Page 99 of Protecting Bree
“Did you arrange that?” she asked.
“Nope. He texted me and asked what the plan was for your stuff. I told him we’d deal with it later. Guess he decidednotto let us worry about it. Again, you good?”
“Yeah. I’m more than good, Smiley,” Bree said. She looked over the crowd. Her friends. She’d almost lost this. That thought upset her more than everything that had actually happened to her. Yes, it had been horrible. She’d been locked up, treated as less than human, threatened, beaten, and scared out of her mind. And yet…she was here. Alive. With more friends than she’d ever had in her life.
She could act like a victim. Let what happened overwhelm her and turn her into a different person. Someone who was scared of her own shadow. Who stayed inside soshe didn’t have to interact with strangers who may or may not hurt her.
The truth was, life was full of ups and downs. And she preferred to concentrate on the ups rather than the downs. Turning in Smiley’s arms, she grinned at him.
“What?” he asked with furrowed brows. “What’s that smile for?”
“I’m happy,” she informed him.
He didn’t look appeased. If anything, he looked even more concerned. “It’s only been two days. Everything that happened could hit you hard when you least expect it.”
Bree shrugged. “You’re right. But you’ll be there. And I can talk to Julie and Fiona about it. Or Remi or Kelli. Or go spend some time with Yana, to remind myself of how appreciative she is for all she has and how well she’s dealing with what happened to her too. I was lucky, I know that. But I’ll take lucky over dead any day of the week. I want tolive, Smiley. Look forward, not back.”
“I love you,” he told her.
“And I love you too. One day, we’ll stand in this place when we’re old and gray. All our friends’ kids will be here, cutting up and saying stuff we don’t understand and talking about technology that’s over our heads. And we’ll look back over our life with no regrets.”
A look of such longing flashed on Smiley’s face, Bree’s heart ached.
“I want that,” he said.
“So we’ll do what we have to in order to make it happen.”
“Yeah.”
A waiter walked over and held out a tray full ofchampagne glasses filled to the rim. Bree took two and handed one to Smiley.
“To us,” she said quietly.
“To us,” he repeated. Instead of taking a sip, Smiley put the glass on a nearby table without looking and pulled her closer.
He kissed her long, hard, and with all the love she knew he felt in his heart.
Bree felt it down to her toes. She was the luckiest woman in the world, and she vowed to live life to its fullest from that day forward.
Hours later, Smiley couldn’t sleep. He held Bree until she’d drifted off, but his brain wouldn’t shut down. After everything that happened, he couldn’t stop thinking about something Castillo had said. The man was dead, and what he’d said was most likely bullshit, but he couldn’t rest until he’d gotten it off his chest.
Turning, he gently kissed Bree on the forehead, amazed that she was here with him. Not only because of what she’d been through, but because he was a grumpy asshole. He knew it, but somehow Bree didn’t seem to care. It was baffling, but he wasn’t about to let her go now. He needed her too much.
Staying as silent as possible, he slipped out from under the covers, standing by the bed for a moment to make sure Bree hadn’t woken up. She shifted a little after losing his body heat, but settled again. Just looking at her shorter hair, her eyelashes against her bruised skin, made him wish he could go back and kill Castillo all over again.
Smiley forced himself to walk out of the bedroom and into the living room. He sat on the couch and stared down at his phone. Taking a deep breath, he dialed a number he’d asked Tex for before he’d left Aces.
It was the middle of the night, but the man on the other end answered after only one ring.
“Rex.”
“I’m sorry for calling so late. It’s Smiley.” The urge to talk to this man had been overwhelming, but now that he had him on the line, Smiley wasn’t sure he’d made the right decision.
“What’s up? Is Bree all right?”
“She’s good. Amazing, really. She constantly surprises me with her resilience.”
“Our women are stronger than we think,” Rex agreed. “Every day, I wonder how Raven survived what she did with her personality intact. I still have no idea how she did it.”
