Twist My Heart by Brooke Taylor (ebook audio reader .txt) 📕

before he returned. “Good news—you’re free to travel. We still have a pilot and plane on standby.”

I sat up and looked at Coop. “Travel where? Aren’t I staying behind?”

Nik lowered his brows at Coop, his jaw ticking. “You’re coming with us.”

“But Coop’s boss said no.”

“Zaki would never go for girlfriends or wives on a job.” Coop jammed his hands in his pockets and looked sheepishly down at the floor. “So I told him you were a hooker with a dog.”

Nik bolted off the bed’s edge, straight for Coop’s throat. Raising his hands in surrender, Coop laughed as Nik backed him against the wall. My finger hovered on the call button for the nurse in case we’d need to admit another patient.

“Easy, big fella, OZ doesn’t understand the concept of significant others coming on a job. Hookers make perfect sense to him. I was very clear though. As part of your transition to civilian life, you were paying extra for the girlfriend experience, dog included. No one’s going to try to horn in and act inappropriate around Thea or Titan, okay? Besides, it’ll only be the four of us and a minimal crew on the boat.”

Nik torqued his neck from side to side. “I don’t want anyone thinking the woman I love is a hooker, got it?”

“It was a joke, but if it got ol’ steel heart to say he’s in love, it was totally worth almost getting killed.”

“Woman you love?” I asked tentatively.

Nik turned away from a smirking Coop, his eyes softening as he caught my smile. Coming back to my bedside, he leaned his hip on the edge as Coop and Leo not so subtly slipped out.

Nik’s finger traced my jaw, hooking under my chin as he lifted it. “I love you, Thea Gale.”

His lips found mine for a gentle, savoring kiss. As he pulled back, he brushed the tip of his nose with mine. “I know you thought my tattoo was to protect my heart, but I gave myself a steel heart because I didn’t think I even had one anymore. Somehow, you’ve brought it to life, because from the second I saw you it’s done nothing but stop and start, twist and buck. All for you. Only for you.”

“Nikolas.”

His low growl simmered with heat. “You know I can’t hold back when you say it like that.”

I wrapped my arms around him as he slid into the bed alongside me. “Don’t you dare hold back. Not with me. Never with me.”

His jaw ticked hard. “Doctor’s orders, Tigger. At least for a couple of days.”

“A couple of days!” I wailed in horror as Nik went in for another tender kiss, deeper than the last. Hearing Titan’s obnoxiously loud grumble growl, we pulled apart to see what his problem was. Watching him collapse on his side with his paw dropped over his eyes had us both cracking up with laughter.

I turned back for another kiss, pausing only long enough to say, “Of course you have a heart, Nikolas Steele. You have mine.”

Epilogue

“Damn, Coop’s employer must really like him,” Nik said as he set me on my feet inside the lavish jet. He’d insisted on carrying me onboard, even though I could’ve easily managed the stairs myself.

The Gulfstream G650’s lacquered, dark-gray woodwork and dove-gray leather seating looked more like a decadent living room and office than the interior of an airplane. Embossed on every chair back, napkin, towel, and even in the carpet was a logo with the letters—O and Z. The billionaire’s initials.

I wanted to meet Omar Zaki and thank him personally for loaning Coop all his resources to help a little ol’ Kansas girl out. But seeing the extravagant opulence of the airplane, I breathed a sigh of relief the billionaire was a recluse. If simply being in one of his planes had me feeling completely out of my element, what would being in front of such a great and powerful man be like?

Titan crested the stairs, barging through the hatch opening past me to bark at the cockpit door. “Titan, no!” I rushed to collect him, embarrassed at how uncouth I must look boarding such a nice plane with my rowdy dog in tow. But it was too late. Still excited by whatever was on the other side of the doorway, he jumped and wheeled, his bushy black and tan tail wagging right into a crystal goblet.

A squeak leaped up my throat as the gorgeously etched glass, the cost of which I couldn’t even fathom, sailed off the counter. It landed right into the palm of a man who’d just exited the cockpit looking like the love child of James Bond and a Victoria’s Secret Angel. After setting the goblet safely on a higher perch, he mussed the top of Titan’s head as if he were his best pal.

I stammered out an apology to the gorgeous, well-attired man, but my eyes went wide when I recognized his sapphire ones.

Coop’s unruly hair had been cut and his scruffy beard shaved, revealing not only a rugged jawline, but a sexy set of deep dimples. The dark navy suit he’d changed into fit him perfectly and the tie set off his eyes like jewels.

Damn, he cleaned up good. And, unlike the rest of us, he looked right at home with the wealth and elegance surrounding him.

“Whoa,” Leo exclaimed. “Did you come from a GQ cover shoot or something?”

Before we could pepper him with questions about the super-hot makeover he’d gotten, he said, “Takeoff is in ten minutes. We’ll only be on the island long enough to grab a bite to eat and swap rides. The boat we’ll be working off of is already in place, saving us about a day’s travel time.”

“What’s the other ride?” Nik asked. “Helo?”

“All the birds are in use. We’ll be taking a smaller plane.”

“A…seaplane?” Leo asked carefully. At the negative shake of Coop’s head, his mouth dropped open. “You mean, we’ll be…?”

“The boat’s big, but not aircraft carrier big. So, yes, we’ll be parachuting in. Nik