Chapter 31
Chapter Thirty-One
NADINE
“Okay,” Lucille announces as she flops down on my sofa, her eyes wild as she searches mine.
Both Lucille and Colette recently had babies, but they didn’t bring them here today.
I’m sure they’re with their fathers.
Sometimes, they bring them into the office, and I have to admit it has been nice to have babies around.
It hasn’t made me want one less.
In fact, I’ve wanted one even more.
Now that I’m in a position to actually move forward with my life and do that type of thing, the only person who I would want a baby with doesn’t want anything to do with me anymore.
“Talk,” Lucille demands.
“Snacks?” Colette calls out.
I watch as she walks over, extending her arms.
She’s carrying a wooden cutting board in her hands.
She’s actually made a charcuterie board.
I can’t believe that she did all of that in the five minutes she’s been here.
“I made it at home and just assembled it here. Don’t look surprised,” Colette mutters as she places it down on the coffee table.
My lips twitch into a smirk.
I’m not necessarily surprised, but at the same time, it’s really sweet that she put any effort into my cry for salty and sweet treats to get me through this time.
This is a hopefully productive brainstorming session to get my man back.
I feel stupid even thinking that sentence, get my man back .
It makes me feel desperate.
But I am desperate.
So desperate .
I don’t want Grayson to disappear.
I know that these men will, without a doubt, keep his whereabouts a secret from me if that’s what Grayson wants.
There is a very small window here where I can hopefully shift this around and bring him back.
I’m not going to be able to seduce him—I’m not a sexy siren or anything—but I need to do something big.
“Now I put myself on the dark web as a hit, but I don’t think that would work for Grayson,” Lucille begins.
I almost laugh, because she did do that, and it really did work.
But she’s right.
It wouldn’t for Grayson because he knows that I can take myself off that list if I wanted to.
So, that’s not going to work.
Colette’s situation wouldn’t work for me, either.
Merrick was caught having sex with her, and there was a whole mafia vibe drama.
That is not my case at all.
My brother doesn’t care who I sleep with as long as I’m happy.
And I’m not a blushing virgin.
Grayson is a completely different beast from Theron and Merrick.
Whatever we come up with will have to be unique to him.
I’m just not sure what would make him change his mind, his view on me—on us.
“Okay, so we need to figure out what will bring him not only out of hiding but also make him want to get down on his knees and beg you to marry him or at least make a dozen babies with him,” Lucille says, reaching for a strawberry.
I think that I need something stronger than a strawberry on the sweet meter, like a chocolate cake…
the whole thing.
I want to drown myself in it.
This feels impossible.
So damn impossible.
“There’s nothing I could do that would bring him back here,” I whisper.
Colette and Lucille share a glance, but then Lucille leans forward, sliding her tongue along her bottom lip as she pops a cube of cheese into her mouth.
I watch as she chews slowly, her mind no doubt working overtime as she thinks about how we’re going to do this.
I have a feeling that this is hopeless and that I’m going to have to move on.
“Could you fake a pregnancy?” Lucille asks.
My eyes widen.
“Lucille,” I hiss.
She shrugs.
“I mean, you could just say you think you are. It wouldn’t be a whole lie.”
“It would be a whole lie,” I say.
“That’s something I don’t want to lie about, and I want him to come back, but I don’t want him to dread it, and I have a feeling that he would be dreading even looking at me if he thought that was the case.”
Colette raises her hand like we’re in a classroom setting before she lowers it and speaks.
“What if you said something like you weren’t sure, but you think someone is following you?”
“There are five security savants who work in the same office as us,” I point out the obvious.
“Oh yeah,” she exhales.
This is going to be so much harder than any of us thought.
In fact, I think it’s going to be impossible.
Grayson is going to slip away, and I don’t think I’ll be able to stop him.
He is going to start a whole new life, the one he wants, and I’ll still be here in Nights, sitting behind a desk at Theron’s office, wasting away.
“Maybe I shouldn’t have come back,” I whisper.
I want to say that there is nothing for me here, but that’s a lie because there are these women, the other Securus guys, and Brody.
But none of them are Grayson.
However, I don’t want Lucille and Colette to think that I don’t appreciate them or their friendship because it truly means so much to me.
I can’t even put into words just how much it means to me that all these people want me here.
Want to be near me, be my friend, love me, and care for me.
But, and I hate that there is even a but, it doesn’t make Grayson want to stay.
“Maybe he doesn’t really want me, and he’s just trying to let me down easy,” I murmur.
“Like that movie, he’s just not into me or something.”
Lucille snorts.
“I’m the wrong person to even try that shit with. I chased after Theron for far longer than any sane woman would.”
Colette giggles softly, and I press my lips together, rolling them as I try not to smile because Lucille really did the most, and Theron was so closed off.
I really thought he gave no shits about her.
I didn’t know that he’d been watching her, too, that he’d been madly in love with her from afar.
And now they’re two of the happiest people I know, them and Colette and Merrick.
I’m just not sure if my destiny is the same with Grayson.
“The only way would be another man,” Colette states matter-of-factly.
“Another man?” I ask.
She hums.
“But it has to seem genuine.”
I open my mouth to ask her how when Lucille jumps up from her chair.
My head swings around, and I look at her.
Watching her as I wait for whatever it is that has popped into her head to make her jump that way to come out of her mouth.
“This is going to be good. So good that when you have those babies, and you’re going to have a dozen of them, you must name one of them after me,” Lucille says, her eyes wide as they sparkle.
Something is working behind those eyes, and I can’t deny that I’m a little afraid of what it could be, but at the same time, maybe it’s exactly what I need.
GRAYSON
The list Theron sends me is fairly detailed, and while I don’t recognize any of the names, I know that I’m going to have a good time watching them, learning about them, and figuring out ways to ruin them—all of them.
This is a good thing.
Not only will I be saving people from being hurt, but it is a way for me to further protect Nadine when I can’t be with her.
I’ll still be able to keep her close this way.
At least in my own head, that’s what I’m telling myself.
I am going underground, and it’s going to be fucking amazing.
And if I pump myself up enough, then maybe I might actually believe the words I’m thinking.
Packing my bag, I pick it up off the bed and glance around my apartment.
There’s an empty feeling.
I know that nothing has changed, but even in the short time I had her with me, Nadine filled the space with something I needed, and now that’s gone.
And so am I.
Gone.
I walk toward the door and tug it open, sending Vaughn a text to keep an eye on my place while I’m gone and reminding him where my hidden key is located in the office.
We all keep one there, just in case.
He responds to my text, but I don’t read it.
Not yet.
I don’t need anyone else asking me to stay.
I already want to fucking drive to Nadine’s apartment and fuck her so hard that she forgets her own name.
Once I’m in my parking garage, I quickly locate and unlock my car before I throw my bag in the back seat, laptop and tablet included.
In the trunk, I load up all my expensive and extensive surveillance equipment.
I’m not sure just how deep I’m going to have to dive underground to get information on these men.
Slamming the trunk, I walk over to the driver’s door, sink into the front seat, and start the engine before I shift it into Reverse and drive away from home.
Stupidly, I don’t head out of town.
My car has different plans and drives in the direction of Nadine’s apartment.
Pulling up to the sidewalk in front of her place, I stupidly shift the car into Park .
The light is on inside.
Like a stalker, I look up and watch her window.
My good binoculars are in the trunk, and I don’t want to get out and be caught.
Not that I think she would even see me down here, but if she did, I don’t want to upset her since I said I wasn’t going to be in town at all, and not only am I in town, but I’m stalking her.
So, instead of getting out and searching for my equipment, I stay where I am, somewhat content to just look up at her window.
There are shadows moving around, and what feels like seconds later, I see both Lucille and Colette walk out the front door of her building.
They turn toward me, but they are focused on one another, talking and not paying attention to anything else.
I wish I could hear what they’re saying.
Without a doubt, I’m sure I would gather some important information about Nadine.
Shaking my head, I try to get thoughts of her out because I need to forget she exists.
She needs to move on.
Nadine deserves to move on, and I need to focus on my task at hand.
I can’t get distracted.
I must stay focused.
Except, I don’t leave immediately.
I stay where I am, my eyes locked on her window as I watch her shadow near the glass.
I know it’s her by her shape.
She places her palm on the glass, staying there for a long moment, almost as if she knows I’m down here watching.
Then she drops her hand, closes the blinds, and her shadow disappears.
A few moments later, the lights are flicked off, and then her bedroom window lights up for just a few moments before it, too, is turned off.