The Negotiator (Professionals, #7) - Jessica Gadziala Page 0,21
might be wondering?
It should have been anxiousness.
Or distaste.
Even anticipation of the job to come.
But it was none of those things.
Nope.
What I felt was something very suspiciously similar to happiness.
That was going to be a big, big problem.
I needed to get the deal done and get Alexander home before the lines of professionalism became too blurry.
If for no other reason than that the guys back in Navesink Bank wouldn't have a reason to rib me for getting another bad guy under my belt.
So, I was just going to get the job done, and get back on a plane to the States in the next few days.
Or, at least, that was the plan.
But you know what they say about plans...
FIVE
Christopher
I didn't need to leave the house to handle my business.
The fact of the matter was, I had to go because I had to get away from her for a little while.
Cora was right.
I never had guests.
I certainly never had female guests.
When it came to the fairer sex, I kept things fun and casual and out of my space. The woman's house or hotels; never my own home.
There was a tactical reason for that, since you never truly knew who you could trust. You never knew who you had on the payroll that you thought was loyal, but wanted to take you down. Enough even to hire a woman to loan out her body, so they could get research about the inside of my house, it's strengths and weaknesses.
On top of that, I was trying to be a good role model to my little brother. I'd seen far too many women in and out of my father's life. I remembered many early morning meals at the breakfast table with some random, beautiful woman who told me how cute I was, how much she was looking forward to being my new mother. And then a few weeks later, just when I had started to grow attached, they were gone, and I was crushed.
I refused to do that to Alexander.
And after many women breaking car windows and screaming outside my childhood home, I learned that some women—despite being explicitly told otherwise—would start to picture a future with you when you let them too much into your life.
So, I never brought women into mine.
Much to Cora's disappointment.
For the most part, she had done surprisingly little nagging me to settle down, to find a good woman who would cook for me and give me half a dozen babies.
I think she understood that my focus had been my business, then raising my brother after our father passed.
It wasn't that I didn't want those things. The wife. The children. There had always been a traditional streak to the men in my family. It was simply that it never felt like the time. And the women? Well, they never felt like the woman.
I had no plans to turn a side dish into a main course. That was a recipe for years of my father's mistakes when it came to women. Thinking with his dick instead of his brain.
If I was going to have a woman in my world, she was going to be the one I wanted to come home to, to wake up to, to give children to.
And until it was her, I had no interest in having one in my space.
Or so I thought.
I'd needed to leave the house because I liked having a woman there more than I should. There was something unexpectedly comforting to come in from my morning workout to see a woman—soft and bed-tossed, wearing nothing but a robe—sitting there waiting for me.
There was something right about sharing a meal beside someone for a change, to banter with them, to start a day with something other than concerns about work.
I was enjoying her presence too much.
Especially for such a short span of time.
So distance was imperative.
Even if all I did while I was gone was wonder what outfit she'd chosen to wear, if she was curled up on the couch watching her baking shows, what she was learning to cook from Cora, or if there would be any left for me when I got home.
"Anything to report?" I asked Niko, who greeted me as I walked through the gate.
"She talks a lot," he told me, barely holding back a grin. Apparently, I wasn't the only one who enjoyed her presence.