Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 142866 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 714(@200wpm)___ 571(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 142866 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 714(@200wpm)___ 571(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
“Hey?” I gape at him, incredulous on so many levels. “You do what you did and just come in here saying hey? Is that all you have to say?”
“I told you I was going to show you, right?” He cups my face in two large hands, his thumbs brushing tenderly over my lips. “So do you see now?”
“I see.” Tears streak my cheeks and I cover his hands at my face with my own. “You love me.”
“Damn right I love you.” He dips and captures my mouth in a kiss that searches my soul and squeezes my heart. Makes the blood sing in my veins like that wordless jazz tune we danced to on a yacht under a moonlit sky. I hear the words to the song now. They’re love and trust and right now and forever and always and enough.
“What about your dad?” I ask, when my lungs are so air-starved we have to break the kiss.
“He was the one who told me do it. Well, I’d already decided, but I knew buying this team was almost as important to him as it was to me.”
“I know this was hard.” I caress his nape and knit my brows in concern. “What’d he say?”
“He said there is nothing and no one I would have chosen over your mother. If you feel that way about Hendrix, I’ll kick your ass myself if you buy this team.” He gives me a wry grin. “He does have a few inches on me and he’s in great shape for an old man.”
“And you do feel that way about me?” I ask, breathless and undone by the force of such a man putting me first this way.
“I already told you I love you. Now you just fishing.” He chuckles. “But if there is any doubt, yes. I feel that way about you. Nothing is more important.”
“I love you too,” I say, pressing a kiss to his lips. “And maybe just as important, at least to me, I trust you.”
The laughter fades in his eyes, on his lips. “That means as much to me too. Thank you. And I’ll never take either for granted.”
“As much as I love that you chose me, it bothers me so badly that Carverson gets what he wants, gets to walk away unscathed.”
“Unscathed?” Maverick’s mouth hardens, firms into a line I would never want to cross.
“He won’t be. Not by the time I’m done with him.”
“You have a plan?” I ask, hoping that we win our case, but also hoping, as petty as it sounds, that the man who robbed Maverick of this dream suffers for it.
“Oh, I always have a plan.” He plucks the rose I didn’t even realize I was still holding from my fingers. “How do you think I got you?”
CHAPTER 52
HENDRIX
I have something for you.”
I should be used to hearing those words from Maverick by now. If ever a man was determined to shower a woman with gifts, he is. The flowers arriving wherever I am. The diamond-and-platinum lower grill with my initials that showed up at Mama’s house after I casually mentioned I liked one Beyoncé was rocking. I’ve taken care of myself and others for so long, I almost forgot how it feels for someone else to want to take care of me.
Or as an adult… have I ever really known?
Because sometimes it feels like new emotions were invented for this thing that has blossomed between the two of us. I’m not sure how to name it, and it’s articulated only in the pace of my heart when I think of him. In the hitch of my breath when I first see him. In the thrum of home, home, home beneath every second we’re together. Of course, we’ve said we love each other, but that feels inadequate. Almost cliché. I’ve heard it used so often in the past, but the depth, the care that is developing in our relationship, I’ve rarely seen. Never experienced firsthand.
“What do you have for me?” I ask, resting my bottom on the edge of Daddy’s old desk. We’ve still been working out of Mama’s house for the last week, but Maverick leaves today and I’m heading back to Atlanta next week. Aunt Geneva’s doctor gave her the official all clear a few days ago.
“A gift.” He scoots the office chair closer and pulls me from my perch on the desk down to his lap. “But you don’t have to accept it.”
I lean into his neck, breathing in the clean smell of him, and chuckle.
“When have I ever turned down a gift?”
“This one carries some responsibility,” he says, pulling back to peer into my face. “For real. If you decide you don’t want this, I’ll find another home for it.”
“It needs a home?” My brows draw together, but my smile stays fixed in place. “I think you’re taking ‘diamonds are a girl’s best friend’ too literally.”