“Get her away from my pregnant wife, please,” Michael said. “She looks like a bomb.”

Yeah.

I started to move away, but Jett ran up to me and jumped into my arms. I caught her just in time.

“Daddy, we’re going to the theater now!” she announced.

“You got everyone?” Michael asked Miss Englestat, who came up with Dag and Fane in each hand.

“Yes, sir,” she told him, breathless. “Athos is staying behind, and Mrs. Cuthbert has tabs on Madden and Octavia. Everyone else is accounted for.”

Damon’s boys grabbed on for a hug, but Ivarsen breezed past, his thumbs tapping away on his phone.

“Hey, be good,” Damon called after him.

“At everything,” the kid finished for him.

I chuckled. Tree? Meet apple.

“Happy hunting.” I kissed my kid on the nose and hugged her tight. “See you at midnight.”

But she started kicking. “Let me go or Indie will take my seat!”

I dropped her to the floor. “Be good.”

Without another word, she raced toward the foyer, one of the nannies wrapping her coat around her.

As the kids left for the next few hours—set to join the rest of the children in town for treats and festivities at the theater—the music turned a little harder and deeper, and I searched the crowd for Banks again.

But my gaze caught on something as I looked. Someone was staring at me.

Full white mask. Black cloak. Near the fireplace. I blinked and spun around, trying to find his face again as my pulse skipped a beat.

Who—?

None of the men were wearing cloaks. Now that would be overdressed.

But when I searched for him again, he wasn’t there. A chill crawled up my back at the way he’d just stood there, the black hollows of his eyes frozen on me.

“You better go,” Damon said.

Huh?

I turned to him, seeing him gesture behind me. Following his gaze, I finally caught sight of my wife as she pulled on a white, half-mask, covering her eyes and nose, looking to me as she slowly backed away into the shadows. I flexed my jaw even as my groin swelled with heat at how taunting she was.

Don’t you dare.

I started off, following her, the man in the cloak and mask forgotten.

I sidestepped the dancers, weaving in and out of the crowd, reaching her just in time to take her arm.

“Stop,” I whispered in her ear.

She tensed, refusing to turn and face me.

“I wasn’t going to kill her,” she said in a low voice, staring at young Soraya at the edge of the room. “Just freak her out a little.”

“She’s a child.”

“Yes.” She turned her head, challenging me. “I seem to remember being that child’s age the first time you had your hand up my shirt.”

The memory of that mysterious girl in my arms in the Bell Tower washed over me again. “Your shirt,” I pointed out.

Not hers.

She spun around, her green eyes and eye makeup piercing me through the white mask. “I mean it,” she said, inching away like she was something I could never have. “You wouldn’t tolerate me teaching someone who flirted with me.”

“And you wouldn’t let me dictate what you’re allowed and not allowed to do.” I stepped forward as she retreated.

I’d admit, I kind of liked her jealousy.

But then I didn’t.

I didn’t like that it could be coming from insecurity.

“Don’t you trust it?” I asked her.

“What?”

“That this will never end.”

She needed everyone to know that I was hers, when it would save her a lot of aggravation if it could just be enough to know that I knew I was hers.

I stalked toward her, slow step after slow step as my eyes dropped to her tits threatening to pop over the top of her dress.

And believe me, I knew I was hers.

The man in her bed every night. The father of her children. Her partner in everything I did.

“I want to give you something,” I told her.

Couples swirled around us, neither of us blinking as her eyes seemed to glow in the dim light.

“Come here now,” I said.

But she didn’t. She just kept backing away.

My blood started to boil. We didn’t have all night. There was shit I wanted to do before the kids got back. “You’re pissing me off,” I bit out, digging in my heels. “You know I don’t like making scenes.”

But I would if I had to.

She didn’t give me a chance. As soon as she reached the edge of the room, she spun around, dove through the double doors, and disappeared. I bolted after her, not giving a shit at the eyes I caught flashing our way.

Coming into the next room, dark with only a couple hidden in the corner making out, I caught sight of her red dress as she disappeared around another corner. I chased her, finally seeing her scurry up the back stairwell.

Running up after her, I wound around the spiral staircase, the stones grinding under my shoe.

Just as we reached the second floor and she tried to escape up to the third, I caught her arm and whipped her around, pinning her into the wall.

“Like I wouldn’t catch you,” I taunted. “I don’t even know why you try.”

A taper flickered on the wall, and I stared down into her eyes, my lips hovering over hers.

She rocked off the wall, but I pushed her back and hiked up her dress, pressing my hand between her legs, my fingers on fire as I rubbed her softly.

Jesus Christ. She was bare. Completely bare.

She shuddered but stopped fighting, and I grinned, loving these rare, little surprises she gave me.

No panties was so unlike her.

“What were you and the girls planning down there?” I whispered over her mouth.

“N—Nothing.”

I glided my hand up the inside of her thighs, feeling my dick harden. God, I couldn’t wait.

“Look at me, Nik.”

Slowly, her eyes rose, unable to resist me when I used her real name.

“I want to give you something,” I said, my mouth dry with need. “Reach into my jacket. Take it out.”

I ran my fingers over her soft skin, and then my knuckles, needing every inch of my skin to touch every inch of hers.

She reached into my breast pocket and pulled out a handkerchief, wrapped around a small object.

I stopped rubbing her, but I didn’t move my hand as she unwrapped the gift.

A silver comb laid inside the cloth, the ornate design featuring three rubies gleaming up at her.

“It was my mother’s,” I told her. “And her mother’s.”

It was one of the only things my mother had left from her family. My grandmother had had to smuggle it to her after she eloped with my father.

Her eyes flew up to mine, and I hoped she understood what the heirloom meant.

“The women in my family pass it on to their daughters,” I explained. “My mom wanted to give it to you herself, but she knew that…”

I couldn’t force the words out, but her eyes dropped, her chin trembling. She knew what I was going to say.

Banks hadn’t gotten a lot of gifts from others in life, and none from her own parents. It still made her nervous. My mom knew it might be easier coming from me.

Raising her hands, she fitted the comb into the back of her hair and wrapped her arms around me.