Emme
Cunningham Security. I was currently sitting in Zane’s truck, which was now parked outside the private investigation and security firm’s building in downtown Windsor, Rising Sun’s neighboring city. It was a couple hours after I had woken from my nightmare and even though Zane had managed to soothe and console me that morning, I was now feeling very tense.
“What are you thinking about?” Zane’s voice filtered into my head.
“This makes it real, Zane. I go in there and I’m admitting that he still exists.”
“Sweetheart, he doesn’t exist the way that he used to for you. You going in there is only about keeping you safe from him. The fact is, he is out there. I’m not taking chances with you. I’m ok with you not going in if you are uncomfortable being around that many men right now, but I’m not ok with you not going in because you don’t want to admit that you need to be protected until that asshole is caught.”
I swallowed hard and nodded. I knew Zane’s number one concern was my safety, but the reality is that I was more concerned for him. I didn’t trust that Seth wouldn’t follow through on what he said in his note. Zane’s life was too important and I wasn’t willing to risk it. Having Levi’s team around would not only keep me safe, but Zane as well.
“Ok, we can go in.”
“You sure?” Zane asked.
“Yes,” I answered, firmly.
With that, Zane exited the truck, walked around to my door to help me out, and held my hand as he led me to the front door. I took in the building’s exterior as we approached. Modern day architectural designs, a matte black stucco facade with dark gray accents, and lots of dark tinted windows all added to the sleek look of the building. When we arrived at the front door Zane punched a code in to the key pad at the side of the door and I heard the lock click. He opened the door and ushered me in ahead of him.
As we entered the building I stepped into the reception area. It was a well-lit space with modern furnishings that consisted of two crisp white couches in the left hand front corner of the room, an espresso colored end table separating them. There were an additional two chairs off the side of one of the couches along with an espresso colored coffee table that sat in front of the seating. Directly in front of where we stood was a reception desk that had a woman, who looked to be in her forties sitting at it.
“Good morning, Zane,” the woman said. “Haven’t seen you here in a while.”
“Morning, Deb,” Zane started. “Been busy training, so there hasn’t been a whole lot of free time. Deb, this is my girlfriend, Emme. Emme, this is Deb.”
I took in Deb. She was a beautiful woman with medium auburn colored hair styled in a pixie cut. She had a pleasant demeanor and kind, pale-blue eyes with specks of gold in them.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you Emme.”
“Thank you. And the same to you,” I quietly answered.
“Oh Zane,” she said as she directed her attention to him. “She’s too sweet. You better take good care of this one.”
“I fully intend to,” he replied as he pulled me tighter into his body. “Speaking of which, I assume Levi and Cruz are here?”
She nodded. “Already in the conference room. The rest of the guys are there as well, except for Tyson and Gunner. Tyson is on a case that’s not exactly local and Gunner is on security detail for another client. You can head on in; they’re expecting you.”
“Thanks, Deb.”
Zane walked with me toward the conference room which was located at the front of the building directly across from the reception area. Zane turned the handle on the door and pushed it open. I had my head down as I took two steps into the room, but quickly realized I should have been paying attention as I bumped into a solid wall of man and big, strong hands gripped my biceps to steady me.
“You alright there?” I heard a deep voice say.
My eyes traveled up from the abdomen that my eyes were currently focused on up to the chest, neck, and finally the face of a huge man standing in front of me and rounded at the sight. I couldn’t say anything. I had no words. I had never seen a man so large in my entire life. I felt Zane’s arm wrap around my waist and his fingers put a little pressure on my side. I slowly nodded to the man in front of me in response to his question. He pulled his hands from my arms, stuck a hand out toward Zane, and said, “Zane, brother, how’s it going? Congrats on the win at the Games, man.”
Zane stuck his hand out to shake the man’s hand and said, “Thanks, Dom. Appreciate it. This is Emme who, apparently, has lost the ability to speak. Emme, this is Dominick, better known as Dom.”
Nice to meet you, Dom.
That’s right. I responded in my head since I couldn’t actually speak. As a result, I nodded again. Dom gave me a grin. Wow.
At that moment, I saw movement to my right so I managed to peel my eyes from the sight in front of me to find Levi was now standing next to me.
“Hey, Em. Good to see you. I want to introduce you to the rest of the guys before we start talking strategy. Come on in and have a seat,” he said.
“Ok,” I said as I turned my head back to find that Dom was no longer blocking my view to the rest of the room. I stopped dead in my tracks.
Holy. Fuck.
A couple weeks ago Charley and I had the pleasure of staying in a beautiful home that Wes rented while we were out in Aspen for the X Games. Charley and I deemed it real estate heaven, even though I still had a special place in my heart for Zane’s house, particularly his kitchen. Then, a few days ago I told Zane I was in sex heaven. Somehow, I managed to look away from the men surrounding the table in front of me and turned to Zane.
With my brows drawn together I asked, “Did he already kill me?”
Confusion marred Zane’s face. “Sweetheart, what are you talking about?”
I leaned slightly into Zane before I said, not as quietly as I had thought, “I’m pretty sure I’m dead and have currently taken up residence in Hot Guy Heaven.”
While his jaw clenched, there was still a brightness in his eyes. They were smiling.
“And baby, I think you’re their leader here.”
I heard a few chuckles from the room and Zane leaned in to press a kiss to my temple. “Sorry, Em. This is real life. You are very much alive.”
“And we intend to keep it that way, beautiful,” Cruz said as he pulled my attention from Zane.
“Fuck, Cruz. Her name is Emme.”
“Already know that Zane. You going to tell me that I’m wrong for calling her beautiful?” Cruz challenged him.
Zane narrowed his eyes at Cruz. Cruz wasn’t the least bit affected.
“Relax, bro, she thinks you are the leader of Hot Guy Heaven here. I’m pretty sure you don’t have anything to worry about.”
I looked down at the ground, suddenly wishing I had kept my thoughts to myself.
“Alright, guys, let’s take it easy here and focus on the task at hand,” Levi chimed in. I was grateful for his redirection of the situation.
With his hand at the small of my back Zane guided me toward a seat, pulled out the chair for me, and then sat down next to me.
“Emme, you’ve already met Dom,” he began as he pointed to Dom who was sitting off to his left. He then began pointing at each man sitting at the table and said, “This is Trent, that’s Pierce, Holden is over on this side, and next to him is Lorenzo. I’ve got two more guys that are part of the team, Tyson and Gunner, but both are on jobs now that they couldn’t be here today. You’ll meet them before they’d ever cover you, so you don’t have to worry about that.”
My eyes had followed Levi’s introductions. Dom was a big man, no doubt about it, but when Levi got to Lorenzo I realized that he was now the largest man I’d ever laid my eyes on. Trent, Holden, and Pierce were certainly built, but where they were lean muscle, Dom and Lorenzo had a whole lot more weight on both of them. It was all rock-solid muscle. I was still in shock. How was it possible that every single one of these guys was gorgeous?
Levi pulled me out of my thoughts when he said, “So I want to make sure you have a better idea of what will happen here over the next few days and weeks. As you know we need you staying at Zane’s where the top of the line security is already set up. We’ll get security on your place, but until then we want to make sure you’re always covered by having you stay at Zane’s. Know that he isn’t planning to let you out of his sight much, if at all, but you should know that if he needs to be away for any reason, one of these guys, Cruz, or myself will be with you. We won’t intrude on whatever you are doing and we’ll be there solely to keep you safe.”
“Um, Levi?” I called out.
“Yeah, Em?”
“I’m not sure if this puts a damper on the game plan, but Zane actually isn’t going to be around much for the next couple of weeks.”
“Come again,” Levi said, his eyes narrowing.
I took in a deep breath and responded, “I didn’t want all of this stuff I was dealing with and going through to take Zane from his passion so I kind of forced him into making me a promise yesterday. He’s agreed to continue training for the US Open.”
“Lucky fuck,” Cruz murmured as he looked to Zane.
“You don’t have to remind me; I fucking know it. Emme made some compromises on her end for me to agree to training and competing at the Open. Her workload is light, only a couple of shoots between now and then. Any additional shoots will be booked after the Open. If she needs anything she calls me first. If she can’t get me or if I can’t get to her quickly enough then she reaches out to one of you. I trust each and every one of you to make sure she remains unharmed and I know all of you would lay down your lives to protect her so I owe you.”
“Oh,” I interrupted. “I have another question.”
Levi smirked and shook his head. “What’s up, Emme?”
“I haven’t had much of an opportunity to research all the details of your agency, but I was curious what you charge? I’m guessing this isn’t going to be cheap considering not only your reputation, but also the fact that you’re planning to have someone with me whenever Zane is not. Given his training schedule, I’m figuring the hours are going to add up quickly. I just want to have an idea of what I need to prepare for. I might need to work out a payment plan if your rates are more than I can afford.”
Levi chuckled and dropped his head. Cruz full blown laughed, and the rest of the guys had grins. I looked to Zane, confused by their reaction. He gave me a soft smile, but didn’t say anything.
“Did I miss something?” I asked.
Levi’s eyes came to mine again and he said, “I’m sorry, Em. I thought you would have just known, so I was a little taken aback by your question. We’re doing this pro bono. You don’t have to worry about the costs.”
“What?” I asked, shocked. “You can’t do that.”
“Considering I own the firm I’m pretty sure I can do that, but I’m definitely curious to hear why you think I can’t.”
“Um, well, it’s dangerous work and it’s a lot of hours. What if someone gets hurt or shot at?”
“That’s already happened to all of us, Emme. I expect it’ll happen again. Hopefully not on your case, but if it does it’s part of the job we do.”
My eyes nearly popped out of my head at the news that all of these men had been shot at at one time or another.
“Ok, so you definitely need to charge me then,” I insisted.
“Not happening, babe. Listen, here are a few things you should know. This firm is in high demand and we charge a lot for the service we provide because it’s the best money can buy. We’ve got plenty of other cases happening now that cover our operating costs and then some. You don’t need to worry that you are putting us out. Also, you’re my brother’s woman and the first good one I’ve ever met at that. If nothing else, that qualifies you for the family discount, which is always free. But Em, most importantly, as part of what we do here there are certain things we don’t take lightly. My guys,” he said as he motioned to all of them sitting around the table. “They need to know all the details of the cases happening here. Cruz and I brought them all up to speed on what you shared with us yesterday. They know what you’ve been through. If there is one thing they don’t tolerate it’s a man putting his hands on a woman or taking advantage of her sexually, especially after she’s already said no repeatedly. None of them would accept payment from you for the simple fact that they all feel, myself and Cruz included, that you’ve already paid plenty in this situation. We’ll get our payment when we catch the motherfucker that thought it was ok to do what he did to you. And Em, we will catch him.”
My eyes welled up with tears and I dropped my head down to avoid their eyes. This was embarrassing. These men now knew what had happened to me and despite washing away the bad and getting the beauty from Zane last night I now felt the ugly creeping back in. Zane’s hand came over and wrapped around mine, while his other arm wrapped around my shoulders and pulled me into his body.
Cruz took that opportunity to speak. “Emme, there’s nothing for you to feel ashamed of or embarrassed about. We all know that you might feel that way, but understand that nobody here sees you the way you might be seeing yourself right now. All we see is a woman who, unfortunately, was seriously mistreated and deserves a bit of a break after what she’s been through. In a situation like this when we are considering offering the work at no charge all the guys here have the option to say no before we officially take on the case. Assuming we have enough guys willing to do it to properly cover the case we take it. When Levi and I told them about you not one of them said they wouldn’t be involved. In fact, beautiful, they’re actually more motivated now because they’re each hoping that they are the one to find him.”
I looked around the table to see them all nodding and smiling.
“Thank you,” I barely rasped out.
“You’re welcome, Emme,” Levi answered. “Do you have any more questions?”
I thought for a moment and said, “Just one. You are going to be covering Zane as well, right?”
Zane spoke up and said, “Em, I’ll be fine. You are the concern right now.”
I pulled back from his body, turned to look at him, and said, “He threatened you Zane. And, I get that you consider me to be the top priority here; I have my own priorities. If something happens to you, where does that leave me?”
I turned to Levi, my eyes pleading with his, and I begged, “Levi, please tell me you are going to cover him.”
I could see Levi was struggling with it and his eyes went to Zane’s a minute before they came back to mine. “Emme, if he doesn’t want the coverage I can’t force it on him. He wants it, he knows he’s got it.”
I turned my head back to Zane’s and a single tear fell down my cheek. “Baby, please,” I began, trying to swallow past the tightness in my throat. “Please let them do it.”
He sat a moment staring at me when he finally mumbled under his breath, “Fuck me.” He turned his head to his brother’s and asked, “Levi, can you offer coverage on me when I’m away from any secured places?”
I turned my head to see Levi smirking at Zane, but nodding as well. I let out a breath and slumped back in the chair. This was exhausting.
With the formalities out of the way, Levi got down to the business. I gave him my schedule for photo shoots so he knew when he’d have to have guys covering me for sure. Zane told Levi that he would start training as early as tomorrow morning assuming I didn’t have another nightmare. Zane would train Monday through Friday for full day sessions, and half day sessions on Saturdays. Of course, that resulted in the guys learning that I frequently had nightmares, one as recently as that morning. This only served to motivate them more in their competition amongst each other over who was going to find Seth first.
An hour later, Zane and I were back in his truck on the way to his place.
“So, what do you think?” he asked.
“About what?” I replied.
“The guys. You good with all of them? Anybody make you feel uncomfortable?”
“I think I’m good with them,” I answered. “I guess only time will tell, but for now I have no complaints.”
“That changes for you, you tell me,” he demanded.
“I will.”
Just then, I heard my phone ringing in my purse. I fished around in my bag searching for it, finally located it, and pulled it out to see Charley’s name on the screen.
“Hey, sweets.”
“Hi, honey. How are you doing?” she asked.
“Ok. Had a nightmare early this morning so it was a rough morning, but Zane got me through it. We’re actually just now on our way back from meeting with Levi, Cruz, and their crew of guys.”
“Emme, I’m so sorry the nightmares are still happening. Maybe Zane’s brothers will find Seth and that will help put an end to them. Speaking of which, how did that meeting go?”
“It went well. Everyone seems nice enough. I just feel bad now because they won’t let me pay them for their services. And, last night I talked Zane into training for the US Open so with him needing to be away to train they’ll need to have one of their guys with me until Zane finishes.”
“Wait, I thought he said he wasn’t going to compete at the Open?” she asked.
“He didn’t want to, but I asked him to not give it up. I don’t want Seth having any more control. If Zane doesn’t compete, Seth wins. So, I convinced Zane to train, but as a result, now I’ll be abusing their security services.”
“Oh, Em. I’m so happy you could talk him into competing. He deserves it, but so do you. I’m glad you’re fighting back, honey.”
“Me, too.”
“So, aside from wanting to check in on you I was calling to give you some news. Yesterday, after we left the condo I had a long talk with Wes. I wanted to do something for you so Wes and I are flying Nikki and Monroe out this weekend. They’ll get here Saturday morning. I wanted to have you come here and spend the day at the house with us Saturday. I’m going to be inviting Elle and Greg, too, and I thought we could do some wedding planning.”
“Charley, I’m going to cry now. Are they really coming out?” I asked, tears welling in my eyes and my throat tight. I loved this girl. I’m certain she hadn’t set a date for her wedding, but she was looking for a way to distract me from everything bad that was happening in my life right now.
“Yes, Emme, they’re really coming.”
“Thank you, Charley, to both you and Wes. I’m looking forward to it,” I said as Zane pulled the truck into the driveway.
“So am I — can’t wait. I’ll text you later and let you know what time they’ll be here. Of course, you can come at any time you want. I’ll be staying here that morning; Wes is going to pick them up and bring them here before he heads into the office. He’s got some stuff to work on this weekend.”
“Sounds great. I’ll talk to you later then. Thanks again, Charley.”
“No problem, honey. Love you.”
“Love you, too.”
I disconnected the call, tossed the phone back in my purse, and looked to Zane, who had just parked the truck.
“Your girls coming out?” he asked.
I nodded and said, “Yes, Charley and Wes booked flights for them and they’ll be here on Saturday morning. Charley wants us all over to Wes’ place on Saturday; she’s inviting Elle and Greg, too, and she wants to do some wedding planning.”
“I think that’ll be good for you, sweetheart. I’ll only put in a half day so when I’m finished I’ll head over there. You can stay as long as you like, but after a week of training I’ll want you close by.”
“Thank you, baby,” I said as I put my hand up to his face and I leaned in to kiss him. Zane wrapped his hand around the back of my neck and gently squeezed as he kissed me back. When I pulled my mouth from his I looked him in the eyes and said, “Thank you for conceding in Levi’s office and asking them to cover you.”
“Didn’t want to do it, Em, but more than that I couldn’t bear to see the anguish in your face when you realized nobody would have my back. I refuse to put you through that so I agreed.”
“Zane?”
“Yeah, Em?”
“I have your back.”
He grinned at me before he said, “Yeah, sweetheart, you do.”