In The Darkness (Project Artemis #1)(40)

The smile slid from her face, and her expression turned serious as she shook her head. “You were so much more than that. You were sent to rescue me, but you didn’t just do that. You gave me hope when I didn’t have any. You made those nights and days bearable, Nick. Don’t diminish how important you were to me.”

Nick didn’t know how to react. No one had ever said anything like that to him in his life. Not when he tried to do good whenever he could and stay on the straight and narrow so the bureau would take him. Not when he proudly worked for the FBI trying to protect his country. Certainly not when Tanya was killed and he left it all behind to become a hired gun to anybody with enough money to hire him.

“I just did what I had to do to protect you,” he said, not knowing how to tell her how much her words meant to him.

“Well, I want that for any woman who needs help. For the woman who is being stalked by some crazy neighbor or an ex-boyfriend who can’t let go, and for the woman who turns to the police but they can’t help her because there’s not enough proof she’s in danger. I want those women to have their Nick like I had mine. I want them to have the hope you gave me. I have the money and the ability to do my part, but this only works if you’re by my side helping me. I can’t do this without you, and even more, I don’t want to. So if you need more convincing, I’m here to tell you I plan on convincing you to do this with me.”

He looked at her beautiful brown eyes so full of that hope she claimed he gave her and couldn’t say no, even if he wanted to. But he didn’t want to. Nick wanted to share that hope she had and let it into his life again.

To believe that he could make a difference once more when it counted most to the one person who made him want to hope again.

“You don’t have to convince me. I’m in. All in.”

“All in? I haven’t mentioned the fact that you’re going to have to convince these guys to live on an estate in rural Virginia.”

Nick had a feeling the men he had in mind wouldn’t have any problem walking away from their lives and starting over on some multi-million dollar estate. “Don’t worry. I’ll figure out a way to make them see they should. Paying them handsomely would be a good start.”

Persephone smiled broadly. “That I can do. It’s one of the benefits of being a very wealthy woman. Anything else you want me to do, just say the word and it’s done.”

“It must be nice having that much money that you can say something like that and mean it,” he joked as he brought her mouth to his in a kiss again.

She tilted her head to the side and chuckled. “The wealthy of this world have a choice to make every day. They can do good with what they’ve been blessed with or they can act selfishly. I choose to do good, and I choose to do it with you.”

He kissed this woman who wanted him to join her in a project that might have been more idealistic than any he’d ever heard of and reveled in the feel of her enthusiasm for doing good as they began to make love again. He had no idea if he could ever live up to who she believed him to be.

But he damn well planned to try every day.

*

Persephone held his hand as she led him through the main building on the Blackmore estate she’d dropped over four million on a few weeks before. In that time, he’d been busy setting up the group with men to fill out the ranks of their group, but she’d spent it getting the house ready for everyone. As he looked around in awe at the mere size of the home around him, she eagerly explained how she planned to add on to some areas of the estate and raze a few outside buildings on the edge of the grounds.

“So at first it might feel a little tight with all the men here and us, along with the assistant I plan to bring in, but the workmen will be starting the new building next month, so it won’t be too bad,” she said in a bubbly voice as Nick tried to take in everything around him.

“Tight?” he asked, stopping in the doorway between what she’d called the great room and another equally as great room in front of him. “How big is this main house?”

“A little over eight thousand square feet,” she said casually, as if eight thousand square feet for ten people would be like them all being crammed into a house the size of a shack.

“Holy hell, Persephone. How many bedrooms does this house alone have?”

“Seven, which means at first some of the men are going to have to share quarters. But once the addition is complete, you and I will be able to move into that, so another few thousand feet will be freed up for some more bedrooms for the men.”

None of this discussion about thousands of square feet seemed to impress her. She talked about a few thousand square feet like it meant nothing. Nick assumed it had to be because she’d always lived like this, but he knew the type of men he’d bring in and thousands of square feet would likely be the biggest space they’d ever lived in.

“I wouldn’t worry about them sharing quarters. Some of them have spent years doing just that.”

“Good. Then they won’t mind doing it here. They’ll have a game room and a place to relax too, along with enough bathrooms for them all, so I think we’ll be able to get started sometime in the next few weeks.”

She moved to walk into the next room on their grand tour, but Nick pulled her back into his arms. Looking down into her face, he saw just getting this first stage of her plan going thrilled her, and he loved that.