Raid (Unfinished Hero #3)(66)

She trained those hazel eyes on me, still smiling. “Okay, babe. But get over that.”

“Sorry?” I asked.

“Uh… with your, mine and the female half of Willow’s citizenry avid contemplation, I don’t think it’s lost on any of us that Raiden Ulysses Miller has got a big dick.”

He did, this was true. I had seen the physical evidence up close (and felt it, sucked it, stroked it, etc.), but I was hoping the female half of Willow’s citizenry had not.

“You might want to explain that,” I suggested as Sam lunged forward and giggled, so I wrapped my arms around her and took over the bouncing.

KC’s eyes moved to her daughter then took in her daughter with me and her face got soft.

Then she spoke.

“Right. The dudes you picked in the past,” she shook her head, “not all that. Except Pete was okay, but he was no Raiden Miller.”

“You’re telling me something I know already,” I pointed out.

She put the spoon in a spoon holder, turned down the burner on the stove and her attention to me.

“What I’m saying is, you don’t have experience of men who are men. I know you have issues with Mark, and I love you more than I already loved you that you’ve kept those to yourself. I hope it’s because you understand I’m not an idiot and I wouldn’t put up with his shit if it wasn’t worth putting up with. And he gives me shit, Hanna. He’s arrogant, and that can sometimes, not often, lean toward him being a jackass. But he loves me. He loves Sam. He finds ways to show us that every day. No, that isn’t right. He doesn’t find them. He just does it, no effort. He gives it naturally. And I know he’d die before he let anything harm either of us,” she put a hand to her protruding belly, “any of us.”

That was huge.

And beautiful.

And something I never knew because I never brought it up.

“Holy Moses, KC,” was all I could think to reply.

“So,” she went on brightly, grinning at me, “when he’s an arrogant ass, tells me what to do or whatever, acting totally like we’d been hurtled back to the 1500’s and I was his chattel, I smile, nod and do whatever I want.”

I thought about doing this with Raiden and it didn’t give me the warm fuzzies.

KC read my face, wagged a finger at me and kept talking.

“This is what you have to learn. Don’t backtalk. Don’t explain. Don’t protest. Don’t fight it out. Just say, ‘All right, honey,’ and do whatever the hell you want. For example, just this morning, Mark said, ‘Make tacos tonight, babe,’ before he kissed me good-bye. No ‘please’. No, ‘are you feeling like tacos?’ Just ‘make them.’” She tipped her head to the side. “Now, are we having tacos?” She shook her head. “Hell no. We had tacos two days ago. I get he loves my tacos, but eff that. My friend is coming over and I just had tacos. Furthermore, I have to make the damn things. So we’re having a roast. You serve company a good roast. Not freaking tacos.”

She moved to the fridge while I asked, “Isn’t he going to be ticked?”

She yanked something out of the fridge as Sam slurped at my neck and I cuddled her closer.

KC turned to me and closed the fridge. “Do I care? If he wants tacos, he can come home and make them.”

“So he doesn’t get ticked?” I pushed.

“If he does, he keeps it to himself. Usually he just shakes his head and grins at me then gets a beer. I’ve decided to take that as him accepting the woman whose ring he slid his finger on. If he’s storing this shit up to list it out in the divorce papers, so be it. His loss.”

If Mark was doing that, it would be his loss.

Absolutely.

But I was getting the feeling Mark would never do that.

KC moved back to the stove as I asked cautiously, “But does he get physical?”

She poured something in a pan and turned to me. “No. That said, when he says something like he’s going to change locks to keep me safe, I don’t argue with him. That’s his job. I give him the freedom to do that.”

“So you think it’s okay that Raiden did what he did?” I pushed.

“I think he didn’t hurt you and I think he could, easily. I think what that said was, you were standing in the way of him doing something he thought was important, that something was looking out for you, so it actually was important and he did what he said he was doing. He got you to shut up and pay attention. It isn’t me, babe, who can say if that’s right or wrong. I wasn’t there. You gave me what you gave me, so I only have that to go on, and this is my opinion. It doesn’t have to be yours. But if he doesn’t hurt you, hit you, smack you, shake you but simply moves to make a point that you need to shut up and listen to him because he’s relaying something important, honestly, Hanna, I cannot think that’s wrong.”

“He backs me into walls,” I blurted.

She blinked before she whispered, “What?”

“Well, we’ve had some kind of… intense conversations,” I thought it safe to share. “One, well, I mistook his intentions about me and accused him of using me…” Her eyes got big and I held onto Sam with one arm but waved my other hand in front of my face. “Long story, and not for now, but he kind of lost it when I wouldn’t listen to him. He backed me into a wall, caging me in, got in my face and explained he is most definitely into me.”