He raised a brow. “How big is this place?” He stepped into the living room, and his gaze moved to the original Picasso that hung over the mantel.
She’d always loved that piece, a bit of surrealism in a traditional world. In a way it reminded her of herself, a woman working in a man’s world. Sure, it wasn’t unheard-of to have a woman hold a seat on a board, but a woman at the seat of a gun manufacturer’s board was unusual.
She shrugged. “Big enough?” She gave him a half grin in an attempt to downplay her elaborate dwelling.
“Is that a real Picasso?” he asked, pointing at the colorful painting.
She nodded. “He was a friend of the family’s in the 1930s. He made it specifically for my great-grandfather, but he never particularly liked it so it sat in storage for years until I took over the place.”
Jarrod walked across the room, staring at the painting. “Beautiful.” He looked back at her. “Why don’t you have security staff?”
The thought of hiring security had crossed her mind many times, but she rarely spent enough time here to concern herself. She’d have to start looking into changing things. “I’m new to living completely in the public eye and drawing all the scrutiny that comes with it. My father was the former CEO for Heinrich & Kohl. That is, until he passed away last year.”
“I’m sorry to hear about your father’s death. From what I’ve heard, he was a good man.”
She was surprised that, working for the Swedes, he had heard even a single good word about her father. “So, you know about my family?”
“A little bit, but not much. Just what I could glean from the meetings I’ve attended.”
She wasn’t sure if he was trying to be vague or if he really didn’t know much about her. Either way, it was strangely endearing. “What do you do for the Riksdag?”
“I don’t work for them,” he said, all of his attention back on the painting.
“Okay, so who do you work for?” She walked over to her white couch and sat down, arranging her gown to cover her knees.
He turned to her, and his gaze dropped to her hands. She covered her naked ring finger with her other hand, his simple action making her feel almost naked...and vulnerable.
“I work where I’m needed and when I’m called upon.”
“That sounds dangerous.” And sexy as hell. “If you tell me, would you have to kill me?” she teased, but from the tense look on his face the joke had fallen flat.
He was silent for a moment too long. “Let’s just say I’m a man who understands the value in keeping a personal life sacrosanct.”
Maybe they had more in common than she had initially thought.
“You’re naive if you think that you’re safe,” he continued.
She felt her hackles rise. “I don’t know who you think you are—”
“I didn’t mean any offense,” he said, raising his hand and motioning her to stop. “I was just saying that I don’t think I should leave you here alone. At least not until the NYPD and the FBI get their hands on whoever was behind the attack.”
“I’ll hire people,” she said, trying to gain control over her anger. Whether or not he had meant it, it had still hurt. She didn’t need anyone telling her that she was stupid.
“I’m sorry again,” he said, sitting down beside her on the couch. “I really didn’t mean it like that. Please forgive me.” He looked her straight in the eyes and took her hands in his.
Sweat rose on her skin as she stared into his bottomless blue eyes. She wasn’t sure she had ever seen eyes that exact shade before. They reminded her of the color of the deepest ocean, and it seemed that they held just as many mysteries.
But she couldn’t forget who she was or change for any man, no matter how handsome. “I don’t appreciate being put down. Ever. I know it was unintentional, but don’t think that you can talk to me that way.”
He looked contrite, bowing his head. “I know. I made a mistake. I just... Well, I don’t want to see you get hurt.”
What bothered her the most was that he was right in his castigation of her. It had been naive of her to think that she was safe on her own here. She had chosen this place, without a doorman, living a life halfway between obscene wealth and a recent college grad. Her brother had warned her that this day would come, the day when things would change and she would have to start really taking her life and safety into consideration. With a business like theirs, it was only a matter of time until they were on the receiving end of the guns they made. They worked in a volatile business, one full of secrets, underhanded deals and political warfare.
Until now, she had thought they had done a pretty good job of staying out of it.
When it came to dealing with corruption, it was best to walk away—no amount of money was worth dying for.
“I appreciate your apology.” She paused, studying his thick, wavy hair. “It’s too bad you’re working for someone else, or else I’d think about bringing you on as my chief security advisor.”
He jerked, looking up at her.
As his gaze pierced through her, she wished she hadn’t spoken so fast although she had meant what she said. He would be a valuable asset to her life, especially when it came to her well-being and safety. She wasn’t sure that he would be as sound an addition when it came to her heart. Though she was almost certain she could trust him, she wasn’t sure she could trust herself.
“I—” he said.
“The shower is upstairs, third door on your left,” she said, intentionally interrupting him, fearing what he was about to say.
“Oh, okay,” he said, some of the tension leaching from his voice.
“Towels are in the linen closet in the restroom.” She motioned toward the stairs, afraid that if she spent one more moment alone with him she would say something else that would bring him even deeper into her life.
He nodded and silently made his way out of the living room and up the stairs. His footfalls echoed on the marble steps, their sad sound cascading down upon her. As the sound quieted, she exhaled long and hard. She needed to get a grip on herself.
She sat down on her couch, picked up her landline telephone and dialed her brother. Daniel’s phone went straight to voice mail. “Hey, Danny, I hope everything is going well in DC. Things up here... Well, give me a call when you can.” There was a crack in her voice as she spoke. No doubt Daniel would pick right up on it and be worried. “I’m fine, everything is fine, but I hope Anya’s okay. Just call.”
Ugh.
That wasn’t how she had anticipated that going. Once he got her message, she would have to talk him down off a cliff. He’d always been the worrying type. She hung up the phone, half expecting to get a call from him, but nothing came.
She waited for a moment before ascending the stairs to the third floor and to her bedroom. It was just as it had been yesterday, understated but tasteful. She could still pick up the scent of her Mademoiselle perfume as she entered the bathroom.
It was as if nothing had happened.
A towel hung on the hook next to a clean washcloth and bathrobe. The cleaning lady must have come, and all had been replaced and freshened. In fact, the only thing out of place in the entire house was her.
She pulled off her hospital gowns and tossed them in the bin as she turned on the shower and waited for it to warm. Steam began to rise around her as she stood examining herself in the mirror. For all intents and purposes, she seemed the same. Same eyes, same nose, same cheeks, but nothing felt the same. In one moment everything had changed.
She wasn’t entirely sure if it was because of the attack or because of the strange feelings she was experiencing with Jarrod.
It was though she were drawn to him by some invisible force. The words that came out of her mouth even worked to pull him closer. At the same time, all she wanted to do was push him away.
She wrapped a tow
el around her body and made her way out to her closet. Surveying the racks of clothes, she wasn’t sure whether she should go with business attire, or leggings and sweatshirt. Whatever she wore, it would send a message to him, but what she wanted to do was put on comfortable clothes and binge-watch Netflix all day.
She grabbed a pair of jeans and a T-shirt. A happy medium, for them both.
As she reached into her drawer of undergarments, a draft brushed against her bare shoulders. She started to turn, but a hand wrapped around her neck.
She dropped her clothes. “What in the—”
“Shut up, dammit.” A man’s hot breath wafted against her skin.
She tried to turn around, but as she struggled, the man’s hand tightened. Reaching to her left, she grabbed her Manolo stiletto.
“You can thank your boyfriend for this.” His accent was thick, guttural.
“Who are you?”
The tip of a knife pressed into her side. And his hand loosened slightly.
She stole the moment. Raising the shoe, she slammed it down as hard as she could into the man’s thigh. She rolled out of his grasp, grabbing her other shoe as he dropped to his knee in pain. He yelled, something in a foreign language she couldn’t understand but was sure was a string of expletives.
The man struggled to stand up, limping on his good leg, slashing at her with the knife. She pressed back into her closet as blood poured down the man’s leg. She had hit him perfectly in the inner thigh.
“Don’t come any closer,” she yelled. “Jarrod is coming. He’s here. He’ll kill you. Jarrod!”
The man lunged at her with the knife. She watched his eyes darken and his shoulders move toward her. His breath froze as the knife in his hand moved immeasurably slowly and the world stopped around them. She held the shoe high and bore it down. The heel pierced the soft, pudgy flesh of the man’s neck.
Blood pulsed from the hole she’d left as she drew the shoe back and slammed it down again.
The man fell as the red fountain sprayed from him, coating the clothes to her right. In a few beats, it slowed. The pool of crimson blood grew around him, staining the faux fur area rug that adorned the closet floor.
She stared at the shoe that was protruding from the man’s neck. The swooping swan-style jewels on the shoe were covered in tiny drops of blood.
Dang.
She’d always loved those shoes, even though they were too narrow and had done nothing but sit in her closet since the day she’d bought them.
At least she had finally gotten her money’s worth.
No matter what—or who—was to come, she couldn’t be taken by surprise again.
Chapter Five
“Oh,” Jarrod said, standing at the doorway of the closet. He held the towel tight around his waist as he stared at the scene in front of him. “Yeah. Okay,” he said, stunned by what was unfolding.
“I... I...” Mindy stammered, pointing at the dead man on the floor.
“It’s okay,” he said, sidestepping around the man’s body and moving to her. Like him, she was wearing nothing more than a white bath sheet. “Don’t worry about this,” he said, looking down at the knife that still rested in the fat man’s hand. “Are you okay? He didn’t cut you anywhere, did he?”
She seemed surprised, as though she hadn’t even thought to check her body for any harm. She glanced down at her body, inspecting it. “I... I think I’m fine. Just... I don’t know.”
“You’re in shock. This is normal. You have been through a lot in the last forty-eight hours.” He took her gently by the arm and helped her navigate around the body and out of the closet. “Let’s just get you into the shower and then we’ll get out of here.”
There was blood on her hands and splattered over her white towel. In an effort to keep her from being even more traumatized, he moved her through the bathroom and kept her from seeing herself in the mirror. He let go of her and turned his back. “Hand me the towel. Then get in. I’ll get you some clothes. Anything you prefer?”
His question was met with silence. After a moment, there was the click as she opened the shower door, and then she gently handed him the towel.
He walked out of the bathroom, loudly closing the door behind him so she could be more comfortable. He made his way back to her closet and the body.
The dead guy was in his midthirties, obese and starting to bald. His features were familiar, but he wasn’t sure from exactly where.
There was no way anyone from the Gray Wolves could have known where he would be, or with whom, unless they had been following him. It didn’t seem possible. This man had to be here for her.
Which brought him back to the reality that, regardless of any feelings he held for the woman, he couldn’t do anything about them. He had to find out the truth and that was that.
He sent a quick email, with picture, to his people at the CIA and followed it up with an email to Zoey. Between his teams, it would only be a matter of time before he had an ID on this guy. Meanwhile, he had to get her out of this apartment and out of New York.
Only one safe place came to mind—Montana.
The Widow Maker Ranch, his family’s new acquisition, was the safest place he could think of. There, they would be surrounded by family and out of the limelight.
However, if Mindy was more involved in the underbelly of the gun world than he assumed, it might well be like inviting the fox into the henhouse.
There were plenty of people on the lookout for him and his family. There had to be a bounty on their heads.
He couldn’t bring trouble back to his family.
But where else could he take her? She was a somewhat well-known figure in the world, had been in her fair share of magazines as an up-and-coming heiress to the H&K fortune. He had even once seen her on the pages of People at a benefit at the Met. Anonymity would be hard to come by.
She was a major liability no matter where they went or what he chose to do with her.
His phone buzzed with an email from his handler at the CIA acknowledging what had gone down. Thankfully, they would take care of the body and get rid of any evidence once he and Mindy left.
At the far corner of her closet, there was a rack of men’s suits and incidentals. He glanced down at his towel. He had planned on calling out for fresh clothes, but they didn’t need anyone else coming or going from this house.
He grabbed a pair of the suit pants and a white button-up shirt. He’d have to go commando. Even if he found some skivvies around there, putting on another man’s underwear was a step too far. The pants were a size too large and the shirt was a bit snug in the shoulders, but both would work well enough to get them out of this place and onto a flight—anywhere away from here.
He grabbed her a pair of jeans and a comfortable-looking shirt. The top had little blue flowers, bright and cheery but still tasteful—just like the woman it belonged to. Hopefully, he wasn’t way off the mark and she’d like what he’d picked out. He glanced down to the clothes she had dropped on the floor. They were similar. Good. But what if they would remind her of what happened?
He grabbed a floral print dress as a second option for her. It was pretty, and he was sure that she would look beautiful in whatever outfit she chose. And for the first time in his life, he chastised himself for not knowing more about women’s fashion.
He set the clothes on her bed. The entire room was huge, and the bed at its heart reminded him of a sled skating on a gray wooden tundra. At the foot of her bed was a faux fur throw blanket, much like the one that lay under the corpse in her closet.
His fingers brushed against the blanket as he laid out her clothing. It was so soft, comforting...perfect for making love.
No. He couldn’t go there.
He dropped his clothes onto the bed beside hers and started getting dressed. As he did up the last button, his mind wandered to who had worn thes
e clothes before him. Their mere presence meant that she had allowed some guy to have his personal items here, and yet she hadn’t mentioned any significant other. Neither had her file. According to what his handler had given him, her last major relationship had been five years ago to an investment banker who now worked on Wall Street. The guy had grown up with a silver spoon and went to NYU on a full ride, no doubt thanks to his family’s donations to the dean of admissions’ retirement fund.
On the other hand, it was possible that these clothes belonged to a new man, someone that the agency didn’t know about. They certainly weren’t infallible.
He shook his head. This woman and her world were a million miles apart from where he had come from and where he was going. She was an American princess and he only got close to her world by being a hired gun for the American government.
However, if push came to shove, his life seemed better; at least he was free to do whatever he wanted without falling under scrutiny from John Q. Public. Whatever she did, she probably had to answer to her board of directors, the tabloids, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and, until recently, her brother.
He needed to tell her. Or, at the very least, she needed to find out.
She walked from the bathroom, toweling her hair dry. He hadn’t thought a woman with wet hair was sexy before, but with her standing there, dabbing at her water-darkened locks, she looked like something out of a vintage magazine ad. With red lipstick, she could have been a spitting image.
When she saw him, she stopped in her tracks. “Oh.” She stared, no doubt because of the clothes he was wearing. “I... I’m glad you found those. I had totally forgotten I even had them.”
“I was hoping you or your boyfriend wouldn’t mind.” He silently prayed that she would put his nonsensical fears that she was seeing someone else to rest.
“Don’t worry, there’s no boyfriend.”
“Do you have a lover...anyone that may come knocking at the wrong time?” He felt stupid for saying the word lover. Even to his own ears it sounded archaic and laced with Victorian-style prudence.
In His Sights (Stealth Series Book 2) Page 4