Adored (Masters and Mercenaries #8.5)(5)

The room seemed to chill.

“Okay, then. Why don’t you sit down?” It looked like his talk with Laurel was going to have to wait.





Thank god for crazy people and their death threats. Laurel Daley sat down and was very aware that most people wouldn’t be happy that their boss had been threatened, but it was a well-timed announcement. She’d been about to cry and she’d promised herself she wouldn’t do that over Mitchell Bradford anymore.

Besides, it certainly wouldn’t be the first time someone had threatened to kill her cantankerous boss. Hell, she thought about doing the deed herself about ten times a day. She was thinking about doing it now.

What right did he have to tell her she couldn’t go to Sanctum? Asshole. Selfish prick.

She’s a bright light, Kai. She’s one of those people you can’t help but adore.

Selfish prick who said the sweetest things when he thought no one was listening. He was also a selfish prick with serious insecurities, with a truckload of baggage it looked like she wasn’t going to be able to plow through.

“I understand your brother is angry with me,” Mitch was saying. He was back behind the massive desk he hadn’t allowed her to get rid of. It was a refugee from the 1960’s, when apparently men compensated with large oak desks instead of sports cars. At least she’d been able to get rid of his crappy chair and replace it with one that wouldn’t mangle his spinal cord. “I’m a lawyer. A lot of people get angry with me.”

“It’s in his job description,” she quipped.

His dark eyes moved her way, and it took all she had not to fall to the floor in a submissive pose. But she wasn’t going to. Nope. Not for him.

“As I was saying, my line of work tends to bring out the worst in people, but I’ll admit I don’t remember your brother. You said his name was Harvey? Harvey Dixon?”

“We don’t have a file on him, sir,” Laurel said, knowing damn well that the “sir” would get his motor running, and that was why she merely meant it as a politeness. She wasn’t even thinking of capitalizing the word the way she would with Master Ian or Master Liam. If Mitch wanted the relationship professional, then he better get used to a lowercase s.

He frowned at her, his handsome face going all gruff in a way that somehow managed to make him look more masculine. “How do you know? Do you have the files memorized now?”

She could have them memorized if she wanted to, but that would cut into her reading time. “Nope. I checked my tablet. I scanned in all the files and where they’re stored about a month after you hired me. We’re fully automated.”

His brows formed that V he got whenever something confused and disturbed him. “No one told me. I don’t think that’s a very good idea.”

He was often like the old guy on his lawn shaking his fist at those young people. For a superman of not even forty, he was very adverse to change. “And that’s why I didn’t tell you.”

She often had to go around her gorgeous grump in order to get anything done. Mitch had a smoking body and the finest legal mind she’d ever met, but he also had a few quirks, and he could be a massive ass when he wanted to be.

“You can’t go around destroying my files.”

“Good god, Mitchell. I didn’t destroy the files. I scanned them in. Please tell me you don’t think that involves the computer eating the files or something.”

“Of course not.” The look in Mitch’s eyes told her he would have a discussion with her after this was over. Which was good since she intended to have a discussion with him, too.

He turned back to their guest. “Why do you believe your brother intends to kill me?”

Patrick Dixon shifted in his chair, his hands nervously moving along the arms. “Well, my first indication was when he told me he was going to spend the rest of his life trying to rip your heart from your chest, eat it and then…well, the rest is all digestion but he used much more crude language.”

“He wants to shit my heart out?” Mitch asked, his eyes rolling. “Like I never heard that one before. Is there a reason he wants me in his bowels?”

“He shouldn’t given how much red meat you eat. It might be harder to pass than he thinks.” She tried to force him to work a salad in every now and then.

Dixon ignored her. “My brother considers himself quite the inventor. Over the years he’s been awarded twenty-two different patents. He’s a brilliant engineer, but he prefers to work for himself, and the patents have never panned out, if you know what I mean.”

“Just because you patent something doesn’t mean you’re going to make money from it,” Mitch replied.

“Exactly.” Patrick sighed as though this was something he’d thought about long and hard. “Some of his inventions didn’t have much use or purpose in the real world. We managed to get a few of his ideas to market, but it wasn’t enough for Harvey. He always thought about the ones that got away. A few of his more brilliant ideas were taken by large companies.”

Mitch shook his head. “Was he working for them at the time? Are you trying to say they stole his patents?”

“No. While my brother is very smart, his processes can be a bit convoluted, difficult to understand.”

“Ah,” Mitch said with a nod. “So someone swoops in and refines the idea, changes the process so it’s easier to produce the wanted effect.”