Total pages in book: 188
Estimated words: 185811 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 929(@200wpm)___ 743(@250wpm)___ 619(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 185811 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 929(@200wpm)___ 743(@250wpm)___ 619(@300wpm)
He’d had no complaints on that, as far as he knew, but he was not going to share that with Lottie.
Even if he was, he wouldn’t get the shot because she kept going.
“So you’re hot, and that’s my call to make, you can’t make it, so I don’t wanna hear another word about it,” she clipped. “Second, my dad promised us everything from trips to the Riviera to castles in the sky. He didn’t deliver on one single promise he made, but more, he wasn’t even enough of a man to fight the urge to hit a table in order to see to his woman and his girls. You’re man enough to fight the urge to fuck me in order to make me safe. What else would I get if you let me have the rest? I don’t know, you do, and I want a shot at that.”
“Lottie—”
“And I don’t want Tiffany’s, Mo. If I did, I’d earn the money to buy something there. I doubt you’re on food stamps working for Hawk, but I also make a good living and if a woman’s about the living a man can earn, she’s not much of a woman. I need a man with ambition and drive and a belief in what he’s doing. I don’t need a man to drive me to Tiffany’s. I got my own damned car.”
“Baby—” he whispered, with all she said, unable to stop that word from leaking out of his mouth.
But that was all he got out.
“I don’t know what those bitches did to you, since my guess is Tammy wasn’t the only one. And I don’t know what happened to you in Afghanistan. I don’t even really know you. All I know, and I know it good, Mo, is that I wanna find out.”
“This isn’t smart,” he said gently.
“Now? Or ever?” she demanded to know.
“Now.”
And possibly ever.
But he wasn’t going to get into that with her right then.
“Call Hawk and tell him to find this guy, Mo.”
“They’re workin’ on it.”
“Tell them to work faster.”
He said nothing because all his attention was set on stopping himself from smiling.
Christ, she really was something.
“Do you have a problem with me stripping?” she asked.
Mo now had no trouble not smiling.
“I don’t like men watching you take your clothes off,” he told her honestly.
“This is an issue because that’s what I do to pay the bills and I like doing it.”
“Yeah,” he agreed.
“Can you get over it?”
He didn’t know how he’d feel if he wasn’t there every night, watching the crowd watching her take her clothes off.
Maybe.
But doubtfully.
He gave her more honesty.
“It’s an issue, Lottie.”
“I’m not getting any younger,” she announced.
Outside his time in the Army and on Hawk’s crew, most his life he’d spent with women.
So on that, he kept his mouth shut.
“And I want kids,” she went on.
He kept his mouth shut on that one too, even if he knew it already with how she was with her nephews, and he liked it a lot.
“Do you want kids?” she asked.
“Yeah,” he answered.
“How many?”
“Two or three.”
“I’m not getting any younger, Mo.”
Well, hell.
Now he was fighting smiling again.
“You aren’t either,” she pointed out.
“Right,” he murmured.
“We’ll work it out,” she declared.
He drew an audible breath into his nostrils.
“We’re gonna work it out, Mo,” she assured him.
“It’ll break me, you get shot of me.”
Her body turned to stone at his admission, her face did too, and she stared at him.
“You’re a good woman. A class act. Smart. Funny. Love your nephews and show it. They love you back, so much, and you make it safe, so they feel free to show it. You got sass. You got talent. You believe in what you do and go all out to be the best at it there is. You’re together. You’re kind to your friends. And you can cook. I want a shot at that, Lottie. I wanna find out how much better you can get. But I already have a clue, and havin’ that clue, I know, you give it, then take it away, it won’t be like Tammy. It’ll break me. Now, knowin’ that, where you at?”
She didn’t wait even a beat.
She ordered, “Call Hawk and tell him to work faster.”
Mo no longer had the urge to spank her.
He had other urges and he had to lock himself down in order to fight them.
It was then he found out she’d take hold of any opportunity she was given.
Even going after what she wanted when he was weak.
“What happened in Afghanistan, baby?”
“Lost two brothers and killed people who were probably civilians.”
And it was then he learned she went after what she wanted so she could give him what he needed.
“You holding on with all of that?” she asked gently.
“This is why I keep busy.”
“And why you only sleep four hours a night.”
“Yeah.”
“Oh, Mo,” she murmured, both words heavy with the weight of compassion he saw in her eyes. “I can’t touch you, right?”