Chapter 64

I discovered a new side of nesting instincts Sunday morning.

“I want to go home.”

I wanted my nest, my own territory, my stuff. It didn’t matter how nice the hotel was—it still wasn’t home.

Mr. Czarn actually wilted.

“That man—”

“Lend me a gun. I’ll shoot him.”

Mr. Czarn stared.

I rolled my eyes. “Fine, a taser. I looked up how to file a restraining order last night and already finished the paperwork.”

“But it’s not in effect until it’s delivered to him, and that doesn’t mean it will actually do anything.”

I pinched my knees together. The preggy instincts were very real, and it was a new kind of agony to ignore them and stay in this ‘not home’ place any longer.

“Please,” I finally settled on. “I just…really need to go home.”

“Sweetie—”

“Don’t call me that.” Oh, the chills it gave.

“You don’t have to beg. I’m not keeping you here against your will. Of course, I’ll take you home.” But he didn’t look nor sound happy about it.

“You do have a taser, right? Crazy stalkers and all?”

“I have a proper series of handguns and rifles, but I suppose there is a taser in there somewhere.” He said it as though, if he found it, he’d pretend the taser was invisible.

For some reason, that made me smile. Something warmed in me, and my nesting instincts calmed just a mite.

“You’re not going to talk me down from walking around with a gun?” I asked.

“Heavens no.”

I giggled. “What if I actually shoot someone?”

He waved his hand. “Legalities. Better them than you.”

I followed him into his bedroom and got to see, for the first time, the true heart of the man den. I wasn’t disappointed, despite the lack of neon stripper signs and sports memorabilia. Everything was done in soft, dark colors, from the wood of the fine furniture, the four-poster king-sized bed, to the silk and satin bedding and curtains, which covered the entire wall. The light peeking out just beneath the curtains suggested this room also had a glass wall.

His scent hit my nose, permeating the air, and I had to fight not to melt onto the carpet and purr.

“Do you prefer a caliber?” he asked.

“Hmm?” Oh gosh, his bed looked so big and soft, and I bet it still smelled like him, drool.

“Caliber. Big, small.”

I mentally shook myself. Bad Alaina. No being seduced. “Uh, I said taser, didn’t I?”

“Well, I have one, but…”

He lifted a rather hefty-looking, black rectangle that just fit in one hand and pinched the buttons on the side. The resulting CRACK made me jump. There wasn’t so much a cute bouncing blue zigzag between the tangs as there was just a flash of lightning.

“Holy—you have that in your dresser?” I took a closer look, the fog of good man smell having blinded me. He wasn’t so much at a dresser as he was standing in an open wardrobe that I swear went back into the wall to a walk-in closet. “You have a drawer of weapons in your room?”

“Why wouldn’t I?” He cracked the taser again, just to see me jump, and grinned.

“Stop it!” I eyed the taser. “What were you planning on taking down with that? An elephant?”

“No, this is a normal grade taser. Pricey and strong, but a taser, nonetheless. What, were you thinking something cute, like a static shock? Humans are tougher than you think.”

“I was thinking discreet, not an effing god of thunder.”

“Why are you standing all the way over there? Come over here and take your pick.”

Still wrinkling my nose at both his teasing and to not breathe in his scent so much, I pattered near and peered over into the sleek dark drawer he’d pulled out.

Guns. At least five handguns, varying in size and color, and several accessories such as silencers, holsters, scopes, and magazines, all set in their own hole cut out of foam to fit them perfectly.

“I got some rifles too, but they’re in the back.”

“I am NOT carrying a rifle around the city.”

He shrugged. “Just thought I’d throw it out there,” he said and opened a drawer near the top to toss the taser in carelessly.

I narrowed my eyes at him. “Aren’t you afraid I might shoot myself?”

He frowned. “You’re suicidal?”

“No! I just—you didn’t question whether I knew how to handle a gun or nothing. For how overprotective you are of me taking one step too much, I’m surprised you’re so ready to hand me a gun.”

He looked at me for a moment, thinking what I couldn’t guess. If he wanted to, his expression could be as unreadable as a brick wall.

Then, with a quiet sigh out his nose, he lifted up my hand, or more specifically, the forefinger of my right hand.

“I noticed this.”

Along the side of my first knuckle was a smooth, silver scar. Scars on hands weren’t exactly rare. I’d be surprised if anyone could guess it was a burn scar rather than a particularly nasty cut.

The niggling in the back of my head gave an awful crunch.

“How do you know I got that from a gun?”

“I guessed. Also with the ease you had in asking for a gun, as well as how I’ve seen you behave around the security personnel both here and in Germany, then when you told me your parents were absentees…” he gave an unconvincing shrug. “It was an easy enough jump to assume you went shooting in your youth without proper adult supervision and got burnt on a hot barrel. I have a burn that’s the same. Metal burns are particularly smooth, I’ve found.”

That sounded a lot like bullshit. But it wasn’t like I was some secret agent.

“My uncle would take me hunting sometimes,” I said. It was some of the few adult family activities I had, even if my uncle wasn’t exactly an on-top-of-it guardian. When I’d burnt my finger, he half laughed, half scowled, and called me an idiot.

“Ah, that explains your ‘cabin in the mountain’ dream. Rifle then?”

But I just looked at him. The power of his scent had faded in the midst of my tight gut.

“Just how far back did your background check go?”

This time, he didn’t try to hold back his sigh.

“Alaina, no amount of money can send me back in time to see that you went hunting with your uncle. I just knew my firearms and made some deductions. If you’re nervous about being out of practice, we can go out to a shooting range.”

And since my nesting instinct to get back home had reared up stronger than ever in the face of my apprehension, I decided to let it go and picked out a handgun the least likely to break my wrist from recoil.

I didn’t want to shoot Joshua in the least, but I did want to intimidate him off my welcome mat. Usually just showing a gun was enough to do that. Mostly, though, I knew it would get Mr. Czarn off my back, and although he professed to respect my wishes, he sure didn’t make it easy to stick to them. I hadn’t forgotten from the start that he was a businessman, and a businessman’s first skill was persuasion.

Tucking the gun into my purse still didn’t make me feel better.