Page 50 of Demanding Mob Boss

"Everything."

"I don't understand."

"Neither do I, but I guarantee I will never get tired of having you around."

"You can't promise that. You can't."

Fuck this. I need to hold her. She needs to be held.

I drop down onto the mattress and then pull her into my lap, blankets and all. She doesn't struggle. Not my Anna. She just looks up at me, questions in her drenched violet gaze. So pretty, something hurts deep in my chest.

"I am not like other people."

"Neither am I."

"I scare most women."

"You don't scare your mom, or your sister."

"I do sometimes." When the beast inside of me gets too close to the surface it scares the shit out of my family. "Even Lachlan wouldn't come into my office the day before yesterday, but you did. You weren't afraid of me."

"You wouldn't hurt me."

She is right, but how is she so certain? "I am more than your boss." After letting me touch her tits like that, she has to know it's true. "You wouldn't offer yourself to your boss, but you did to me."

"I have a crush on you." She says it like it's a shameful secret.

I feel a rare smile curving my lips. "I think it's more than a crush. I think you need me like I need you."

"But how could you need me?"

I shrug. "I don't know. I've never needed anyone before."

When my dad moved Helen and her family away, I was pissed because I wanted to figure out what about her was different. But I didn't need her.

"Not even your family?"

"Not even them." I am responsible for them, but I don't need them.

"I needed my mom, but I was too much for her. Like the world is too much for me."

"Explain that."

"Which one?"

"Both."

She settles in against me and I'm not sure she even realizes she's doing it. Anna's sweet little hand plays with a button on my shirt. "For as long as I can remember, being around people has been hard for me. Sounds are too loud. Smells are too pungent. Colors are too bright."

Without her, I hardly feel anything, but she feels too much.

"And I help?"

"You're like a mute button."

Except after I took her into a blissed out state and then didn't give her enough time to recover. I left her wide open to everything. I'll never do that again. She's my responsibility.

She allows me to feel.

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