Page 32 of Walking Red Flag

I’d seen that in just the few times that we’d met.

I didn’t need to make him into a bad guy.

I went from seven miles over the speed limit to the speed limit.

There was one thing that I always made sure to do—if I could—and that was drive safely.

When I was a teen, my bodyguard had been driving me to school and had driven us into a light pole when he’d lost control trying to go around someone.

Thankfully, I’d been in the backseat and the brunt of the accident had taken place on the driver’s side front bumper.

Sadly, my bodyguard had sustained a head injury that had made him incompatible for security detail work anymore.

I’d been happy about it. Honestly, I had never really liked the guy, and Ernest Mosley, the guard, had always given me a really weird vibe.

Speaking of weird vibes, when I finally parked and got out of my car, I headed to my sister’s bakery instead of my shop.

I could see from where I was walking that the door was wide open, and there was plastic everywhere. In fact, that was all I could see as I glanced inside the shop on my way past.

Legs protesting the fast walking—I didn’t know why I didn’t want the man to see me—I opened the door to Maven’s bakery and went inside.

I spotted her in the doorway of the kitchen, a sheet of cupcakes precariously perched above her head, and my nephew jumping up and down yelling at her.

“Redford!” I called.

Redford whipped his head around and screamed, “Aunt Mina!”

When Redford was small, he couldn’t pronounce Milena fully, and my name had been shortened to Mina, since that was all that he could say.

I dreaded the day when he switched back to my full name.

He was growing so dang fast.

I bent down and opened my arms just as his surprisingly stocky body hit me full force.

I made a “whoosh” sound and fell backward onto my ass, my sore and tired legs protesting even a little bit of effort to stay aloft.

Laughing, I curled my arms around the sturdy little body and inhaled.

“Have you been eating cookies without me, Redford?” I teased, burying my face into his hair.

“I’ve been eating scones,” he disagreed. “I’d never eat cookies without you.”

I smoothed back his hair, which looked exactly like his daddy’s, and looked into his mama’s eyes.

“What are you doing here today?” I asked curiously.

“Mama said that I couldn’t stay at home with Lola and Brando because they have stomach bugs, and she didn’t want me to catch it,” Redford said. “She says that I can’t make it to the toilet yet, and that if I throw up all over the floor again from the top bunk she’ll murder Daddy in his sleep.”

I snickered.

I actually remembered that particular incident because I’d been staying over at their house because Auden, Lola, Brando, and Maven had been either on the mend from the stomach bug, or still actively participating in life with it.

I’d been there as backup for Maven so she could catch some sleep.

And I’d had to deal with Pukemageddon.

It was what sold me on never having kids.

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