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I was in a dream, and nothing was going to disturb the blissful peace that had descended on Emerson and me. We woke up that morning, tangled up in each other's arms and legs, our mouths finding the first bit of flesh we could kiss. It was closer to lunch by the time we made it downstairs, but she insisted on cooking me a lavish breakfast.

“How can I say no to a meal cooked just for me by Khoroshiy’s head chef?”

“You can’t,” she said, and adorably flounced across the kitchen to pull out eggs and bacon.

“Tell me what to do,” I said. “You know I can hold my own. I’ve even created a special or two at the restaurant in the past.”

She assigned me the pancake batter, watching over me like too much baking powder would cause civilization’s collapse. We ended up in an ill-conceived food fight that she stopped before I could mash banana into her hair. By the time everything was put together, we were laughing almost too hard to eat.

“Look,” I said, showing her the date on my phone. “It’s Thursday, your day off. So you can’t complain about not going in.”

“Who said I would have complained,” she answered, rubbing her neck. “I’m sore all over, and not just from you.”

I frowned, reaching to knead the back of her neck. “You’re not used to fighting.”

“Not very good at it, either,” she said.

“I wouldn’t say that. You obviously held your own as long as you could.”

“I was down for the count when you came in.”

I shook my head. “Well, that slap was no joke. You just need to build up your stamina. And I can teach you some moves if you want.” I felt almost shy making the offer, which was bizarre.

“Will you?” she asked eagerly. “I hate to admit it, but before I started getting winded, I almost felt… exhilarated. Like I kind of enjoyed it.”

“Why should you feel bad about that? You were defending yourself, not just whaling on some unsuspecting person you never met before.”

She considered that, her smile growing wider as she nodded. “Okay, how about today since it’s my day off anyway? Unless you have other things you need to do?”

The hopeful apprehension in her voice would have made me cancel everything if I hadn’t already. Even if it wasn’t her scheduled day off, she was staying home to rest today.

“Only if you promise to take it easy. I’ll show you some defense moves, and when you’ve recovered from yesterday, you can get into it more.”

She faked throwing a punch across the table, her fist whooshing clumsily past my nose. “I’m ready, coach.”

I laughed and reached to pull her close for a kiss. She was irresistible when she was laughing and smiling, even more than when she was honestly trying to take me out. Scrambling up to clear away the breakfast dishes, I stopped her by pulling her close, letting my hands roam up and down her back.

“You don’t have to do the dishes. Go laze around by the pool for a while, and I’ll meet you out there after I send some messages.”

She pressed herself tight to my body, looking up at me with a pout. “What about self-defense lessons?”

There was no reminding her we’d both just eaten a breakfast suited for a family of four, and since I was determined to make her take it easy anyway, I led her to my home gym in the basement. Windows along the edge of the ceiling let in plenty of the afternoon sunlight, and I rolled out a mat in the middle of the tiled floor.

“I never knew this place existed,” she said.

I was shocked, thinking she’d been snooping over every inch while I was gone, but told her she had free rein and could work out whenever she wanted. Putting her through some gentle stretches and light cardio didn’t wear down her excitement and soon she was soaking up my lessons.

“Like this,” I said, moving her hand in an upward sweeping motion. “Try to get them to look at your other hand like this, but hit them under the chin as hard as you can.”

“I can’t say I exactly wish I had a chance to try this out,” she said.

“Not going to happen again,” I swore. “But we can eventually get you a partner closer to your size to do some more serious sparring. Mila likes to throw down every now and then, but she’ll probably refuse until after the wedding.” I tapped her nose. “Can’t have the bride walk down the aisle with a busted nose.”

Not even bringing up the wedding dampened her high spirits, and she ended up getting me in the gut before I could block the punch. It was like a gnat flying into a cement wall, but I doubled over, pretending she had knocked the wind out of me. Then I grappled her into a bear hug and kissed her until she dissolved into giggles. She had heart, and was certainly fearless in the face of an attack, but seeing just how easily she could be overwhelmed had me refusing to sway on the amount of security I wanted surrounding her.

As much as she wanted to keep working out, there was a sheen of sweat on her pretty face, and she rubbed her neck again when she thought I wasn’t looking.

“Enough for today,” I told her, swinging her over my shoulder and carrying her upstairs.

Dropping her on the overstuffed couch in the media room, I found the remote and told her she had the first pick of what we watched.

“No, you decide,” she said. “I want to see what kind of movies you like.”

“You’d be surprised,” I said, betting half of my fortune she would never guess I liked hard science fiction and the occasional musical.

“Buddy cop movies,” she said, scrolling through the endless list. “No, dirty cop movies.”

I made a buzzer sound and then took the remote, replacing it with my phone, which I’d opened to the food delivery app. “Might as well order something to eat,” I suggested while finding something I thought we would enjoy watching.

With two big pizzas on the way, we settled in to watch a classic black-and-white thriller with a doomed love story that had her sniffling at the end. I had never seen her cry until last night, even though there had been plenty of instances before that warranted tears. She must have worked very hard to hold them back all those times, and I felt honored that she finally let herself show real emotions around me.

It killed me that she thought for one second that she wasn’t good enough, and the fact that Arkadi, or whoever was behind the attack, had stung her fragile pride as well as put her in danger pissed me off. It also reminded me that I had to stay on top of things, and while Emerson’s choice started playing on the big screen, I snuck out my phone to check for updates.

“No way, you need to watch my favorite now,” she said, tugging on my arm.

Fine. Anything to keep that smile on her face and the worry out of her eyes. The cheesy romantic comedy was one I never would have chosen in a thousand years, but it made her happy as she hummed along with the opening theme song.

That was enough for me, and I pulled her close, completely content to watch paint dry as long as Emerson was curled up by my side.