Page 102 of Damaged Desires

ATHENA: We have the video meeting with the FBI and Brady’s team in thirty minutes. Are you going to be here, or should we hold it without you?

A stab of guilt flew through me. I’d left flowers for her and then not been back to enforce their meaning with a kiss. I certainly didn’t want her to think the flowers had been a goodbye token. Quite the opposite.

“I have to go,” I said, standing in the middle of Henry’s sentence. “Sorry.” I stuck out my hand, shaking his as I added, “It was really good to see you again.”

I turned to my uncle, a mix of old and new emotions flowing through me. “See you back at the house later?”

He nodded, and I left, texting Dani back with a briefI’m on my way.

I jogged out of the building, hopped into the golf cart, and sped off toward the house with my history trying to right itself. With my future trying to take shape. I pushed it all aside to concentrate on the one thing I knew for sure: I needed Dani in my life.

She was set up in the library at Carson’s desk in a top that showed every delightful curve. She smiled up at me from the huge chair. I swirled it around, leaned on the arms, and kissed her, hoping I was sending all the right messages about us. I was in unchartered oceans. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to find my footing on the seafloor with all the swells that were hitting me unless she stood and helped me carry the boat.

We were both breathless when I left her lips to touch our foreheads together. “Good morning.”

“It certainly is,” she said smiling, and my heart leaped for joy. I could make her happy. I could make her happy with just a kiss.

I looked at the work she had sprawled out on the desk, and my eyes caught on a bud vase with the two camellias I’d given her. They were no longer alone. An iris had been added to them. Hope… My breath got stuck in my chest. The word was surrounding me today. Hope for Carson. Hope for me. Hope for Dani and me together.

Her phone buzzed, and she tore her eyes away from my face to turn it over.

“It’s just my reminder. Grab a chair.”

“What I really want to do is sit in that one with you on my lap, but I have a feeling you wouldn’t let me get away with it.”

“No. You’re right. I wouldn’t, but we can talk about sharing a chair later.” She winked at me, and I went right back to kissing her.

She pulled away, laughing. “Go get a chair.”

I did as she wished, grabbing a chair from the other side of the desk. I slid it so that we were sitting close together, knees bumping, as she pulled up the video meeting software and logged in.

There were several other faces in the meeting. Tanner, Brady, and Lee were on one screen together with Garner in the second. On the last screen was the FBI agent, a huge, dark man in a black suit with a straight face and an aura of pissed about him. Tanner had his perpetual look of dissatisfaction on his face, and Lee appeared slightly disheveled as if he’d been playing referee.

Garner was the first to speak. “Thank God you’ve joined us; perhaps you can talk some logic into this lunacy of a plan.”

“What plan?” I asked, my eyes narrowing.

“Dani, Nash, this is FBI agent, Cruz Malone. He’s been assigned to us with the situation crossing so many jurisdictions,” Lee told us.

Malone asked, “You’re the SEAL?”

My arms crossed over my chest, and I nodded.

Malone kept talking. “As I was explaining, this isn’t my normal detail. I’m in the middle of an investigation that’s requiring my coordination with CIA, NSA, and DEA. I don’t have time to sit around and just wait for this Fiona woman to strike.”

“We’re so sorry our little attempted-murder situation is getting in the way of your career,” Tanner said snidely. For the first time, I had to agree with something he’d said.

Malone didn’t let it rile him up. “I’ve been requested to handle this situation because of my knowledge of the music business, and like you, I just want it to be over and done with as quickly as possible.”

“As safely as possible,” I uttered, and Malone seemed to meet my eyes over the computer screen.

“Of course, as safely and quickly as possible.”

“I hardly think it’s safe to put Dani and Brady together in the limelight,” Garner said.

“What?” My voice went down ten octaves, trying to catch up to their meaning.

Malone grunted. “We’ll have your team and an entire team of FBI agents. Nothing is going to go wrong.”