Heaven and Hell (Heaven and Hell #1)(116)

“We had this conversation. You agreed. And we’re not havin’ this conversation again.”

Now I was confused.

“We’ve had this conversation?”

“Are you my woman?”

I was still confused. How were we back to that?

“I don’t get it,” I told him.

“Kia, sweetheart, are you my woman?”

“Mostly,” I replied without thinking, encroaching into territory we needed to explore but I didn’t think it sensible to breach at this juncture.

I watched his brows snap together again and I also watched his entire body get tight.

“Mostly?” he asked quietly and very, very scarily.

Oh man.

“Yes,” I changed my answer hurriedly. “I’m your woman.”

“That’s a better answer,” he whispered again very, very scarily.

“Sam –”

He cut me off again.

“I protect my woman as I see fit. You agreed to that.”

“Well, yes, I did,” I concurred. “But how does this fit into that?”

“I protect my woman however she needs to be protected and whatever she needs protection from.”

Oh.

Now I got it.

“So, essentially, what you’re saying is you decide how I need to be protected, what I need to be protected from and therefore there are times when you’ll decide what I need to know and when.”

“No.”

“No?”

“No in the sense that there’s nothing ‘essentially’ about your statement.”

He couldn’t be serious.

“Sam!” I cried.

“What?” he asked.

“I’m not a little girl and that’s just… it’s just… I don’t know what it is but it isn’t right.”

“How isn’t it right?” he shot back.

I threw out an arm saying, “I don’t know, it just isn’t.”

Sam uncrossed his arms and planted his hands on his hips, leaning in and exploding, “Jesus, f**k, Kia! When this shit is over we will never be back here so when it’s done, we won’t have this problem unless, hope to God not, some other shit comes up. But this shit isn’t over. There is a woman out there who wants you dead. She’s incarcerated now but the man she hired isn’t. This is serious shit and we agreed I’ll deal with it so I’ll f**kin’ deal with it and, sweetheart, I wake up and live and breathe worry that I’ll miss somethin’ or someone will f**k up and the consequences of that is you bein’ dead and now we know that threat is real. You wake up and go on viewings with your girl and giggle yourselves sick. You sit with your Mom after eating a chicken breast stuffed with cheese and surrounded by three slices of bacon which explains why she needed a heart valve replaced though she clearly didn’t get the message and you two gossip and cackle about everyone in town. You didn’t ask to meet Lee and Tanner. You haven’t asked to meet the men who are lookin’ out for you. I assumed that meant you were puttin’ this shit in my hands where it belongs. And I was glad of it. The only thing I have to hang onto is I got control of this situation and my woman can giggle with her friend and gossip with her mother. I might worry, she keeps eatin’ her mother’s food, she’ll need a heart valve replacement in ten years but I see you emerging from the shit he left you, I’m good with that and can focus on the other shit he left you. What I’m not good with is havin’ this conversation that you promised me we would not have.”

He stopped speaking and scowled at me.

I pressed my lips together.

Then I defended myself. “Okay, I get that but I have to tell you I wasn’t aware of all the nuances of that agreement and I still might not be.”

“Then let’s clear this shit up,” he offered. “You trust that I got matters in hand. You trust I’m lookin’ out for you. I pay for makin’ you safe. And you trust that the decisions I make are done for rational reasons I’ve thought through with you in mind. Does that work for you?”

“Um… yes,” I muttered.

“Fuck,” Sam muttered back.

Since we seemed to be concluding things, I thought it important to add, “I still don’t want Memphis going outside off the lead until she’s more accustomed to your house.”

Sam again scowled at me.

Then he asked, “Fuck me, how the f**k can you piss me off to an extreme and then, right after, be cute and make me want to laugh?”

I was being cute?

I thought it prudent not to ask that question and instead remain silent. So I did.

Sam didn’t.

He ordered, “Come here.”

It was then I thought it prudent to do as he ordered. So I did.

When I did, Sam’s arms folded around me and I returned the gesture.

He tipped his head down and caught my eyes. “We good?”

“I don’t like it that you live and breathe worry about me.”

“Soon, I won’t have to.”

I pressed my lips together. Then I nodded.

Then I did a face plant in his chest.

“I didn’t ask to meet the guys because, well… with everything else, it kinda slipped my mind,” I told his chest.