Page 22 of False Start

“Besides — this would guarantee that I wouldn’t rush buying a house. I wouldn’t be in a hurry to get you your commission if I knew I could watch over you in the meantime.”

“I don’t need—”

“I know you don’t need me,” he said, cutting me off. His eyes flashed with something achingly familiar when he added, “But I need you.”

I swallowed past the wad of sandpaper in my throat, searching his gaze as I tried to find something, anything, to say to that.

“Come on, Mads,” he said after a while, one corner of his mouth ticking up mischievously. “What do you say? Do we have a deal?”

Kyle

It was a dumb fucking idea.

I knew it, and had I stopped long enough to consider what I was proposing before I actually opened my mouth, I likely would have shoved the idea down and never spoken it out loud.

As it was, seeing those bruises on Madelyn’s arm had my brain short circuiting.

I didn’t care about being logical.

I only cared about making sure she was okay.

The truth of that made me frown a little as I waited for her to respond, because the first time I’d seen her after all those years, I’d wanted to hurt her. I’d wanted her to feel the pain she’d put me through.

Now, I was trying to keep her from pain.

I was a walking contradiction.

“Well?” I probed again when she didn’t answer, the word echoing in the empty foyer where we stood.

Madelyn’s soft brown eyes flicked between mine, and then she blew out a breath, shaking her head and looking up to the ceiling.

“I can’t believe I’m saying this, but… fine.”

Inside, I threw a fist into the air in victory.

On the outside, I simply smirked.

“But I have conditions,” she added with a finger pointed straight at my chest. She was using that thing like a damn weapon today.

“Name them.”

“No fighting with Marshall.”

Marshall.

So that was the fucker’s name.

Madelyn must have seen how tense my jaw was because she arched a threatening brow. “I mean it. If you go fighting him, it’s going to cause more issues for me. So, be the six-foot-seven bodyguard all you want, but do not goad him, do not call him names, and do not lay a finger on him.”

“I won’t,” I promise. “Unless he lays a finger onyou.”

Madelyn’s brows tugged inward, just a little, as if she didn’t understand why I would care if he did. But she listed her next condition before I could think too much on that reaction.

“No one lays a finger on me. You included.”

It was my turn to cock a brow.

“We can…pretendall you want,” she said with a wave of her hand. “But let’s not forget the reality. We aren’t even friends, let alone anything more. Don’t go holding my hand or touching my back or trying to sneak in a kiss.”