Page 168 of Renewal After Dark

He’d loved seeing her in hot demand among all the island businesses. He didn’t love paying estimated quarterlies, but he did what he was told by his business manager. She’d taken a huge load off his shoulders, and he’d heard others say the same thing. “She’s worth every dime,” Sierra had said bluntly a few weeks ago.

Duke leaned over to kiss her. “All work and no play makes McKenzie tired and cranky.”

She laughed. “Guilty as charged.”

“Missed you. Long one hundred and twenty minutes away from you.”

Smiling, she said, “Missed you, too. How was the visit with your friends?”

“I took a lot of ribbing, thanks to you.”

Her brows came together adorably. “Because ofme?”

“Uh-huh. I used to be a regular over there, and now I’ve got much better things to do with my evenings.”

“Oh, I see.”

“They want you to come in.”

“Let’s do that sometime. I’d love to get to know them.” She glanced up at him, and he saw torment in her expression that immediately put him on alert to trouble. “Can we talk?”

Oh God. No, no, no. Nothing good ever came from those words. For a second, he was struck so dumb with fear that she wanted to tell him they were over that he couldn’t breathe.

“It’s not about us.”

It took a full ten seconds for him to start breathing again.

“Duke! Come on, you know it’s not about us.”

“I, uh…”

She stood and wrapped her arms around him. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“You didn’t. Not much, anyway.”

“Yes, I did, and I hate that I did. You havenothingto worry about where I’m concerned. Please tell me you know that.”

“I do.” He kissed her and leaned his forehead on hers. “It’s just that you’ve become so damned essential to me that I could barely stand to spend one evening away from you and Jax.”

“We missed you terribly. Jax didn’t want to go to sleep without Doo Doo.”

“Best nickname ever,” he said with a chuckle.

“What I wanted to tell you is that we heard from Eric about a financial settlement.”

Duke went completely still when he heard that son of a bitch’s name.

McKenzie took his hand and towed him along with her to the sofa, where they settled next to each other with her legs over his lap and their hands still intertwined.

He never got over how soft her skin was or how much he craved everything about her when they were apart.

“What’d he say?”

“He offered a one-time payment of one hundred thousand, provided I sign away the right to more down the road.”

“Fuck him and his money. We don’t need anything from him.”

“That’s very sweet of you to say.”

---