Chapter 43
Jonas
They know.
The reporters know.
And I mean everything .
They know I’ve been here for weeks. They know Hayes bought a house and exactly where it is. They know about Fiji. They know about Emma.
They know where her house is.
They know about Bash.
They fucking know about my son.
I can’t hug Emma tight enough once we’re all together again at Theo and Laney’s house. “Are you okay?”
“Getting there.”
I’m glad she trusts me enough to give me an honest answer and pissed that there’s any reason for her to not be okay. “I’ll find the leak,” I tell her. “I’ll find a way to make them go away.”
“Sabrina already did half of that,” Laney says, holding out her phone for me to see three words in a text message.
It was Chandler .
Bubbles appear on the screen, telling me Sabrina’s not done with whatever she’s texting, and a second later— No doubt. No question. I’d swear on my grandma’s scone recipe in a court of law .
I nod to Laney. “Tell her I’ll handle it.”
Theo’s looking over Laney’s shoulder. “Get in line,” he tells me.
“I am in line. I’m first.”
Emma sighs. “Stop. All of you. Fighting over who deals with it won’t actually solve it.”
It’ll solve a lot for me, and I’m gonna guess based on the way Theo’s jaw’s working that he’s in full agreement.
Laney too.
She seems a little bloodthirsty right now.
“You might want to tell Sabrina that,” Laney says.
“Mama Fed titty eat Dodo Ono!” Bash suddenly shrieks.
Theo disappears like a magician while Emma pulls away and looks down the hallway like she can see the cat playing with her chicken.
“Drop the chicken, Fred,” Theo orders.
Yolko Ono bagocks pathetically.
Emma squeezes her eyes shut and sighs, and Laney moves in and takes over hug duty.
I feel fucking useless.
And I hate feeling fucking useless.
I can take her to New Hampshire. Plenty of security there.
“When the reporters came for Theo, they left after about a week,” Laney tells me. “I have no idea if we collectively learned as a town to chase reporters away more efficiently or if you’re a big enough name that we’re fucked.”
New Hampshire is definitely the route to go.
If Emma wants to go.
Her chickens are here. Bash’s daycare—which may or may not be an option now—is here. Her job is here.
She doesn’t have to work for money—I will absolutely make sure of that—but I know she likes having a role in the community. That’s the need her job fills for her.
Belonging. Participating.
Normalcy .
And I’ve been fooling myself to think that this day wouldn’t come.
Emma pulls back from Laney’s hug. “I’m okay,” she says. “I’m okay. They can’t hurt us. I mean, they can , but they can’t…destroy us.”
She gulps.
And I have never, ever felt more impotent in my entire life.
I can’t show her how to handle this fast enough.
There’s no four-hour seminar for building mental and emotional resilience to what people say about you.
No weekend retreat that’ll transform well-earned anxiety into self-confidence.
She can’t walk through a magic door with legit worries and fears and come out on the other side a new kind of badass wearing that rubber whatever you say bounces off of me and sticks to you suit.
This is when I should ask her if she wants out.
But there is no out .
The only thing I can do for her now if she wants out is to deny I know her and deny that Bash is mine.
Which I will do.
If she wants me to.
It’ll cost me my entire heart and probably one of my lungs and definitely my happiness for the foreseeable future, but if that’s what she wants, that’s what I’ll do.
“Emma—” I start, but she turns a glare on me that cuts me off at my knees.
“Do not even think about saying out loud what you’re about to say,” she says.
“ This is part of who you are . You’re willing to turn your entire life inside out and upside down and walk away from everything for us, and you don’t think I’d do the same for you?
I don’t like people knowing who I am. I don’t like people knowing who Bash is.
But I chose this when I kept him. And I choose this now .
I choose you . The good and the bad. So don’t go pulling a Mr. Sacrifice It All movie-hero move, okay?
Just—just be here and show me how to get through it. Help me through it. Please?”
The knot in my heart loosens, and my eyes get hot.
I choose you .
My life has never been hard for me, but I know it’s hard for other people around me.
And she knows— she knows what she’s signing up for.
“Saved the chicken,” Theo calls.
“We never had doubts,” Laney calls back. “Also, shush . This is the good part.”
Emma half smiles and rolls her eyes, which are looking a little shiny too.
“You’re fucking amazing,” I say hoarsely. “You know that?”
She shakes her head. “I’m a ferocious mama bear madly in love with my baby’s daddy. That’s all.”
“I have to go somewhere and do something,” I tell her.
“I’m going with him.” Theo strides back into the room with Bash under one arm and the chicken in the other.
I knew it was a risk, bringing Yolko Ono to a house with cats, but I couldn’t leave her there.
And my security team is guarding the coop at Emma’s house under strict orders to take care of anyone who makes a single chicken bagock wrong.
“You two are not— ” Laney starts, but Emma cuts her off.
“Let them do what they think they need to do. Much as I’d like to handle the problem my own way, a mantervention might be the only thing that solves the root of the problem.”
Laney gapes at her.
But Theo puffs his chest out. “Damn right. Mantervention it is. Jonas, guess that means you’re sitting this one out—ow—ow—ow— ow !”
“I’ll mantervention you, too, if you don’t do this the right way,” Emma says as she lets go of his ear. She looks at Laney. “And if a mantervention doesn’t work, then we do it our way.”
“You’re okay?” I slip an arm around Emma’s waist and tug her closer. “You’re sure you’re okay?”
“I will be.” She pecks my cheek. “Bash, I’ll bet we can find Uncle Theo’s stash of chocolate chip cookie dough if we look hard enough.”
“Tookie dough!” Bash yells.
“ After you eat watermelon and a grilled cheese for lunch.”
“Oh my god, that sounds good,” Laney murmurs.
Emma slips away, heading to the kitchen, but not before squeezing me back one more time.
I watch her, looking for any signs this is a mask. That she’s putting on a brave front. That she’s waiting for me to leave to give in to the desire to collapse in on herself the same way I found her in Fiji.
But Theo claps me on the shoulder and mutters, “She’s a lot stronger than any of us give her credit for, and even if she wasn’t, she’s not alone,” and my nerves settle.
“I’m driving,” I tell him.
“Your security team’s driving and we both know it.”
“Semantics.”
My security team drives.
The entire trip, I read over the document Mom’s assistant forwarded like I’ll be on camera in ten and the entire script changed overnight.
Theo stares at me without saying a word.
I ignore him until Graham tells me we’re close.
“You don’t strike me as the type to do this,” Theo says.
“Everyone has a limit.”
The fucker grins at me.
Doesn’t say another word.
And he doesn’t move to get out of the car when we arrive either.
But I know if I decide I need him in there with me, he’ll be there.
Not that I’ll need him with the little surprise my security team slips into my hand when they let me out.
The house we’re stopped at is a duplex in a small mountain town not far from Snaggletooth Creek where a closed-up antique shop and a single active diner beside the gas station seem to be the only attractions.
My intel says Chandler works at home, but I’m still unsurprised when my first knock goes unanswered.
So does the second.
The door finally swings open on the third though.
“What the fuck do you want?” the not-at-all charming man who belittled Emma for far too long snarls at me.
I don’t know why I grab him by the neck and push him into his house. I’ve never done anything like this before in my life.
But I don’t let go until we’re in the low light of his living room, which smells like dead rodents and stale whiskey.
He tries to swing at me, but I have the advantage of adrenaline.
And rage.
Pure, unfiltered rage.
“Sit,” I growl at him after ducking a second swing.
He doesn’t listen.
Asshole.
So I show him the mason jar as I duck a third time. “Sit, or I let the bees out.”
He freezes.
“Jar’s already mostly unscrewed. You take me out, they get out. So sit your ass down . Now.”
He’s heaving from the effort of swinging at me, staring at me like he knows he’s trapped.
And it takes everything inside of me to not take a swing at him.
“I know you’re gambling again,” I say quietly.
“I know about the porn sites. And I know about the loan you got with your grandfather’s forged signature.
So we’re going to talk about how you’re moving to Nebraska and never setting foot within a hundred miles of Snaggletooth Creek, Los Angeles, or the entire East Coast for the rest of your life. ”
“You don’t know shit.”
I know I’m so furious that I’m about to come apart at the seams, and I can’t quite remember why I’m not supposed to put myself in jail for a good cause.
And crushing Chandler Sullivan’s skull feels like a very good cause. “That business deal in Tiara Falls wasn’t in Tiara Falls. Tiara Falls doesn’t specialize in what’s in your basement.”
He goes white as a sheet.
Still not as satisfying as putting my fist through his nose.
Especially when what’s in his basement is so dumb.
He’s breeding hedgehogs. Part of an underground hedgehog breeding program that’s illegal in Colorado.
“Moving. To Nebraska.” Pretty sure there’s zero chance Emma would give up her mountains for Nebraska.
Pretty safe bet, and no major cities that I’d want to go are there either.
Sorry, Nebraska. “And if Emma’s name ever comes out of your mouth again, to anyone , I’ll release everything I know to the press.
When it’s most convenient. Which will be about the time the press is eating out of Emma’s hand because she’s fucking fabulous , and there’ll be nothing they want more than to finally see you get what you deserve for what you did to her. ”
“You think because you’re a rich snooty asswipe, you can stand there and make threats? You have no idea who my friends are.”
“The friends that aren’t here?”
“One phone call?—”
“Because you can’t handle a snooty asswipe on your own?”
He looks about ready to lunge at me, so I wave the jar of bees again. “I’m the only thing standing between you and Theo Monroe, who probably knows even more shit than all of my money can dig up.”
“Fucking all-talk asswipe.”
Things after that are a bit of a blur.
I know I move.
I know something connects with my fist.
I know there’s blood.
I know it’s not mine.
And I know I walk out of there with the jar of bees still unopened to be returned to Grey, with zero fear that Chandler Sullivan will ever, ever again utter Emma’s name or cause a moment’s concern for her or Bash for the rest of their lives.
“He’s alive,” I tell Graham as I slip into the SUV.
As if they can’t hear him moaning inside.
My lead security agent sighs. “Does he need medical attention?”
“Unlikely,” Theo says. “Can Jonas actually throw a punch? I should go check.”
“Stay,” Graham orders both of us.
He doesn’t knock before letting himself into the townhouse.
“Feel better?” Theo asks me.
“Mostly.” My heart’s still hammering like I just tried to race a horse in the Kentucky Derby.
I suck in a breath that doesn’t reach the bottom of my lungs.
I’m too amped up. Too furious still. Too certain that there’s zero punishment in the world harsh enough to compensate for what this man put Emma through.
“Won’t be fully better until I know he’s being tortured in hell. ”
“Em should’ve been the one to put a fist through his face.”
“That too. But she’d never do it.”
“And he’d hit her back, and then we’d both be in jail.”
I eye the man who tried to put his fist through my face the day we met, who now feels almost like a brother to me. “You’re not rushing in there to do any damage yourself.”
He smirks. “For once in my life, Rutherford, I’m being the responsible one who makes sure someone else doesn’t get arrested. For Emma’s sake. Plus, I wanted to see for myself if you surprised me and actually hit him.”
Chandler yells something inside, then all goes silent. Graham slips out of the townhouse, and he’s barely back in his seat before we’re pulling away from the curb.
None of us say anything for a block or so.
“You fix his nose?” I ask Graham.
“Enough. He’ll still think of you every time he looks in the mirror.”
“Good.”
Theo looks at me.
Back to Graham.
Then back to me.
“You two do this before?” he asks.
“You sure you want to know the answer to that?”
He stares at me a beat longer, and then he cracks a grin. “Does Emma know how many Razzle Dazzle lines you still use in your daily life?”
Fuck me.
He’s right.
I’ve said that one in nearly every Razzle Dazzle movie I’ve ever been in.
Usually when my leading lady co-star would ask who hurt you or what happened at fill-in-the-blank-based-on-the-movie-scenario or why do you think you could never love again?
But I hold his gaze and spend one last long moment of my life playing a role I never want to have again.
And I end it with a line that’s not in any Razzle Dazzle movies but could be.
“Does she know how many you know?”
“Would you two shut up and hand me a Snickers?” Graham mutters.
I do as the man asks.
And then Theo and I fall into another silence on our way back to his house.
My fury with Chandler Sullivan fades, and my appreciation for Emma’s brother grows.
And when we get back to his house and Emma meets me in the front yard with the tightest hug I’ve ever had and Bash comes flying out of the house too, yelling, “ Dat my daddy! ” there’s nothing left but relief and joy and love.
“Are you okay?” Emma whispers.
“Never better,” I reply. “And he will never hurt you again.”
Full truth.
No regrets.
This is the best life I could have, right here with Emma and our son.