The Coltons of Grave Gulch miniseries.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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