Page 77 of Diamond In The Rough

“I didn’t feel right taking the meeting without you, so…” He shrugs when I bring my head down again. “I got in the car and drove all the way to the gates. But you not being with us felt off, so we turned around and came home. Honestly, the fact you got busy possibly saved both our lives.” His lips curl into a devilish grin. “I think I should meet the woman who has the power to make you forget business. That must be some seriously magic p?—”

“Don’t say it.”

“What!” he laughs. “I was gonna say ‘pulchritudinous.’” He giggles. “It means pretty.”

“You must’ve gotten today’s word of the day email,” I sneer.

Coming back to the monstera, I breathe through the temper beating in my veins. The protective instinct I’ve always had when it comes to anyone with the last name Malone coming around anyone of the female variety that I’d rather keep alive.

It’s the way of our world: if we like a woman, chances are, someone in our family—our dad, typically—will rape and kill her. It happened to a girlfriend of Archer’s. And one of Felix’s. It happened so fucking often, I learned to never bring a woman back to this house and expect her to be okay.

But I force my jaw to relax. Exhale the poisonous rage coursing in my blood. Because our father is dead now, Felix is happy and practically married, and none of us took up our sperm donor’s habit of destroying his own family to exert a little power.

“You should bring her around,” Lix says. “Invite her to dinner. I think it’s important I meet the lady who can make you forget me.”

“I didn’t forget you.” I give the monstera and its roots a gentle shake. “I got busy. Found something else I’d rather do than be here. But I didn’t forget you.”

“I might’ve gone to that meeting alone.” He presses a hand to his chest. “Been gunned down in the street. The tragedy…”

“But you didn’t go alone.” Christabelle strides into the kitchen in four-inch heels and a pressed skirt suit that makes her look like a million dollars.

She’s class. She’s money. But as she comes closer, she extends her fingers and waits for the dog to scramble to his feet and trot to her.

“And the fact you didn’t means your intuition was on the mark.” She scratches the top of Bastard’s head and continues in our direction. “You’re brothers, and you protect each other. You couldn’t go without Micah to that meeting any more than you could go without your suit.” She comes up behind Lix and presses a gentle kiss to the back of his head.

It’s quick.

Quiet.

There’s no fanfare, no loud mwah to turn the gesture into something silly. There’s just Christabelle Cannon loving my brother the way he deserves.

And there’s my brother, closing his eyes for a beat and absorbing the fact he’s found something that we, as children, were convinced we would never have.

We were bred to think that money, status, turf, and power were the ultimate goals to make a man happy. We’ve had those things all our lives. But it took until Archer found Minka, then for Felix to find Christabelle, for us to realize what a man should really hope for.

Love.

Love makes a man powerful, and having something to fight for makes him immortal.

“Keep listening to that intuition,” she murmurs, hugging her man from behind and speaking just loud enough only the three of us can hear.

Funny that seeing her hold him that way, speaking to him from behind, would make me think of Tiia. Not because I want her to hug me like that, or for other fanciful, romantic reasons. But because if it was me whispering to her from behind, my lips hidden from her view, I’m not entirely convinced she’d be able to hear me.

Setting the monstera carefully on the counter, I reach into my pocket and take out my phone. While Felix and Christabelle do their thing, I swipe my screen unlocked and navigate to my texts. Opening a fresh chat, it bothers me somewhere in the recesses of my mind that my lips curl into a stupid, giddy smile. But I type anyway.

How are your ears, Hale? Have you been to a specialist? You told me last month that a cold had you all blocked up, but you’re still staring at my lips when I talk. What’s up with that?

Hitting send, I lower my phone and glance across the kitchen when it turns too quiet. When everything stops, and the beady warmth of someone’s stare burns my skin.

I pause not only on Felix’s gaze, but Christabelle’s too. “What?”

“This is cute.” Christabelle comes around and perches her ass on Felix’s lap. She crosses her legs and wraps her arm around his neck for balance. And using her free hand, she flicks her wrist my way with nonchalance. “This smiley, in lust thing. It’s cute.”

“I’m neither cute, Ms. Cannon, nor in lust.”

“‘Ms. Cannon,’” Felix sniggers. “He’s getting formal with you, Darling. You’ve hit him where it hurts.”

“I’m not hurt!” And yet, the moment my phone beeps, my eyes shoot down to the device in my hand.

---