Up until a few weeks ago, I’d missed the fuck out of her. But somewhere along the way, this siren showed me something I’d never seen before. I liked being myself. I needed to be myself. I didn’t want to fucking hide who I was or where I came from or make apologies for who I was. I’d been missing Leigh, I’d been missing the part of my life that had settled into being a husband but I wasn’t missing the part where I’d changed who I was for someone else. “I used to miss her so bad it hurt to breathe. I’d be lyin’ if I said otherwise. But this blonde-haired, blue-eyed beauty fell in my lap and blessed me with somethin’ I didn’t know I could have.” I stroked her cheek. “Wanna know what that was?”
“What?” she whispered.
“You.”
“Talon—”
I didn’t let her finish. I needed to get this out. “I remember that night I met you. I remember how beautiful you were and how miserable you looked. You still took my breath away but I wasn’t ready to feel somethin’ for a woman besides grief. I didn’t have anythin’ to give back then. Hell, maybe nothin’s changed in that regard but the difference is I wanna try and it’s because of you. Not that you changed me, but you made me realize somethin’. I’m still livin’ and I don’t have to be someone I’m not. I like who I am around you.” I cupped her cheek and dropped my voice. “I wanna be the man you come home to. I wanna be your hero.”
The wheels touched down and Maddie came awake with a small cry. Siren hugged her tight and leaned her head into my chest. “You’re our hero.”
Fuck if that didn’t feel good.
TWO OF ANDRÉ’S MEN MET us when we landed. They secured Maddie’s car seat in the back row of the SUV and Siren climbed in and got Maddie settled. Neil had a new truck waiting for him and Roark was taking the plane back to Miami.
Standing on the tarmac, I held my hand out to Neil. “Thank you.”
His gray eyes trained on me, we shook hands. “Let me know if there are any problems with Stone.”
I’d shoved my anger toward Stone down deep so I could get Siren and Maddie out of harm’s way but now that we were back on solid ground, I was ready to find him and fucking unleash. If Neil had beaten me to it, I wanted to know about it, right fucking now. “You did somethin’.”
“I do a lot of things.” Neil’s deep voice was unapologetic.
No fucking shit. My brain stretched in all directions, trying to decipher what he’d done. I could only come up with one plausible answer. “What do you have over Stone, besides the shit you built without permits?”
“I didn’t build anything without permits.”
I sighed. “Okay, I’ll bite. What did your crew do while they were out there?” They must’ve done something. I knew how to read between the lines with Neil and he was telling me something had gone down.
“The measure of a man is not what he does but how he does it.”
Jesus fuck. What’d he do? Wire the fucking place? “You sayin’ I don’t need to kill Stone?” I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. At all.
Neil placed his hand on my shoulder. “Move forward.”
André walked up. “We got your back.”
I stared at them.
“Go take care of your women,” André added.
“What about Stone?”
André glanced at Neil and Neil nodded. “He shouldn’t be a problem.”
“I thought we’d decided to keep the cops out of this.”
“We did.” André agreed.
My hands on my hips, I hung my head a moment. When I looked back up at them, I let them know I wasn’t fucking around on this. “Shit goes down, I’m not gonna ride out the storm. I will be the storm.” I stalked to the SUV and got in.
I made sure Siren and Maddie were okay then I turned my phone on and checked in to my security system. André said something to his two men in the front seat before he turned toward me.
“We’re dropping you off then I’m heading back to Miami.”
“You should’ve stayed on the plane with Roark.”
André ignored me. “I’ll have one of my men bring your car up tomorrow.”
I scrolled through my live camera feeds but I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. “Kendall can drive it back.”
“Is Candle going to be okay with that?”
“Why should I give a fuck? You said I didn’t have to worry about that shit anymore.” I was still pissed they hadn’t told me what they’d planned on doing about Stone.