With a wistful sigh, closed her eyes, imagining how it would feel to be there. The ocean breezes drifting across her formerly office-bleached body, her skin now tanned by the sun. Salty scents. The crystal blue water lapping calmly all around her.
“I’ve always wanted to swim in crystal blue water,” she admitted.
“Those waters might be hard to come by, if you plan to start your own business,” Liam said.
Her eyes opened and flashed at him. “Excuse me. This is a fantasy, remember?”
The smile that split his face threatened to make her knees weak. Such a compelling smile—uncontained, deep, true. Like the ocean. Like his eyes.
Why did that take her breath away? Maybe she liked Liam a little too much.
Or maybe she just wanted to delve into an easy, pleasant distraction from her nerves worn raw by the day she’d had. And by Todd’s blatant absence. As she’d bleakly anticipated, when she’d left that hellish little room and returned to gather her things from her desk, her phone had received no incoming calls.
Tucking her hand inside her purse, she reached for her phone, swiped the button that would reveal all. When the screen lit up, she still found no calls. One text message—from Maribeth—wishing her well.
In that moment, she’d never felt so alone. In spite of the engaging, attractive man beside her in the car.
Then she considered that she’d thought of this game purely on selfish terms. What would she do to help others, with those funds at her disposal?
What would Liam do?
She asked him.
“Not as much as I should,” he stated, guilt wreathing his face.
He didn’t realize it, but his automatic answer placed him on a level similar to Alex Atlas. Liam was a wealthy man, even if he wasn’t a casino billionaire. She turned in her seat to face him, intrigued to hear more.
Downtown traffic continued to move at a crawl, as they traveled in the direction of her condo.
“I sit on a couple of boards. I guess I donate money instead of time, which sucks. Didn’t used to be like that,” he said. “I just don’t have the time right now. As I hear myself say that, it’s a lame excuse.”
“What would you devote your time to?” she probed.
“One of my big focuses is on reading programs,” he said. “My brother, Adam—you’ll meet him tomorrow—has dyslexia. He struggled hard in school. Harder than he should’ve, and there was no help for him.” He seemed genuinely distressed by the circumstances his brother had endured. “Awareness and knowledge are key to reaching the kids, like him, who fall through the cracks. Too many do, and it’s because they’re poor.” His knuckles tightened on the steering wheel. “We were borderline destitute. No one paid attention to us. We weren’t worth helping.”
Within his words, she found two things of note. That he’d grown up as poor—maybe poorer—than she and her mother. And he used the word “we.” He could’ve said just his brother had fallen through the cracks, but she suspected he had, too, in some way.
What had Liam been through?
She wanted to know. Even if her intense interest might be inappropriate for a girl with a boyfriend. Or a girl relying on this man to prove her innocence.
If anything, this conversation drew her to Liam. Not where her mind should be, at the moment.
Shifting away from him in her seat, she said, “You’ll turn right at the next street.”
“I see,” he said, motioning to the elaborate navigation system built into the vehicle.
Despite Todd’s experience in IT, he hadn’t made time to synch her phone to her car. She appreciated little luxuries, like synched navigation.
“What about your true intentions?” he asked.
On guard, she took his comment as a judgement. “What do you mean?”
Reaching out, he touched his hand on top of hers, where it lay on her lap. He’d grown a little too comfortable doing that, and so had she.
“That came out wrong,” he said.
What came out wrong was the fission of electricity that arced from his palm to hers. She lost her breath.
Why had that simmer of attraction just happened?
It shouldn’t have happened. She tugged her hand from his.
Letting go, he returned his hand to the steering wheel. “How I meant it was…”
Despite him retracting his earlier statement, she didn’t hear him. She was focused on his hands, his knuckles.
Too many scars to count covered his hands. Alarming were the pure-white, star-shaped scars on his knuckles. She wondered what could’ve made them.
The image of his fists meeting someone teeth, splitting open the skin on his hands, made her cringe. He’d been a brawler.
Why? And how had he gone from a back-street, knuckle-fighter to wearing a three-thousand-dollar suit?
Then she observed the silvered lines and divots marking the periphery of his tanned face and the high crests of his cheeks. He was so handsome she hadn’t noticed the marks before.
With this close-up view, she saw proof of violence done to him. His nose was sharp, straight and perfect. But the divots and hairline scars, one disappearing into his light beard where the hair refused to grow, spoke to a long history of facing brutality.
Her heart squeezed in painful awareness.
Who had done that to him?
An irrational part of her wanted to reach out to him, shield him. To keep him from experiencing those awful things. Those swings to his face he’d taken. Those violent episodes. He was a good, decent guy. He’d offered to help her, taking her side when no one else had. He didn’t deserve to have suffered, baring the scars so obviously.
He didn’t seem to notice her probing stare. He was a proud man. Someone who wouldn’t comprehend how to complain-a-brag even if Todd gave him lessons. She wondered.
Would Liam ever reveal what he’d been through? Even to a stranger, like her?
Silence permeated the car for several minutes.
As Liam turned into her complex, he frowned, noting the security gates stood wide open.
“If the gates were closed, what’s your password?” he asked.
“Why does it matter?” She pointed ahead. “Keep following the main road.”
“Humor me.”
She shrugged. “One-one-one-one-two-seven.”
He arched an eyebrow. “That’s a decent password. A hell of a lot better than one-two-three-four.”
“I’m a numbers girl, remember?”
“As a security guy, myself, if you’d said five-six-seven-eight, I could forgive you.”
She eyed him with curiosity.
“Laverne and Shirley?”
She laughed and sang, “Five-six-seven-eight…shlemiel, schlemazel, Hasenpfeffer Incorporated.”
“Nice.” He held out his fist, and she bumped it with hers. “I watched too many sitcom reruns, back when my family’s TV got three channels—on a good day.” The numbers she recited captured his interest. “All codes have meaning,” he said. “What’s the meaning behind yours?”
She glanced at her hands in her lap and fell silent.
For a second, he thought she wouldn’t answer.
“Mom and I had this thing. It started when I was little. Whenever the digital clock read eleven-eleven, she told me to make a wish.” She gave a ghost of a smile. “I made a lot of wishes.”
“Did any of them come true?” he asked, winding along the main thoroughfare.
“I can’t remember, honestly.”
He nodded. “I try to remember as little about the past as possible,” he said on a wink, feeling a sense of camaraderie continuing to build between them. Deliberate, on his part.
When she turned her face away from him, he watched the corners of her mouth turn down. Unfinished business lingered between her and her mother. Did it have anything to do with her fulfilling her mother’s dream, even if it wasn’t wholly her own?
Yeah, he’d gotten that, right up front. This whole starting her own busin
ess thing had more to do with someone else’s dream. Was it actually hers, deep down?
What was Sophia’s dream? The real one, that only she knew?
He wanted to find out.
“What’s the two-seven part of the code?”
She laughed slightly. “I thought I’d start my own business by twenty-seven. It took two more years to make it happen.”
“You’re twenty-nine.”
She nodded.
Three years younger than him. “Four years ago, my cousin, Trey, took a huge risk and poured our family’s modest fortune into buying a bodyguard company. The guy’s a frigging genius. It panned out, despite ourselves—or despite me and my brother—and we made it.”
That seemed to pique her interest. Her compelling gaze—those copper-penny eyes—landed on him. “Where did you make it from?”
“We used to be bounty hunters, on the streets of Las Vegas.”
“No way. You used to work in Vegas?”
“Born and raised, too.”
“I don’t remember you. You would’ve been in the senior class at my school. You must’ve gone to a different school than me. I’m pretty sure I would’ve noticed and remembered you.”
He grinned. “Honey, we swam in different circles. I swam with the sharks—like you want to, only I came across the ones that live on land. You and I never would’ve met, at least I hope not.”
“Maybe.” She sighed. “There are so many people, on so many different levels here. It’s hard to know the real from the fake.”
Again, that residual sadness tugged at her lips. That aloneness he’d seen in the interrogation room enveloped her.
“Who let you down?” he asked softly.
She startled. “What? No one.”
In her lap, her thumb nails clicked against one another. He’d seen that response from her before. The clicking seemed to speed up, the more nervous she became.
“Whoever he is, he’s an idiot,” he muttered.
“No, he’s not,” she said, coming to a nameless man’s defense. She pointed out the passenger window. “Take another right here.”
He did as she instructed but refused to let go of the intriguing insight into her life. A father? A brother? A lover?
The last consideration made something venomous coil inside him. Because she deserved to have someone to count on, damn it.
For now, he let it go.
As he took the turn she suggested, out of the corner of his eye, he caught her reaching into her purse. She discreetly checked her phone for the sixth time since she’d been reunited with her handbag.
Apparently, she expected someone to contact her. That person had dropped the ball in the worst way. He saw the weight of it pressing on her shoulders, while sorrow darkened her stunning eyes.
If she had a guy in her life, he was doing a shitty job of being there for her. Selfish moron. The thought irritated him for no good reason.
Or a partly rational one, he confessed, as he followed the twists and turns toward her condo. Sophia had seen him—really noticed him.
She’d noticed him as a person. As a man. As the contradiction he was. She proved a fine observer herself.
During their first meeting, she’d noticed his hair and his cowboy boots. During the drive, she’d noticed the scars on his hands and face. She’d reviewed the evidence of his past, on physical display for anyone to see.
Unlike most, she’d witnessed, taken into consideration, and accepted the truth he wore all too close to the surface. Few did.
He’d read her insights, as they occurred to her, through her expressions. He appreciated that she saw him as a three-dimensional human being. That she took him for a man of his word. It was humbling.
The intrigued looks she kept sending his way said she wanted to know more about him. What made him tick? Who was he? How could he relate to her experiences growing up, when in the present they seemed so different?
He’d gaged her responses closely, taking stock of every nuance. The skill came from years of experience born out of necessity, he wasn’t a damn creeper.
Her interest impacted him. In return, he viewed her like a man discovering a quality diamond in a muddy river. It had been a long time since a woman had wanted to know more about him. Other than the balances on credit cards, the square footage of his house, the make of his cars, or the number of zeroes stocking his bank account.
Hardly anyone, anymore, took the time to investigate the exterior, to gain insight about the internal.
He liked Sophia. More than he should. Way more.
She’d hit a soft spot inside him, and he couldn’t explain it. His interest in her centered around more than proving her innocence.
That wasn’t a comfortable admission.
Did she have a boyfriend?
If she invited him into her place, he’d know soon enough. Men were careless, neglectful creatures, on the whole. He’d see the signs. When—if—he did, he’d back off.
Until then…
Until then, and past then, you have no business pursuing her. His conscience kicked in. Stop thinking of her as a possibility. She’s a client.
Well, technically, she wasn’t a client.
Close enough. She needs your help, not your advances.
True that.
Liam recognized that fine line. He wouldn’t cross it.
A secret grin tucked into the corners of his mouth. For the moment.
When she smoothed her palms along her skirt, he caught the movement. He fought the impulse to drag his attention from the road to her legs. The impulse won. His gaze traveled from her basic black heels, up her long, smooth legs, to the hem of her skirt.
Those long legs. His mouth watered. What he would give to follow those sleek, slender curves from ankle to thigh, to her—
“Stop, turn here!”
Barely missing a utility pole, he swerved to conform to her directions.
She glanced at him. “I thought the GPS knew the way.”
“Even technology can give false indications,” he said, reminding him of a similar suggestion he’d used to skew Alex Atlas’s attention away her.
Sophia needs your support. Not your personal distractions.
He cleared his throat. “I got this.”
“My condo is up ahead,” she said, as he turned onto her avenue. “The third building on the right.”
As he spun the wheel with his palm and maneuvered into a tight parking space, he noticed an absence of cars alongside of them. That struck him as strange.
“Your section of the complex is under new construction?” he asked.
“It is.” She smiled. “I purchased the first one for sale a year ago. It’s beautiful.”
“Amazing,” he marveled, “that builders continue to carve viable construction plots out of this used up desert. Is this still in a decent part of town?”
“Pretty much. I feel safe here.” She shrugged, like the safety factor hadn’t ranked as the first consideration on her wish list. “The new construction is what I liked about this development. The finishes in my condo are modern with nice touches—granite counters, stainless steel appliances, ceramic tile in the kitchen and bath, cozy gas fireplace, in-unit washer and dryer.”
“Hell yeah, that’s huge.”
“I agree. There’s a matching slab of granite surrounding the fireplace. It’s a nice addition.”
“I meant the washer and dryer.”
Her eyebrows drew together. “I thought it was pretty standard.”
“Thank God. Because in the shithole neighborhood where I grew up, we hung clothes to dry outside on the line. Never could get the desert dust out of the creases and pockets. But better than the old laundromats shoved into seedy strip malls. Those things were foul dens of boredom. My brother and I used to bet dimes on cockroach races.”
Her jaw dropped. “Is that a thing?”
He chuckled. “We made it one. Passed the time.”
As he turned the key to kill the ignition, she aske
d him, “When did you live in the area?”
“Most of my life.” He shrugged. “Until four years ago, when my brother, two cousins and I moved to Denver, Colorado.”
“You know,” she said, in a warm tone, “it’s really nice to meet another ‘lifer.’ It’s hard, growing up in a city of transients. Two years ago, my last good friend and her husband moved to Portland, after they had their first child, to be near his family and get away from the Vegas lifestyle. I’m the lone holdout.” A clicking sound drew his gaze to her lap, where she flicked her thumbnails against each other. “No one here stays for long.”
The locks automatically switched open when ignition turned off. He glanced at her legs as she swung them out of the car. Talk about long…
Dude. Not cool.
His gaze snapped up. Remaining in the driver’s seat, he stiffened—so did the crotch of his suit pants. Guilt stabbed his gut, because any second she could look over her shoulder, and he’d get caught with his eyes on the forbidden cookie jar.
While he had worked with plenty of attractive female clients, he always kept things strictly professional, holding himself above any lure of temptation. Something about Sophia, though, made his blood heat in a way he couldn’t explain.
Technically, she wasn’t a client. Was she strictly off limits?
Yes, dipshit. Knock it off.
God, what was his problem? He shook his head to clear it.
For a second, he fumbled removing the keys from the ignition of the parked car. When he met her on the sidewalk, he couldn’t bring himself to meet her eyes as he followed her up five steps to a long walkway toward her condo’s communal door.
Following her up those steps meant the curves of her backside were at eye-level. That sucked. Sort of. Not really.
He envisioned fitting his palms around her appealing curves, gliding them up to her slim waist. Turning her around. Untucking her white button-down from her skirt, moving the fabric up with his thumbs until he met skin. Pressing his lips to the strip of skin he revealed. Breathing in her scent.
Deep hunger—the aggressive, untamable, dangerous kind—churned within.
Shocked by the force of his attraction, needing another direction for his thoughts, he refocused his attention on the surroundings. Something he usually did by rote.
The Billionaire's Seduction (Billionaire Bodyguards Book 5) Page 5