No way was Damon admitting to that. That kind of death wish would land him back in observation. No thanks. “People seem to think I need closure.”
Trevor scoffed. “I have never heard you use that word.”
Because he hadn’t. He wouldn’t. It didn’t mean anything to him. Not in the real world where wounds didn’t close and some didn’t deserve to. “Does it really sound like something I would say?”
“Tonight’s close call means your mere presence in the county is enough to push someone into making a bad move.” Trevor continued to play with the water bottle. Peeled and picked at the label. Tightened the cap until it made a cracking sound. “I get it. I’ve felt the same way around you, but I wouldn’t act on it. This person already has.”
“You just sold the idea that this attack was linked to Cate.” Damon didn’t understand the new tactic. Looking to Cate meant tying the attack to her sister’s death. Now Trevor seemed to be hanging it on a much older sin—Damon’s.
“Does it matter? The result is the same—danger. And if someone kills you, who is going to save your girlfriend?”
The word screeched across Damon’s brain. “She’s not—”
“Fake or not, I don’t care.” Trevor, usually so calm, shifted his weight around as if anxiety had his insides churning.
Damon couldn’t really hear much. His mind kept zooming back to the girlfriend thing then misfiring. In one sentence, Trevor had managed to get so much wrong. Damon rushed to correct some of the mistakes. “She’s not weak or looking for someone to swoop in and solve all of her problems. She needs help and asked for it, but she is not backing out of this investigation and handing it over. I’ve already learned that about her.”
Trevor exhaled as his shoulders fell and the intensity in his voice eased back to normal. “Can she catch a bullet with her bare hand?”
Even Damon had to admit the argument made sense. He tried to think of a good comeback as he looked around them, checking for predators of the two-legged and four-legged varieties. “You made your point.”
“I’ll stick around but you should think about getting her at least a hundred miles away from this place until we know who visited you two earlier.”
It was a good plan. Solid. But still potentially very unhealthy for Trevor. “You made it sound like you’d have to take some pretty big risks and potentially blow your cover to get more intel.”
For the first time in a few minutes, Trevor smiled. “I thrive on stress.”
Damon picked the one topic that could get Trevor to rethink this plan. “What will Aaron say about you sticking to this assignment?”
Trevor wiggled his eyebrows. “That he has a hot, lethal boyfriend.”
“No one wants to take on your guy-who-pretends-to-be-an-engineer boyfriend.” The guy had this nerd look about him with the dark glasses and all, but Damon had once gone to their condo not knowing they were back from vacation. You know, just to borrow a bed for the night, and Aaron had him slammed against the wall with an elbow to his throat before Damon could shut the door behind him. No fucking way did that guy sit at a desk all day.
Trevor’s smile only grew wider. “He really is an engineer. He’s also a retired sniper who did some very dirty undercover work overseas, so yeah. I wouldn’t mess with him.”
“He knows you’re here?”
Trevor nodded. “I told him I was keeping you out of trouble.”
“Excellent. I can hardly wait for him to track me down after you accidentally blow your cover and get yourself shot.”
Trevor sighed. The loud you’re-an-idiot kind. “Your lack of confidence in my skills makes me sad.”
“You are definitely sad.”
“Once you figure out where you’re going, leave a note for me with the manager.” Trevor downed the rest of the water bottle then handed his empty to Damon.
He took it, but only because the comment stunned him. “The motel manager?”
“He was hired to watch over you. To make sure you didn’t get yourself killed before you got into Sullivan and all that.”
Well, shit. “He didn’t even open his curtains when I was getting thrown around the parking lot.”
“He probably thought you had it under control.”
Right. “He looks like a serial killer, by the way.”
“I’m pretty sure he was a marine.” Trevor snorted. “But who knows.”
“I don’t need a bodyguard.”
“That would be more convincing if you hadn’t gotten stabbed tonight.” Trevor reached into his front jeans pocket and pulled out a handful of something that made a crinkling noise in his palm. “And, here. I didn’t put them in the food bag because I have some decorum.”
“What are . . .” Damon held out his hand and stared down at the packets stacked there. “Condoms?”
“I’m happy you’ve seen them before and recognize them.”
There had to be twenty of them. The choice made Damon wonder exactly what Trevor thought was happening during this mission. “This is a fake relationship. She’s not actually my girlfriend.”
“Do you only have sex with official girlfriends?”
“My point is, I don’t need these.” But Damon couldn’t seem to hand them back. A small voice in his head told him to pocket them and be grateful.
“I was in the room with the two of you for five minutes and I know you need those, or you hope you will.” Trevor snorted. “Even a gay man could see the sexual tension pinging between you. You look at her when she’s not looking at you. You tease each other. From what I can tell, straight people flirting is a lot like fifth grade.”
Damon refused to deal with any part of that comment and skipped to the point. “I’m on the job.”
“In a motel.”
All true, but still. “It’s not like that.”
Maybe a part of him wondered what that might be like, but no. He couldn’t protect her if he got caught under her. He needed a clear head. And she needed something other than him. Feelings, emotions, building ties—all that had been burned out of him long ago. He had a handful of friends and keeping up with them proved exhausting enough. He wasn’t looking for more human contact. Not the type that lasted for more than a few hours, and with her it would make it last longer.
Trevor shook his head. “I will never understand straight guys.”
“Go.”
“You really should think about being out and away by tomorrow morning.”
The plan made sense to him. He could get her out of danger and regroup. “Is that an order?”
Trevor wasn’t smiling or joking now. “If that’s what it will take, yeah.”
Chapter 9
Cate stayed in the chair, polishing off the last of the french fries. She’d thought about saving Damon a few then remembered how he held back the information about his ties to Sullivan and she kept on eating. But she picked her seat carefully. She figured the food would lure Damon back inside and she’d be waiting next to it. Then he’d have to deal with this. With her.
As predicted, Damon came in after about ten minutes and locked the door behind him. Without hesitation, he headed straight for the hamburger. It was cold by now but he bit into it, not appearing to care. He didn’t even bother to sit down.
When he didn’t say anything, she started. She had a feeling she’d have to be the one to lead them through all the tough conversations. “You have interesting friends.”
“You have no idea.”
She actually liked Trevor. Found him charming in an odd sort of way. He was a fraction taller than Damon, maybe six-three. They glanced at each other throughout their informal meeting, sharing frowns that supported the claims that they had been friends for a long time.
But she didn’t know the specifics. Not about anything, actually. Damon tended to limit his explanations and answers to brief responses that didn’t say much. That needed to end now. “I’m betting you won’t provide any other details.”
“The basics aren’t very exciting or a secret.
I met Trevor a few years after I left here.” Instead of joining her at the table, Damon kicked off his shoes and sat down on the edge of his bed. “We were . . . I’m not sure how to say it. Lost boys together? Something like that.”
Huh . . . “I feel like I’m missing a reference here.”
“Growing up at Sullivan I had certain skills. I’d been homeschooled and took classes with some of the professors who used to come in and out. Mostly, I learned survival skills. Even those weren’t enough to keep me out of trouble, but when I spun out of the mess I’d created I got a second chance.”
That was not the upbringing she’d expected. The press for Sullivan had boasted about bringing in expert lecturers and engaging in a new way of thinking, which included mandatory work projects for the students to offset the cost of attendance. In all of that PR spin, she created this picture in her mind of rolling green hills and students sitting on a quad. Progressive in its teaching strategies, maybe, but with a sort of educational snobbishness.
Nothing about talk of survival skills fit in with the version she’d dreamed up. But it did match the rumors of a closed-off facility stormed by government officials. That happened at least twice that she knew of, the first being chalked up to government interference, but not the second.
She’d assumed Damon grew up in the ivy-covered college version but now she wondered if it was more like an armed camp. Either way, she wanted to know more. “Did you get that second chance here?”
“A long way from here.” He finished off his burger in a few bites then rested his hands on his lap. “A man named Quint owned a security company. He started this program where he took in wayward twenty-something males and tried to teach them the skills to keep them out of jail or a casket.”
“Them?”
“There were five of us. Wren was one. So was Trevor.”
“That’s the training you were talking about.”
“Yep.” Damon stared at his hands in a moment of awkward silence before looking up again. “In between learning the basics about financial dealings and other things, I figured out that revenge and anger weren’t really great job skills, so I found some others.”
“How did Trevor end up with Quint?” She thought maybe it would be easier for him to talk about someone else, to hold back on the rest of his story for now, even though she ached to hear it.
“We all got there the hard way.” Damon smiled as if he were reliving a memory only he could see. “Trevor had a self-destructive streak.”
Not exactly the answer she was hoping for but she didn’t push. She understood how a family could look one way on the outside and be very different on the inside. How someone could come across as sure and put together as a way to hide how internally they were a crumbling mess.
Her sister suffered from that duality. A fact Cate didn’t understand until it was too late to stop being angry and feeling abandoned to give Shauna what she needed. Damon had that edge. If she had to guess she’d say it ran through Trevor as well, though he hid it better, under a pile of sarcasm and quick responses. “Does he still act that way?”
“No, he’s all domestic and basically married to a great guy who gets him. Aaron lets Trevor run wild on a small scale—handling jobs and taking on more risk than he needs to—then Aaron pulls Trevor back in before he gets into too much trouble. It works for them.”
Now that was interesting. So much for her preconceived notions about macho guys and what they would tolerate about their friends. Nothing in Damon’s reactions suggested he cared if one of his closest friends were gay. One more thing to like about him.
“I guess Trevor was lucky.” He’d found a peace of sorts. She knew from personal experience how difficult that could be.
“We all were. We weren’t on a path headed for survival, but it happened.”
The harsh rumble of his voice called out to her. “You’re serious.”
“Very.”
The reason Wren picked Damon to help her became a bit clearer. At first, she thought working together amounted to a mismatch that would set her back instead of move her forward. Now she knew differently.
Damon tried to pull off this air of disinterest. Acted like he was a loner who blew into town and helped out on cases for a paycheck then blew out again. Someone not tied to, or responsible for, anyone.
She didn’t buy any of that careful cover now. She had at first, before the drive to Pennsylvania and before seeing him in action against the attacker. He struck her as hot and tough and the exact kind of guy she should run away from—fast. But digging deeper she saw the truth. He had friends and made personal connections. He left Sullivan for reasons he hadn’t yet shared but she could see the pain move through him when he talked about life here. Forget the shallow act, life affected him.
No longer comfortable with sitting five feet away from him, she curled the burger wrapper into a ball and went over to him. Dropped down on the bed next to him. “I’m guessing you also know how important it is to have answers. Some of us can’t move on without them.”
He shot her a sly smile. “I see what you did there.”
“Then you also know I’m not running away from this, right?”
He sighed hard enough to blow a puff of air across her cheek. “Trevor is worried about your safety.”
“And what are you worried about?”
He lifted his hips and pulled a handful of condoms out of his pocket. “He gave me these.”
Sex. The word flashed through her head. Kissing was one thing but she’d intended to stop the attraction there, focus them back on her sister’s case and keep their lips apart. But now the thought bounced around up there. A release. The warmth of a body next to hers. For an hour, maybe a night, letting her mind empty of thoughts of death and disappointment and just feel.
She tried to remember the last time she’d been touched. Greg, a lawyer in the building next to her office. They met at the lobby coffee cart a few times, she thought by accident until he admitted he waited for her.
He was cute and shy and a good guy . . . and she wished every day she’d had the energy for a relationship, the space in her heart for something other than this drive and obsession for answers. But she didn’t, so they ended.
That was almost a year ago. Twelve months suddenly seemed like a really long time.
She picked up one of the condoms out of his hand then let it drop. “There sure are a lot of them. Nothing subtle in that message.”
“Trevor is many things, subtle is not one of them.”
“Are you hoping to use all of them?”
“Tonight? Woman, I’m not a machine.” Damon leaned forward and dumped the pile on the edge of the table.
“I meant with me.” She’d blurted that out. She was not a blurter. She didn’t just drop sex talk into a conversation with a guy she barely knew. Not while they wallowed in danger and confusion and a whole mess of other unsexy things.
“Ah.” He threaded his fingers together. “I guess that depends on you.”
She couldn’t figure out his mood. His expression bordered on a smile but it was not quite there. “You don’t get a say?”
“I’m kind of a sure thing where you’re concerned.”
She decided right then she would never understand men. He looked on the verge of rolling his eyes every time she spoke. He argued with her, at times she was pretty sure he did it just to see her reaction. Only a guy would think that signaled interest. “I thought you found me annoying.”
He nodded. “Definitely.”
That time she saw him smile. Her first thought was that he should do it more often because it lit up his face and eased away the tension that seemed to linger around his eyes.
“Then there was your theory about separating work from sex.” Apparently now that she mentioned sex, she was just going to keep on mentioning it. “Your idea not mine, by the way.”
He put a hand on his chest. “Did I really say something so stupid?”
“You balked.”
/> “Looking at you I’m not sure why. You’re hot and annoying. Smart and a bit quirky. Sexy as fuck.”
“Is it because I smell like a hamburger and you’re confusing your love for those with an attraction to me?”
“I’m pretty clear on what I want to do to you.” He lifted her leg until it rested over his. “While I could say something dirty about eating you, you should be clear that you are far more intriguing than a burger.”
Her heart jumped at the contact. His hands, those long fingers. They mesmerized her. She had to blow out a little breath to calm the racing sensation inside her. “That’s high praise coming from you.”
His hand settled on her knee. “You have no idea.”
The warmth of his touch burned through her jeans. The conversation kept flipping around. She let the threads fall away and concentrated on him. The scent of his shampoo, like evergreen, and the musky heat of his skin. Their arms balanced against each other, their thighs touched. Little space remained between their bodies. Despite the shortness of time they’d known each other and the danger whirling around them, this felt right. Safe . . . and a little not safe, exciting and risky. Not words she usually associated with her sex life, but she suddenly ached for a change.
Instead of pulling back like any smart-thinking, head-in-the-game person would do, she slid her leg over his thighs until she straddled him with a knee on either side of his hips on the mattress. The move brought their faces close and had their hands skimming over each other.
“You know, you talk tough, but you seem a little shaky.” She traced her finger around his mouth and felt him shiver.
She couldn’t think of anything sexier than a big, tough dude being felled by the skim of a fingertip over his bare skin.
“I’m on a job. I usually don’t have sex on a job.” He winced while he said the words.
She chose hers with purpose. “Is that a hard rule? Like, no sex at work ever. Is there wiggle room?”
A breath stuttered in his chest. She could see it, hear it.
“Are you going to wiggle for me, Cate?”
The back and forth, the sexy innuendos . . . all of it was new to her. She’d had fun before, enjoyed time with a few good guys, but this had a different feel. Raw and a little wild, like she’d been spun up in a frenzy she couldn’t quite control. “Is that your thing?”
The Protector Page 9