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wasn’t he expecting more of an objection?
    “Grace is a grown woman,” Vince continued, obviously reading at least part of the wariness Zack could feel tightening through his body. “I’m not stupid, and I don’t expect my boys, Kenni or Grace to live by some antiquated code of moral conduct. If she wants a lover, that’s her business. I may question her taste in men”—his look assured Zack he was the questionable male—“but that’s her business, not mine.”
    Her cousins appeared on the verge of outright amusement, though, especially Sawyer. He kept rubbing his hand over his cheek as though trying to hide the twitch of his lips.
    “So let me in on the fucking joke,” Zack growled.
    “No joke.” Sawyer finally chuckled, shaking his head. “No joke at all, man. I’m still stuck on the ‘puppy in a wolf’s den’ image. I have to remember that one.”
    He wasn’t the cousin known for his tact; that was for damned sure.
    “Yeah, a sweet little golden retriever, that’s our Grace,” his twin, Deacon, agreed a little too solemnly. “All bounce and fluff and no teeth. We like her like that. She’s a calm, comforting influence on all of us.”
    “It could get her killed,” Zack informed him.
    “We see the error of our ways now,” Cord injected, anger slipping into his tone as Zack turned to him.
    It was time one of them realized what a mess they’d created.
    “As Dad said,” Cord ground out, “who she takes as a lover is her business. Whether or not she agrees to actually let you into her bed for the sake of her safety is up to her as well. But she will know what’s going on and what your plans are.”
    “You’ll allow me to inform her of them,” Zack demanded, the tension in the room causing the hairs at the back of his neck to lift in warning. “I’ll be damned if I need you turning her against me before I even tell her what’s going on.”
    “Agreed,” Vince voiced before his sons could object. “You have twenty-four hours. Get your gear—you can have the suite next to hers.”
    He frowned at that. “My home is more secure—”
    Vince leaned forward, his weight bracing on his arms as he propped them on his desk. “The suite next to hers, Zack,” he reiterated with dark warning. “Grace will remain here until you can prove she’ll be safer at your home. She has a job to do here, and no one else can do it. Live with it or leave. Your choice.”
    The phone on Vinny’s desk buzzed at that moment, bringing a grimace to his lips as he jerked it to his ear with a brusque “What?” His lips flattened and he disconnected the call without a response. “It would seem Kenni is now stalking up the drive along with Jazz and Slade.” He pushed his fingers through his hair in frustration. “Dammit, I wanted her out of this.”
    A father’s lament, Zack thought with regret. A father who had already lost his daughter once.
    “Grace helped her, Vinny. She won’t stay out of it. Even for you.” As much as Zack regretted it, as much as he hated it, there was no keeping his brother or his brother’s fiancée out of the coming mess.
    Vinny glared at him. “You’re going to become a problem, Zack.”
    His lips quirked at the accusation. “I’ve always been a problem, Vinny. I just didn’t let you see it. Until now. But I’ll be damned if I watch another defenseless young woman die for this family. Not again.”
    Not Grace.
    Cord snorted as he rose to his feet, mocking amusement filling the sound. “I almost pity you,” he stated, his green eyes filled with ire as he glared down at Zack. “Almost.”
    With that, he turned and stalked from the office, leaving only a tension-filled silence Zack had no intention of disrupting.
    Let them think what they wanted. No one hated the thought of hurting Grace more than he did. Just as no one could possibly hate the fact that she was involved in this more than he did. That was the hand being dealt to them, though, and none of them had a choice