I reached for it. “I do after that run-in with your uncle.”
She sat down in front of me. “I’m so sorry that happened today. I wish I would’ve been with you.”
“I’m just glad you’re okay. I had myself convinced that when I got home, you’d be dead on the floor in the living room or something.”
“I’m fine. I promise. No one’s been here all day.”
I threw the wine back with one gulp. “All right. Hit me with it. What’s on your mind?”
She gazed down into her glass. “Who was that woman your father brought to the anniversary party?”
I blinked. “You mean Alice?”
She nodded, but still didn’t look at me. “Yeah. Her. Who is she?”
“Just a girl.”
“A girl you were with at one point, right?”
I sighed. “Bonnie, look at me.”
Her eyes slowly rose. “All I want to know is if she’s a threat to us. A rival family, maybe? Or someone your father introduced you to in order to throw you off?”
I stared at her. “Is that all you want to know?”
She narrowed her eyes thoughtfully, a slight tsking sound escaping her lips. “It is, yes.”
“Because here again, I think you’re lying to me.”
“I’m really not. We haven’t actually had a chance to talk about the party over the past few days. I’d like to talk about it now if that’s okay.”
“And it can’t wait until tomorrow?”
“Not unless you want me to be up all night thinking about it.”
I slid my glass to the side. “Well, she’s no one you have to worry about. She’s a woman from my past, but nothing else. She’s staying in my past.”
“Then, why did your father bring her to the party?”
“Because I was supposed to have a lunch date this past Friday with her mother.”
Bonnie licked her lips, a worried frown furrowing her brow. “I didn’t know that.”
I shrugged. “Well, now, you do.”
“What did her mother want?”
“Probably to try and hook us up.”
She scoffed. “And you didn’t think that was prevalent information I needed to know?”
“Now you know what it feels like to be in the dark.”
She shot to her feet. “Excuse me, but I’m not going to be talked to or treated like that anymore. We’re supposed to be a team. And while you might look for any excuse to cast me off, you at least have to give me some credit here. I was sent to kill you, and something about your demeanor changed that for me. Being with you changed that for me. That has to count for something. And now you want to blindside me with the fact that your family’s trying to set you up to marry someone else when you’ve got a perfectly good woman standing here trying t—”
I let her rant until she cut herself off, but when she did? I stood. I placed my hands against the table and leaned forward until I smelled her wine-tainted breath waft beneath my nose.
She slowly sat back down.
I didn't. I gazed into her eyes even though she kept averting hers from mine. After moving around the table, I crouched down beside her, watching as she kept her eyes cast to her lap.
“Bonnie,” I said.
She licked her lips. “That was out of line. I—”
“Look at me, please.”
Her eyes fluttered my way. “I don’t hear you say that word often.”
“Because I don’t. That means when I use it, I’m serious.”
She nodded. “I know.”
My eyes danced along her face. “Yes, you have proven to me on various occasions that you can’t be trusted. Even though you had good intentions, you executed them wrong. You want a partnership, but you won’t talk to me.”
“You won’t talk to me, either.”
“We keep forgetting at the base of everything is your uncle. We lose sight of that when we get caught up in our emotions. That’s why I’m not allowing myself to get caught up like you are right now.”
She closed her eyes. “I know. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry for them. Emotions are what remind us we’re human. But they’re also a catastrophic distraction in a situation like this. I want you safe, Bonnie. I want you alive. Even though you make it difficult, and even though you make my head sometimes hurt with your insane ways, I just want you safe. Understand?”
She brushed a tear away. “And I just want to prove to you that I can be the partner you want. The partner you need. But if we can’t keep our word to one another and we can’t talk to each other, all I have is sneaking around behind your back to prove my point, which only makes it worse no matter the outcome. If you keep closing me out, I can’t communicate. And that’s the hub of everything in any relationship.”
I tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “You’re right. It is.”
“So, I’m communicating to you that I didn’t enjoy Alice at that party and how she interacted with you.”
“I promise you what happened between Alice and me is over.”
“Are you sure about that?”
I paused. “Why that question?”
She sighed. “Because I saw you two out on the balcony laughing and talking and having a grand old time. The way you were with her—you’re never that way with me. You two seem magical together. We don’t have that.”
I slowly stood. “You were spying on me?”
She released a frustrated breath. “Your brother led me to the two of you. You abandoned me at the party for her. All I want to know is if you’ll continue to do that as things go on. You know, leave me for her.”
My brother? What the fuck was he doing in all of this? “Look, the scenario is much more complicated than you—”
She stood up, her face red with anger. “Then, why don’t you try a bit of that communication we were just talking about and tell me what the hell’s going on.”
I gripped her chin. “You won’t take that tone of voice with me. Understood?”
She ripped away from my touch. “And you won’t
