“Don’t doubt yourself. Not now. Until this moment, you were sure. Very sure. Be sure. Take the investment, make those offices something that anyone walking into them will trust you’ll get the job done, then be sure and get the job done.”
Well, one could say Ren was succeeding wildly in trying to be okay with me opening a private investigations agency.
Still.
“This is too much,” I whispered.
“It’s investing in your future, which is tangled with my future. How is that too much?” he asked.
I said nothing.
“If I didn’t have a plan and was at odds and you were in the position to invest in something I wanted to do, would you do it?” Ren pressed.
“Absolutely,” I answered.
“So because you’re a badass, you can’t take the same from me?” he pushed.
Seriously.
Totally.
Completely.
How awesome was my man?
To share this with him, I muttered, “Okay, okay. You’ve convinced me.”
“Good, then kiss me and go in there and tell them they got twenty-five K to blow on makin’ my woman’s space right for her.”
I stared into his beautiful eyes.
Then I whispered, “You’re totally the shit, Zano.”
“I know,” he whispered back.
I leaned in and up and kissed him.
He kissed me back, wet and deep.
When he broke the kiss, I didn’t move away, so I could say, “Though, as awesome as it is, you doing this for me and investing in our future, it was awesomer, you giving shit to Dawn.”
Ren burst out laughing.
I pressed close and watched, smiling the whole time.
When he was done, I got up on my toes, touched my lips to his, pulled back and moved away.
But I blew him a real kiss before I walked into my new kickass offices to tell the gang they had twenty-five Gs to blow in making them killer.
And it was with no doubt that Ren heard the shrieks and squeals when I did.
By the way, we decided on gray carpet, gray walls and black furniture.
And when Sadie sent a text picture of The Majestic to me and offered the Rock Chick Discount (in other words, free) with a text that said, Remember. I’m loaded, we decided on that, too.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Never Forgive
I’d found a parking spot three blocks away from the Lucy in Cherry Creek North but as I was hoofing it up to the store I saw Darius’s Silverado parked three cars down from the front door.
Lee and his boys always managed to do that. It was some kind of voodoo but they had parking magic.
It was annoying, especially after driving by Lucy (twice) to find a parking spot that Darius obviously got after me and hoofing three blocks.
Darius was sitting behind the wheel of his truck. I stopped outside Lucy, where Darius and Brody were supposed to meet me, and sent a salute his way to get his attention even though it looked like his wire-rimmed shades were aimed my way.
He lifted a hand and did a full finger curl indicating I should haul my ass to his truck.
Badasses.
Save me.
I sighed and moved to his truck, yanked open the door, climbed in and turned to him.
“I have a full day and I need to shop,” I said by way of greeting. “So if we can multi-task, that’d work in a big way for me.”
“Then it’s good this meetin’ is gonna go fast because my ass is not gonna be in that store,” Darius replied by way of his.
