Still, he’d told Faith he was going to do it and the file had been clear: Senator Hawthorne wanted his daughter protected after receiving death threats against his family, and he’d asked for the best in the business.
Jack didn’t mind being called the best in the business. It had been a while since anyone had needed his considerable skills and he’d found he was eager to prove them.
But what he was not eager about was being messed with by some rich bitch socialite who was too busy partying to take anything seriously.
She looked the part too, a little bitty thing—five foot nothing, had to be—wearing the tightest, shortest white minidress in the history of creation, plus a pair of spike-heeled silver sandals a stripper would envy.
A wealth of tawny blond hair tumbled down her back, while her eyes were the kind of sea blue that sailors drowned in willingly, her features almost china-doll-like in their perfection. And the way she was looking at him, all wide-eyed innocence, seeming drunk and yet . . . no, he didn’t think she was drunk.
He stared harder at her, examining her pretty face, and saw it again, the very slightest flicker of fear. Why? Was it him? The death threat situation? Being caught somewhere where she shouldn’t be?
She wobbled slightly on her heels, looking up at him from underneath her lashes, the margarita glass she had in her hand tilted at an angle that made liquid splash on the floor. “Sorry . . . I guess?” she said at last. Her voice was as soft as the rest of her and slurred, and this time that glint of fear had gone.
But he remembered it. He knew it was there. And it made something kick hard inside him, a protective instinctive he’d thought he’d buried a long time ago.
Fuck, that’s not good.
No, it wasn’t. Protecting curvy little women with big blue eyes and pouty mouths, all softness and vulnerability, who looked like they would break if he even looked at them wrong, rang just about every alarm bell he had.
But he wasn’t going to turn around and give up this mission simply because he was annoyed and vaguely disturbed by her. He wasn’t that much of a pussy. He’d decided to take on this job and he’d do it.
He’d never given up on a mission yet and he wasn’t about to start now.
He examined her again, more closely this time. He’d seen her standing on the balcony just before, while he’d been on the dance floor. He’d felt that prickle on the back of his neck, an old military instinct alerting him to the fact that someone was watching him, and so he’d looked up. And there she’d been, watching him, and now that he thought about it, there’d been nothing afraid in her eyes then, nothing disgusted or shocked by the scars that marked him like some people were. No, she’d looked at him like—
Fuck, why was he thinking about that? He didn’t give a shit how she’d looked at him. She was his mission now and nothing would compromise that. Never had, never would.
“Is there somewhere quiet we can go to talk?” Jack asked, impatient now to get on with the business of being her bodyguard. “It’s taken me all goddamn day to find you, and there’s a few things I need to—”
Before he could finish, Callie took a couple of tottering steps up to him and stroked a finger down the center of his chest. The move was so sudden he had no time to anticipate or avoid it, and that finger must have been some kind of lightning rod because for some fucking reason, it felt like she’d conducted all the electricity in the entire room right down through the center of his body.
He couldn’t move. Could barely breathe. Conscious only of one single glaring fact: This was the first time anyone had touched him since he’d gotten out of the hospital. The first human contact outside of a medical exam. The first by a woman . . .
Callie fluttered her eyelashes and murmured, “Is this about the silly death threat thing? ’Cause if it is, you can tell Dad that I took some shooting lessons and I can fire my own gun.” She giggled and gave him another stroke with her finger, sending another bolt of electricity right through him. “Whoa, you’re really hard. What are you wearing underneath that T-shirt? Kevlar?”
Shit, really? You’re going to stand there like a little bitch just because some woman touched you?
Barely forcing back a growl, Jack whipped his hand out, circling her slender wrist and jerking her finger away from him. “You don’t get to touch me, sweetheart,” he said roughly, trying to ignore the line of fire her touch had left behind. “Not unless I ask you to. And I didn’t ask you to.”
The drunken act dropped for a second, and he could read the shock in her eyes, along with that fear, plus something else. Something complicated he couldn’t untangle.
Then she laughed again, pulling her hand from his grip and sidestepping him unsteadily. “Whatever, dude. Just tell Dad I don’t need a bodyguard. Oh, and if you could also tell him that I wasn’t here, then that would be awesome too.” Without a backward glance, she went past him, heading in the direction of the stairs.
Jack had never had much patience and since the attack that had destroyed his life, he had even less of it. His hip was sore and he was pissed at having to chase after her, pissed at the way her touch was still lingering down the middle of his chest, but, more than anything else, he was really fucking pissed at the way that flicker of fear in her eyes had somehow reached inside him and held on tight.
He hated to see fear in a woman. It called to every protective instinct in him, and even though the very last thing in the world he wanted was to have to deal with a frightened woman, he couldn’t ignore it.
Callie Hawthorne was afraid and trying to hide it. And his job was to protect her. End of story.
Scowling, Jack turned to see her go back to where her stupid friends were sitting, turning a few things over in his head.
The brief interview Jack had had with the senator on his arrival in Boston had been enough for Jack to know that a) he didn’t like the bastard and b) he didn’t trust the bastard, but since Jack had no good reason for feeling either of those things, plus, he was trying to be professional, he’d stayed quiet and obeyed the guy’s orders.
“Callie is difficult,” Senator Hawthorne had said. “She won’t want you around and she’ll protest. Convince her otherwise. That’s why I’m paying you obscene amounts of money.” Then he’d smiled thinly in a way that suggested to Jack that if Jack ran into any difficulties, he was going to have to straighten the girl out himself.
Right, so here was the first difficulty he was going to have to deal with: She very clearly didn’t want him around.
Callie had tottered back to her table, the white dress she wore molding beautifully to her gorgeous ass, golden hair gleaming over her shoulders, her hips swaying as she walked.
And that male instinct, the hungry one that had been lying dormant for at least two years, began to stir.
Jack’s mood darkened even further.
Time to give that poor little rich girl a wake-up call.
He had a feeling she wasn’t going to like it.
CHAPTER 3
Callie didn’t look behind her as she went back to the couch, but she felt the pressure of his gaze boring into her the whole way. It nearly made her stumble.
God, she couldn’t believe she’d done that. She’d just gone ahead and pretended she was drunk, like it wasn’t a big deal that the big scary man had somehow found her.
Then she’d . . . she’d touched him. Run her finger straight down his chest like it was no big deal. And he’d been so hot and so hard and—
Her brain stumbled over itself, her breath catching, the icy fear that had been sitting in her gut before suddenly melting at the memory of all that heat.
The people she’d been sitting with were all shrieking questions about “that hot guy” like they knew her, like they were her best buddies instead of simply a random bunch of people she’d attached herself to in order to blend in.
She ignored them, sitting down on the couch between Sylvia and . . . Tamsen was it? . . . her heartbeat careening about inside her chest. Her finge
r, where she’d touched him, tingled and she had to slip both hands between her knees to try to get rid of the sensation.
She could feel herself quivering but there was only a cold puddle where the fear had been sitting earlier so it wasn’t that. No, it felt a little like . . . exhilaration. As if she’d faced down a grave enemy and won. Which was weird, because that’s what he’d essentially turned out to be.
Jesus, she was an idiot. She should have known the moment he’d headed straight toward her that he’d been the one she’d been trying to avoid all day. He’d looked so dangerous, but he hadn’t been wearing a suit like her father’s other security staff so she hadn’t connected him to the senator’s latest edict that she was to have a bodyguard pretty much 24/7. Her father had announced it a week or so ago, but when nothing had materialized, Callie had assumed he’d forgotten about it.
At least until earlier that day, when he’d informed her out of the blue that her new bodyguard would be joining her and that there would be no argument about it. Death threats had been issued against the family, the risk her to was acute, blah, blah presidential campaign, etcetera ad nauseam.
Except he was lying and Callie knew it. There were no death threats. This bodyguard thing was simply an excuse so he could exert more control over her life. Probably something to do with the fact that she wasn’t living under his roof and he didn’t have constant control over her. He had allowed her to live separately from himself and her mother, on the condition of her absolute obedience, and it had been a major concession. But she knew he loathed it. And had clearly been looking for ways around it.
You knew this was coming. You knew he’d do this eventually.
Yes, she knew. And she knew what it meant, too. No more sneaking out to catch her favorite bands play. No more dancing in nightclubs. No more music.
No more freedom.
She closed her eyes, forcing back the stupid tears because she wasn’t going to cry, she just fucking wasn’t. She’d been trying to avoid the cage closing by avoiding the bodyguard today, but that had been a childish move.
She couldn’t run from it any longer.
There are other options.
No, there weren’t. She wasn’t like any other twenty-two-year-old. She couldn’t simply pack up her stuff and leave, shift states, or even shift countries. Not given how powerful her father was and, how that year at college when she’d realized that other people’s fathers weren’t like hers and she’d tried to escape, he’d gotten his security team to drag her back home kicking and screaming. Then, with her mother present, he’d laid it all out for her, the terms of her obligations.
She was his only child and because her traumatic birth had led to her mother’s hysterectomy, there would be no other children for him. No chance for him to have the son he’d always wanted. That was her fault and now she owed him.
Yes, he could have divorced her mother and tried for another baby, but divorce for a Hawthorne was inconceivable. As was adoption. Blood was everything and she was all he had left for a chance at a dynasty.
Her life was not her own. Her life was his.
So no, there really weren’t any other options for her. And now that this . . . bodyguard . . . was here, even the few little breaks for freedom she allowed herself would be over.
You’ll pay for your escape tonight, too.
Callie clenched her hands tight as the ice re-formed in her gut. Yes, she would. But it had been worth it. And it still wasn’t over. Not yet. If this was the last night she’d ever have free, then she was going to have it, bodyguard or not. Punishment or not.
The squeals and shouts of the group died away abruptly, as if someone had cut the vocal cords of everyone in the immediate vicinity, and when she looked up to see what was happening, she found a pair of green eyes slamming into her.
He’d come back to the table and was now standing down at one end of it, his arms folded, tall and muscular and incredibly intimidating. His scarred face was set in hard lines, his focus on her as if everyone in the nightclub had ceased to exist.
Her breath caught, and the heavy beat of the band still playing on the stage echoed louder, a driving rhythm she felt deep in her chest. It filled her with strength.
“I need to speak with Miss Hawthorne alone,” Mr. Green Eyes said flatly, his deep, rough voice somehow cutting through the music like a razor-sharp knife through thin silk.
Every muscle in her body tensed, her pulse spiking.
She didn’t know what he wanted to say to her, but whatever it was, she wasn’t going to listen until she was damn well ready. And she wasn’t ready now.
The band hadn’t finished playing and she hadn’t gotten to dance yet, and she wasn’t leaving until she had.
This was her last night and she was taking it.
“Oh, wow,” Sylvia was burbling, grinning at him. “Don’t mind us, we can—”
“I said alone.” His voice went even flatter, slicing through the music and the roar of the club as if he’d shouted it.
Determination coiled inside Callie, bright and diamond hard.
This asshole thought he could talk to her? Fine. He could try. She’d let him say his piece and then she was going to ignore him, simply pretend he didn’t exist. And if he thought he could drag her away . . .
Yeah. That was not happening.
Flicking her hair over her shoulder, Callie sat back against the couch and looked up at her new bodyguard, meeting his gaze head-on. Letting him read the fuck you, asshole in her eyes.
The group she’d been sitting with were already jumping up and fluttering around like drunken butterflies, giggling as they headed down the other end of the balcony toward the bar. Sylvia brushed by him and murmured something that Callie didn’t catch, but he didn’t even look at her.
Apparently, the only thing in the nightclub he was interested in looking at was Callie.
Something way down low inside her kicked, a little burst of exhilaration and excitement, a part of her secretly hoping he’d come over and try to drag her away. Because she wanted an excuse for a fight.
But he didn’t. Once the others had all gone, he moved to the couch opposite her instead, and she thought he was going to sit down, but he didn’t do that, either. Instead he simply stood there, towering over her with his arms folded across his broad chest, pinning her in place with the force of his gaze alone.
It should have been intimidating, but weirdly, it only made her excitement kick harder.
“No,” he said, the word heavy as a boulder. “You don’t get to walk away from me, sweetheart. Not again.”
Her heartbeat began to race. Oh yes, he could try telling her what to do the way her father did. But he wasn’t her father and she wasn’t her mother. She wasn’t a woman all bent out of her true shape and molded to suit the man she’d tied herself to, doing everything he wanted without argument.
No, she was her own woman. She was strong. And now it was time he knew that.
Shoving herself off the couch, Callie stood as straight as she could, lifting her chin defiantly.
“First of all,” she snapped, letting her anger bleed into her voice in a way she never did around her father, “I am not your sweetheart. You can call me Miss Hawthorne. Actually, scratch that. You won’t be calling me anything because, second of all, I don’t need you.” She made a hard, flicking gesture with her fingers toward the stairs. “So why don’t you trot on out of here and take that toxic masculinity of yours somewhere else.”
The man’s expression didn’t change one iota. “Sit. Down.”
It was an order pure and simple, and it made the fury and that strange excitement flare, gripping her hard by the throat. “No,” she said, putting every ounce of her defiance into the word, so that it sat there, vibrating like a struck tuning fork in the space between them.
The man gave one long, slow blink. Then he frowned, as if he’d never heard the word in his entire life and didn’t understand what she was talking about. “Excuse me?”
“You heard,” Callie snapped, quivering with that weird combination of rage, excitement, and exhilaration. “I’m not repeating myself. And I’m also not sitting down.”
Mr. Green Eyes said nothing, his gaze running over her like a laser beam, and Callie didn’t care that he could probably see her shaking. Let him.
For the first time in years she was saying “no” to an order and, by God, it felt good. It felt right. Powerful. Like she was finally standing up for something instead of lying down the way she’d been doing ever since she’d gotten back from college. Ever since her father had told her what was expected of her and what her life would be like from now on. And she’d had to suck it up and suck it up, swallowing all the burning anger and frustration, all the while trying to ignore the pain, the way they seared her insides. Because silence was the only way.
Silence and acceptance were the keys to her escape and she had to remember that.
But not tonight.
No. Not tonight. Tonight was hers.
“Okay,” Mr. Green Eyes said slowly, his dark brows drawing down as he gave her a long, sweeping look from the soles of her feet to the crown of her head, making that quivering feeling in her stomach jump and flutter. “No sitting then. But I want to talk to you.”
“No,” she said again, because even the sound of the word was heady. Like drinking tequila straight from the bottle. “I have nothing to say to you.”
“But I have something to say to you.” His gaze returned to hers, catching it, holding it. “Whether you like it or not.”
Callie lifted her chin even higher. “You can’t make me.”
“I can.” His voice was quiet but there was nothing but certainty in it, leaving her in no doubt he meant what he said. “Now, we can do this easy or we can do this hard. You can come with me to talk about this somewhere quieter and less public, or—”
“Or what?” she interrupted, just because she could.
He gave her another long, silent look that made that weird exhilaration get more intense and her breath get shorter, faster.
She had no idea why she was feeling like this, but the fact that she was feeling anything at all, especially after the months of the horrible blankness that was the only way she could deal with her life, was glorious. She never wanted it to end.
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