He grinned, snuggling close again. “Yes,Sir.”
“And if a project is too big for you to beable to handle, you will tell her flat out. She can’t expect you to doeverything, especially since it’s not your house and I’m betting you alreadyhelped her with the down payment.” His quiet stillness said I’d hit the nail onthe head.
“If she needs help because she’s truly overher head, I’ll help and pay for someone, but she needs to learn to manage onher own. Most of those projects can be saved up and planned for. But ifsomething breaks unexpectedly or can’t wait, then we see if you have time, andif you don’t, we hire someone.” Landon was starting to look nervous, so Iwaited to see what he would say.
“I can agree with explaining to her that Ican’t do those projects and school at the same time. You’re right, that’s justlogical. But I can’t ask you to pay for something like that, so if somethingbreaks unexpectedly and I can’t handle it, I think that’s something I should beable to do overtime for.” His tone said he was trying to find a middle ground,but that wasn’t necessary or reasonable.
“Baby, you’ve never asked much about thesale of my company or how I can support myself.” His expression said it lookedlike he thought I was changing the subject, but he responded anyway.
“You seemed to be doing fine financiallyand your comments made it clear it wasn’t something you were worried about, so Ididn’t think much of it. I was kind of glad I didn’t have to worry about you.”His face tightened. “Should I have worried about you?”
“No.” I gave him a kiss. “You do not haveto worry about me.”
Ever.
“Baby, ask me who bought my company.” Itwasn’t something I told just anyone, but he needed to know.
Landon swallowed, studying my face beforehe followed my directions. “Who bought your company, Sir?”
“Alphabet.” I waited for that to sink in.
It didn’t take long.
His mouth dropped open, and he blinked severaltimes before he got a word out. “Sir?”
I nodded. “I designed my own payrollsoftware, and they decided they wanted it. Something about some of the codebeing used in other systems. I like tinkering with coding, but I never wantedto get into the software business, so when they made an offer for the company,I decided to take it.”
“Google?” He was still stuck on that, notthat I blamed him.
“Yep, and they paid very well too. So evenif your mother needs her entire house rebuilt, we’re not going to worry aboutit.” That just had him blinking at me again, prompting me to give him anotherkiss. “I’m not going to try to turn you into some kind of kept boy, but I needyou to understand that I will take care of you.”
“This is turning out to be like some of thoseweirdPretty Womanstyle books my sister reads. You know that, right?”He sighed like it was all just too ridiculous.
“Be nice or I’ll make you go on one ofthose shopping trips where I get to dress you up all fancy.” I grinned as hesnorted and shook his head.
“I’ll be good. There’s no need to tortureme.” His smile came back, and he started absentmindedly stroking my chestagain. “Google, really?”
I nodded. “Yep, craziest thing ever, butfrom what I discovered, companies like that buy up all kinds of randomcompanies just for little bits of software or technology they think they canuse at some point.”
He glanced up at me, grinning. “So I canask for something really good for Christmas without worrying? Something sillyand useless like a new wallet?”
He could’ve asked for a car, but I wasn’tgoing to point that out.
“Santa only brings toys to good subs whobehave and don’t overwork themselves.” I bopped his nose as he grinned. “Do youunderstand?”
“Yes, Sir.” He stretched his neck up andgave me a kiss before curling back into my lap.
Landon was much more relaxed, but I knew wehadn’t addressed all the issues yet. His nightmare had said that. “Now, tell meabout your dream.”
He winced, peeking up at me. “Dreams aresilly. I’m fine.”
I snorted which had him trying not tolaugh. “Yet another thing you need to be punished for. I didn’t ask if you werefine. I said to tell me about your dream.”
If he thought anI’m finewould gethim out of answering my question, we definitely needed more ground rules aboutlying to me.
Chapter 21
Landon
