by J. Lynn
“Nothing serious?”
He liked that she didn’t question the going-home-with-him part. “You passed out, probably from shock and pain.”
She winced. “So embarrassing.”
He grinned. “It’s nothing to be embarrassed about.”
Her chest rose with a deep breath and her brow wrinkled even further. “I…I wasn’t even wearing my panties. You…took them.”
A laugh burst from him and if he could’ve without hurting her, he would’ve scooped her up. “Yeah, but I don’t think that was anyone’s concern.”
“I don’t like the sight or smell of blood,” she explained, and he was thrilled to see color pinked her cheeks. She drew in a breath and winced again as she looked at her bandaged shoulder. “Ow.”
“How bad is the pain?” He started to rise, but her grip on his hand tightened. “I can get a nurse—”
“No. I’m fine. It’s a dull ache, really. I want to sit up.”
Sliding an arm around her uninjured shoulder, he helped her sit up and then hit the button on the bed so she was in a recline. “How’s that?” he asked, sitting beside her legs. “Better?”
She nodded as her gaze went to the plastic cup of water. Leaning over, he grabbed the cup and held it to her lips. Must be the pain meds, because she didn’t fight him on the assistance or when he smoothed his thumb under her lip, chasing away a tiny drop of water.
When she settled back, exhaustion pulled at her lush mouth. “What are they pumping through this IV?” Lifting her hand, she frowned. “I feel high.”
Chandler chuckled as the muscles in his neck and shoulders finally started to relax. “Some really good stuff?”
“It is.” She settled back against the flat pillow, eyeing where he still held her hand. For one of the first times in his life, he actually wanted to know what a woman was thinking. “Did they get the guy?”
And then his muscles tensed again. “Yeah, the cops got him the second after he fired off a round.”
“Who was he? I didn’t recognize him at all. Did he say why—”
“It’s not our guy, Alana.” Reaching over, he tugged the blanket up, feeling like a nursemaid. “Basically, it was really a wrong place, wrong time kind of thing.”
“What?”
He nodded, recounting what the officers had told him while Alana was being stitched up. “It was some douchebag who’d just robbed a store two blocks down. He took off on foot and the police think he was actually shooting at them. We just happened to be in the wrong place.”
She stared at him for a moment and there was no hiding the disappointment filling her cloudy gaze. He understood it. Not like she wanted to get shot or have someone who hated her that much to do something so horrendous, but then at least it would be over.
This was nowhere near over.
“He could’ve killed you.” Her face slipped into a wobbly scowl that was more cute than threatening. “And for what? Nothing?”
“Kill me?” Surprise radiated through me. “You were shot. Not me. Speaking of which, I’m your bodyguard, you little idiot. I’m supposed to protect you, not the other way around.”
A wry grin twisted her lips. “If I didn’t push you, you would’ve been hit in the back and I….”
“And you what?”
She met his stare and then her gaze flitted away as she pressed her lips together. “So you almost got shot—”
“You were shot.”
“Anyway,” she murmured, waving her hand dismissively, as if taking a bullet wasn’t a big deal. “We were shot at because we were standing in the wrong place? How fucking wrong is that?”
“Pretty wrong.” He smiled. Some guys didn’t like it when a woman cussed more than they did. Chandler loved it. He watched her lashes lower, fanning her cheeks. There had been something—something important—she was going to tell him before she’d been shot, but it could wait.
“Hey,” he said quietly, smoothing his hand over her cool cheek.
Her lashes swept up and a winsome smile appeared on her lips. “Hey back.”
Chandler bent his head, pressing a kiss to the corner of her lips. “If you ever do anything as stupid as that again, I will take you over my knee…but thank you. Thank you for most likely saving my life.”
Alana’s eyes were wide as he pulled back, and he knew in that moment, he had to be careful around her, because she was the kind of chick who could steal his heart.
Thing was, he wasn’t sure he wanted to be careful.
…
There was a good chance that Alana might be more than a little high after the second dose of painkillers. She was feeling rather…okay with everything.
Okay with being stalked out of her vehicle and home. Okay with missing a half a day of work. Okay with being shot for no good reason. Okay with letting Chandler help undress and then dress her in one of his old shirts. And most surprisingly, okay with being stretched out in bed beside Chandler.
Staring at the ceiling, she wondered how her life had gone from painfully orderly with the exception of random hate mail to sleeping beside the shirtless, sexy—and oh my God, he smells like soap, spice, man, and so good—brother of an ex-client while recovering from a bullet wound. Exactly when had her life veered in this direction? And why had she agreed to allow Chandler to scoop her up like it was their wedding night and carry her upstairs to bed—to his bed?
Oh, yes. It probably had something to do with the vroom-vroom Vicodin.
Chandler was asleep beside her, or at least she believed he was. His breathing was deep and even, and the warm arm pressed against her uninjured shoulder hadn’t moved in a while. He was shirtless, of course, because why should he cover all those beautiful ropey muscles? Now they’d have matching scars on their shoulders. How cute.
She squeezed her eyes shut, mentally cursing her addled thoughts.
There was no way she could sleep like this. She was an on-her-side kind of gal and if she rolled onto her good side, then she’d be facing Chandler and…then came marriage and a baby carriage or something like that.
So far she’d been handling things pretty damn well. Only came close to a major breakdown when she got an eyeful of her apartment. Getting shot sort of felt like the tip of the fucked-up iceberg. Although she’d been nothing more than an innocent bystander, when she first woke up, all she could think was that someone hated her so badly that they shot her. Talk about an eye-opening experience. Had her tactics really been that bad? Hadn’t she helped these people in the long run? Not all of them. In the silence of the dark room, she could admit that to herself. There were those on the fringes whose lives were changed after Alana took a case. Sometimes it was friends, other times it was lovers or family, who had to be neatly cut out of the person’s life to succeed. And she had done the cutting.
Did she regret it now? She couldn’t, but maybe she could’ve been a little less harsh about things. Catch more bees with honey. Or was that bears? While she wanted this little ditty of self-realization to change things, it wouldn’t. Her job, well, it was all that she had at the end of the day. This—whatever this was with Chandler—wouldn’t be forever. She wasn’t so stupid to believe in that, and she would never allow herself to fall into that trap.
But in the shocking seconds after she’d felt the searing pain in her shoulder, she had seen the horror in Chandler’s gaze, the raw emotion that surprised her. He’d stared at her like he was facing the loss of something precious to him.
Glancing at the man beside her, she sighed. No matter how damn sexy and sinful that trap was, it was still a trap. Because when his job was complete and he grew bored with her, he’d leave and all she’d have was her job. Blowing out a breath, she squeezed her eyes shut and willed her brain to shut down and for her heart to stop racing.
A few seconds later, the arm between them lifted. “Come on.” When she didn’t move, he grumbled something under his breath. “I won’t tell anyone.”
Her lips curved up at the corners, but she s
till didn’t move. Doing so may not seem like such a big deal to others, but to her it was a monumental step.
Also another nail in the coffin.
Chandler sighed. “Waiting.”
And he was waiting for her. Arm in the air, face turned to her. In the darkness, she felt his gaze searching hers out. Her body and the sometimes-treacherous muscle in her chest yearned to do so. Was there really any harm in it? Probably. And if she was being honest with herself, she wanted nothing more. Later, she could blame it on the pain pills.
Drawing in a deep breath, she decided she’d face the consequences later. Right now, this was what she needed and wanted. Easing onto her uninjured shoulder, she placed her head on the crook of Chandler’s arm and sighed. The sound cracked as loud as thunder in the silence and she waited for him to make some smartass comment, but he didn’t. His large hand landed on her hip and urged her closer. After a bit of wiggling, she was fitted to his side in a way that had her wondering if their two bodies were designed for this.
Definitely the pain pills talking now.
Moving her arm carefully, she placed her hand on his bare chest and closed her eyes. Several moments passed and then she felt his hand flatten along her hip. The weight was intimate and cozy and…suffocating.
No. She forced herself to take a breath. It wasn’t suffocating at all. Truthfully, it was relaxing and nothing like the other times she’d attempted to do a little cuddling.
“Can I ask you a question?” she asked, staring at the moonlight.
“Anything.”
Her heart sped up at his quick response. Chandler was…well, he was nothing she had expected.
“The scar on your shoulder? Were you shot?”
His thumb smoothed over her hip, and she liked the constant, idle motion. “Yes. About four years ago.”
“How?” She winced, feeling awkward. “Sorry. That’s none of my business.”
“It’s okay. I was doing a job in Chicago. A white-collar was about to turn state evidence and wanted security before he met with the police. Thought the guy was paranoid, but turned out, he wasn’t.” His chest moved in deep, slow breaths, the effect lulling. “When I was taking him to pick up his daughter at school, some bastard lit up the vehicle with gunfire. I took two bullets, but the client didn’t get scratched.”
“Christ.” She lifted her head, staring down at him. The way he said it was like it was no big deal. “You could’ve died!”
“But I didn’t.” His lips tipped up at the corners. “You could’ve died today.”
She was seriously trying not to think about that or why she had so readily pushed him out of the way. “I didn’t, but you…you do this every day.”
“What I do is my job.” He moved his other hand, gently cupping her cheek. “It’s not every day, and what I do doesn’t come cheap.”
They hadn’t even talked price yet, but lying in bed together didn’t seem like the right moment to bring it up. She let him guide her cheek back to his chest and his hand stayed on her cheek.
“Can I ask you a question?” he asked.
She tensed. “Yeah.”
“You grew up with your grandmother, right? You’ve said some stuff about your mom, but what happened to her?”
Unease formed little knots in her stomach. Talking about her family was hard, but she’d already gone there with him, opened the door so to speak. “I moved in with my grandma when I was seven. It became apparent that Mom couldn’t take care of me. She still visited, off and on, until I was thirteen, but then she…”
The hand on her hip started to move again. “What?”
“She died—overdosed.” She closed her eyes. “Mom…well, she was in love with being in love, you know? Went from one guy to the next and each one was ‘the one’ and none of them ever worked out. But each time she met someone, she gave away a piece of herself until there was nothing left.”
“I’m sorry.”
She sighed. “Thank you. It’s just… The thing is, I loved my mom. Even though she didn’t raise me, whenever she came around, she was happy to see me. I kept thinking that maybe I could’ve done something to, I don’t know, facilitate her need to love. That if I—”
“There was nothing you could’ve done differently,” he said passionately. “Trust me, I know. There wasn’t a damn thing my brothers or I could’ve done that changed where our parents ended up. They set their own futures. We were just along for the ride. Same with you. You had nothing to do with how your mom decided to live her life.”
Besides the bullet wounds, they had more in common than Alana really ever realized. Both of them had parents who were too wrapped up in their own lives to pay attention to them. If anyone would understand where Alana was coming from, it would be Chandler.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
The hand on her hip stilled. “For what?”
She didn’t answer, unsure if she could put it into words. After a few minutes, Chandler started peppering her with questions and she found herself answering them with little reservation. How her grandmother always believed that Alana should’ve been born a man and because of her mother’s chaotic life, she was obsessed with keeping things orderly. She told him about the night she got the tattoo.
“Does the rose mean anything to you?” he asked, and she could hear the grin in his words.
“No.” She laughed softly. “It was just on TV that night and it reminded me of my mom. Like she had already started to wither, but if I could keep her in this protective vase, she would be okay.”
“Sounds like the rose does mean something to you.”
Her nose wrinkled. “Ah, good point.”
Chandler switched topics, telling her how they’d spend the holidays at the Danielses’ house and how everyone knew that little Maddie had been in love with Chase from the moment they crossed paths. She smiled at the childhood stories. It was obvious that Chandler had been the parental influence out of the three, getting the younger two out of trouble and basically taking care of them. It saddened her, because she feared that he hadn’t had much of a childhood and probably wouldn’t have had any if it hadn’t been for Maddie’s parents. Their home had been cold and sterile, but the boys had made the best of it and they supported one another above all else. Chase took over the family business, growing it in ways their father never could. Chad had used all those afternoons playing ball and turned it into a stellar career. And Chandler ended up doing what he had always done: taking care of others.
Mere minutes passed after the last word was spoken and she’d already begun to drift off. Unsure of whether she was dreaming or not, she felt Chandler’s velvety soft lips brush her forehead, and she sank a little deeper into sleep and a little further into Chandler.
Chapter Thirteen
Chandler jerked awake, slow to process what exactly had woken him up. Wasn’t his alarm or phone. The room was silent. Thin rays of early morning sunlight streamed through the blinds. Brushing the hair out of his face, he squinted and then reached out to find the warm body of—
The space beside him was empty.
He jackknifed off the bed, dropping his hands to where the pajama bottoms rested low on his hips. Son of a mother’s tit, where in the hell was she? If she was sleeping on that goddamn couch downstairs, injured or not, he might strangle her.
Spinning around, he stalked out of the bedroom and started toward the stairs, when he stopped. It was barely audible, the soft cry, but he heard it coming from the extra bedroom he’d put Alana in. A huge knot formed in his stomach as he stepped forward, pushing the bedroom door open.
Alana was unaware of him. That much was certain. She was wearing pink lacy panties, and her hair fell forward in soft, dark waves as she got one arm through her white blouse. Did she think she was really going to work?
“What are you doing?”
Her chin rose as she turned to the door. A faint flush stained her cheeks, her eyes wide without the glasses. “Don’t you know how to knock on a door?”<
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“It’s my house.”
Her lips turned down at the corners. “You still should knock!”
Walking into the room, he stopped a few feet from her and folded his arms. “Alana, you cannot be getting ready for work.”
“Whatever,” she muttered, turning around and giving him an eyeful of that perfect ass. His sex responded, swelling painfully. He tried to ignore it, because seriously, the hardness was fucking inappropriate at the moment.
He took a deep breath and inconspicuously adjusted his erection. “The doctors said you were off work until next Monday. You have a note. Your boss already knows not to expect you—”
“I feel okay,” she answered, turning slightly. Her brow pinched, and there was a wrenching sensation in his chest as he watched her struggle to get her bandaged arm into her blouse.
She might feel better, but this was ridiculous. People who got shot didn’t go to work the next day. Well, he had, but that was a different case. He stepped toward her, but she backpedaled.
“There’s nothing wrong with taking a few days off and relaxing,” he reasoned in a patient tone that even surprised him. “We can chill at the house, watch some bad movies, and—”
“No!” Her voice cracked on the word. “I need to go to work. I just got the job and even though Mr. Patricks says it’s okay, I need to be there.”
“You do not need to be there.” As she started to button her blouse, covering the sweet swells lifted by the pink bra, he inched closer to her. “You need to be here.”
Her fingers stopped and she lifted her gaze. “Here?”
The way she said that one word, like it was the most horrifying idea, was confusing and fucking irritating. Opening his mouth to point that out, he stopped when he watched her gaze dart from him to the door and back again, as if she were judging the distance. But to do what?
It hit him then with the force of a Mack truck.
Alana was running.
Running from him, and the reason why seemed ridiculous, but this woman had more commitment issues than his two brothers combined. She had slept beside him all night and he knew without a shadow of a doubt that it had been the first time for her. Something like that shouldn’t be such a big deal, but it was to her.