Free Between The Sheets - Complete Collection by Mia Cardine

your own space.”
    Geoffrey knew at once that he had said the wrong thing.
    A harsh scoff burst from her almost before the last word left his mouth.  The woman drew herself up, straightened her shoulders and somehow managed to stare down her nose at him despite his greater height.  “You can’t really expect me to move out of my home.”
    Still, he persisted.  The idea of her residing here with her ex, to whom she might be vulnerable, did not sit well with him.  “You expect to be at peace living here with him?”
    “This is my home.”  Flat. Uncompromising.  But not really an answer, so he tried a different tack.  “Do you expect me to be okay with this?”
    “I expect you to trust me to handle my own business.”
    “Trust?  You speak to me about trust when you do not trust me to have your best interests at heart?”
    A dismissing hand slicing through the air, Brandi turned away from him and took a seat at the head of her dining table.  “This isn’t about you and me, Geoffrey.  Nick is declaring war against me .  Not us.  I’m not about to let him win.  Moving out just because I have to allow him to live here would be like surrendering.  That’s so not going to happen.”
    “Even in war, the legal ultimatum you have received would just be a small skirmish.  For you to move out while he stays here would be a strategic retreat on your part, not surrender. You will continue to fight the legal battle without the threat of a physical encounter with the man.”
    Brandi blew out a small breath.  “Hold up, wait a minute.  What exactly are you saying?  Are you worried that Nick will harm me physically?  Or is your concern that of a man who feels threatened that another man will take what he considers his?  Because, frankly, either of those concerns insult me.  You clearly do not trust me to have enough sense to protect myself nor do you trust my feelings if you think I can easily be seduced by someone who hurt me so badly.”
    Geoffrey stood and came toward her, but she rose and backed away until the table stood between them.  He stopped and met her unblinking gaze.  So beautiful, so stubborn, she stood there with a straight back, chin up, yet so clueless.  It was evident that nothing he could say would change her mind.
    Looking around, he spotted his keys on the breakfast bar even as he ran a hand through his hair, leaving the strands sticking up every which way.  He walked over, grabbed the keys, and went to the door.
    Hand on the knob, he gave her one last glance.  “You will do what you want, no matter what I say.  I thought I had made it obvious how much I care for you.  Evidently, I do not matter to you as you do to me.”
    “Don’t even try it,” she stated, not tempering the harshness of her tone.  “Emotional blackmail is beneath you, Geoffrey.  You’re not even trying to understand my viewpoint.”
    He sighed heavily.  “And you do not want to hear what I see in this situation.”
    “What, Geoffrey?  What do you see?  Just say it.”
    “You are allowing Nick to drag you into an emotional battlefield that is, basically, an extension of what happened when you broke up.  He is controlling you, Brandi.  He has known you longer than I have, so he knows exactly which buttons to push, so that you do what he wants you to do. The thing you cannot see is that this is not about this condo at all.  He does not want to see another man in your life.  He will do whatever he can to ensure things do not work out between us.  Do you think he does not know that there is not a male in the world who would be comfortable with his woman residing with an ex-lover?”
    Brandi shook her head.  “Even if Nick is trying to sabotage our relationship, you should know that, for me, this is about so much more.  I don’t want Nick back, Geoffrey.  When he left, I saw the type of man he was and it wasn’t pretty, believe me.”
    “Yet you are willing to remain here in this place you call