“Really?” he muttered.
“What? I just woke up.”
A lie, but I had just rolled out of my chair, so that was almost the same thing.
I had projects to complete, people counting on me, and I needed to find out who might be after Sparrow. Or our family.
“If you’re awake now,” Roman drawled, “it’s time for us to discuss what happened here.”
I bit into one of the pastries chef had made and nearly groaned. “Don’t mind me. I’m just orgasming over cream cheese.”
Roman rolled his eyes and turned to meet my gaze. “You know, you’re not getting any younger. You’re the heir; you need to stop acting like you’re just a spare.”
No way I was touching that ticking time bomb. “So, why did you summon us?” I asked. “Is it just us?”
“No, we’re here too,” a familiar voice said from behind me, and I turned to see London and her husband Kannon on the screen.
My eyes widened, and I grinned, this time with sincerity. “Well, hello there, baby sister. And Kannon.”
My brother-in-law narrowed his eyes at me. “Breck. I see you’re up to your usual shenanigans.”
“You know, I love the word shenanigans. We don’t use it enough these days.”
“I’m sure we use it enough around you,” London said, beaming. London knew me pretty well, and though I liked to pretend I was the laughing brother who would always make her smile, I was just as overprotective of her as Wilder and Roman. Maybe more sometimes because I tended to surprise her when I did it, but she just needed to get used to it.
“Anyway, now that we’re all here, let’s get started,” Wilder said, clearing his throat.
I swallowed the rest of my Danish, downed the last of my coffee, and set everything to the side. I wiped my hands on the linen napkin and then poured myself a glass of water. Everyone stood in silence as they watched me, and I nearly groaned. I was starving, thirsty, and in desperate need of caffeine. It wasn’t my fault that everything I needed just happened to be right there in front of me. They could talk around me.
“We’re here to discuss Sparrow and the attack.”
I swallowed a gulp of water and nodded. “I sent over the specs to Wild and Sparrow and her team.” I turned to Kannon. “Did you see?”
Kannon gave me a tight nod. “Yes. I saw. And we’re still going to be looking at exactly what happened.”
“Yes, you’re going to need to work with Sparrow a bit longer because Olly’s not here since they’re setting up the other team in California,” Wilder said.
I nodded. “I can do that,” I said, trying to sound professional. Although, I didn’t know if anybody believed me.
“Why exactly are we forcing these two people to work together?” Kannon asked Wilder instead of me.
I swallowed hard, trying not to think about why Roman wouldn’t trust me to make these kind of decisions. I hadn’t done anything to take away that trust, but it was just easier to step away and let Wilder act like the heir, the protector, while I did what I needed to do. I partied harder, I smiled more, and I felt like I could never live up to what Roman needed me to be. So I didn’t. I did my own thing outside the family purview. And that was just fine with me. They didn’t need to know about my tech or my company. They didn’t need to know the long hours I worked. Because it wasn’t for the family, so what good was it? It was just mine. Something that could be mine for the first time in, well, I didn’t want to think about that.
I shook my head, annoyed with myself for even thinking about stuff like that. I didn’t need to wallow in my misery while they were discussing Sparrow and Kannon’s teams in California and here in Alden. I needed to focus on them, and yet I could only focus on the way that Roman leaned on Wilder, and now on Kannon, and I was the odd man out.
Roman was always overprotective when it came to London, so it made sense that he wouldn’t lean on her, even though she would always be there to step in when needed. But me? I was just there to cut ribbons and kiss babies, just like Sparrow had said before.
And I needed to stop thinking about Sparrow. We were two completely different people, and me thinking about her in any way other than as the annoying new person on security was a bad call. Not only was she my sister’s friend who worked with the palace at times, she was the forever type. It was written all over her face. You didn’t screw around with that. And I could not make that mistake, yet I had a feeling if I wasn’t careful, I was going to do what I did well. Make another fucking error.
“Are you done wool-gathering and finally ready to listen?” Roman asked.
I swallowed hard. “Sorry, I didn’t sleep much.”
Roman narrowed his eyes, but Wilder looked nonplussed.
“Just keep working with her. I have a weird feeling that this is only the beginning,” Wilder said.
Chills washed over me, and I nodded tightly, my chin raised. “I’ve got it. I’ll fill in and cover whatever Olly can’t do from where he is.”
“And we can get on a flight right back to Alden,” Kannon said, and London nodded. “Really. We can be there to help.”
As if they didn’t trust me to do it myself. Well, I would just have to show all of them. I cleared my throat. “I’ve got it. You don’t need to watch out for little Sparrow. Not only could she probably kick anyone’s ass and take care of herself, I’ll be there to help.”
I ignored the disbelief on everyone’s faces.
I was the one who had put it out there to begin with, and now I was going to have to deal with the consequences.
“If you keep frowning at the screen, your eyes will cross.”
I blinked, uncrossed my eyes, and looked over at Jaye. “What?”
“You hadn’t blinked in a full minute, and your eyes are going to dry out. Plus, you have this frown on your face that makes me believe you are either thinking too hard or you’re not thinking about the topic at hand.”
I shook my head, embarrassed. I didn’t usually slack off at work—even if most people wouldn’t believe it. I usually had my head down, focusing on the projects at hand and what we could be doing better on our next assignments. I had a team that worked for me and relied on me to be the boss—not the prince most people saw.
And clearly, I wasn’t doing a good enough job of it right then. “I’m fine. Stop staring at me. And if you’re studying my face enough to notice when I’m blinking, you’re not paying attention to your task.”
Jaye rolled her eyes. “True, true. Okay, if you’re not going to focus on the work in front of you, can you help me look at this code?”
I nodded at two other team members who were in our office as I walked over to her. We all liked to work in a community setting rather than telecommuting from home. My goal was for everyone to be able to work where they were more comfortable as long as they could keep up with the steady and fast pace of the team. Another of our programmers was on maternity leave but kept trying to email work in as if I didn’t know she was exhausted from lack of sleep and covered in baby drool. Or whatever else babies excreted. We’d all kindly reminded her that she didn’t have to check in and be present if she didn’t want to, and her job would be there when she was ready to come back. I valued each and every person on my team, and I’d do whatever I could to make them comfortable. The more freedom they had, the better work they created.