Page 80 of Pretty Pink Poison
“I disagree. You’d make a good daddy.” She leaned forward and removed her combat boots from my desk before she planted her elbows on it instead.
My cock jumped at her saying that, but I shut down the feeling fast. “I won’t because I don’t intend to have any. You’ll make a good mom if that’s what you want to be though.”
She jerked back, “ I can’t have kids, Bane. You know that.”
“What? Of course you can.”
She glanced away and then pushed at an imaginary fuzz on my desk. “I can’t. You and I both know I miscarried.”
“Your health records are clean, baby girl. That was just bad luck.”
“A lot of bad luck,” she murmured and then she stood to turn away from me. I wanted to ask her more, wanted to pry through the sadness I suddenly saw in her eyes, but there was an alert that my brothers and Jameson along with his daughter, Franny, had arrived at my penthouse door.
“Franny?” Bianca shot up. “His daughter? I’ve never met her.”
“She isn’t supposed to be here but—”
“Oh my God. I’m so excited.” And then she was off, running to the front door in her baggyJawsshirt. I remembered how she’d explained the shark was a victim one night too. And secretly I loved every one of those shirts because it meant she accepted the darkness in things more than the light. Her combat boots clomped as she ran to greet my brothers and Jameson. She hugged Ez, was reserved with Rafe, and then Jameson pulled her close, and I felt that fucking clawing jealousy I always did when she looked at another man.
I stomped after her, irritated that she was hijacking my meeting with them too. Yet, no one seemed to care when she bent down to Franny’s level and asked her if she likedJaws.
That spoke to the little girl who smiled wide. “Wednesday is actually my favorite character ever, but I’ll pick Ursula on your shirt.”
“Dang. Wednesday is the best choice. We need to find some shirts with her on it.”
“My daddy ordered me a Wednesday outfit too. He said I can wear it any time I want.”
“Did he?” Bianca eyed Jameson, and I immediately considered gouging out his eyes when he winked back at her.
“I’ll buy you a Wednesday outfit too if you’d like.”
She pulled him in for a hug as she laughed at his offer. “I’m so happy to see you again.”
She was always happy to see the fucker. I knew he was good looking and charmed just about every woman he encountered, but it was clear he had a soft spot for Bianca. It’s probably why he’d brought Franny in the first place.
“Bane said you’d be working so I’m damn near ecstatic to see you. And Franny wanted to come since she’s down a nanny for the time being.”
“Well, Franny, I could be your nanny while you’re here. Want me to show you the resort?”
Franny sighed. “I don’t like kid areas.”
“Oh good. Me neither. I think we’ll go bother some adults.” She glanced at Jameson. “It okay if I walk her around?”
“As long as Hades goes with you.” The man with a permanent scowl that had walked in with Jameson and was standing by the door walked over to Franny’s side.
“And Pepe.” I flicked a gaze at our own security. Bianca shrugged and threaded her hand into Franny’s before they walked off, and we sat down to talk business.
We went over territories and shipments for a while, every word measured, every nod a calculation of power and influence, before the Oracles came up. Rafe and Ezra were diving deeper into the revamp of the Oracles App. They’d come onto to control the app with me at this point. We filtered entries and we utilized them to our advantage when we could.
Half the world, even politicians and leaders of countries were using it, giving us way too much information like they thought we wouldn’t listen.
And with all that information, we enforced where we wanted to. Now, though, my brothers wanted to pull back on that “You can’t just kill him. You’re getting fucking toxic with this app.”
I laughed. Yuri Walden had been the owner of the app before and he’d been the most toxic of them all. He’d allowed AI to practically relegate everyone on that app. That was toxic. I was responsible.
“Yuri admitted to using Oracle for his own devices, always. I’m doing better than that at least,” I growled but my frustration wasn’t with any of them.
I was trying to give Pink space and not be jealous while I did it. I couldn’t kill the guy Pink was with, so I’d collected skull after skull in my office instead and I wanted more. My outlets weren’t calming my rage though. The violence in me kept building and building. “I want Yuri’s head on my shelf.”
