Hot Soldier Bodyguard

by Cindy Dees

  “I know that look. It’s cold feet if I ever saw it. Don’t lose your nerve on me now, princess. We’re in too deep to back out.”

  “No, we’re not,” she argued. “You can just walk away and you’ll be safe. My father will never know a thing.”

  “Oh, yeah?” Joe growled. He turned her around, his hands encircling her waist, and nodded toward the front door.

  Cari looked in the direction he indicated. And gulped. Freddie and Neddie had their heads together and were staring straight at her and Joe. Both men’s faces were thunderous. As she looked on, Freddie pulled out a cell phone and pressed it to his ear.

  Oh, God.

  He said quietly, “That smoking hot dance of ours crossed the line. We have no choice but to go forward now.”

  “Joe, get out of here right now. They’re calling my father. If you’re lucky, they’ll just put you in the hospital for a few weeks, but if you’re not lucky…”

  Joe chuckled.

  She stopped midsentence. And stared at him in shock.

  “You’re laughing about this?” she demanded incredulously. “They’re telling my father right now that we’ve been pawing all over each other in public. He’s going to tell them to kick your teeth down your throat. This is serious!”

  Joe smiled down at her gently. “Thanks for worrying about me, sweetheart, but those two jerks couldn’t hurt me if they tried. I’d put them flat on their backs in ten, maybe twenty, seconds.”

  Cari rolled her eyes. “Don’t you go all macho on me, Joe Smith. Those guys are both street fighters.”

  He laid a finger on her lips, stopping any further protests from her. “Trust me. They don’t pose a threat.”

  She frowned.

  His grin widened. “Wanna really give them something to stew over?”

  Her eyebrows raised in question, but that was all the response she had time for before he leaned down swiftly and captured her mouth with his.

  Wow. Heat and man surrounded her completely, invading the darkest corners of her mouth and her mind. His lips and tongue were hot and demanding, nipping and stroking and sucking like she was the best ice-cream cone he’d ever tasted, all sweet and drippy and melting, and he was determined to capture every last drop of her.

  Her knees turned to rubber and she leaned into him, tingling all over. She devoured him right back, and Lord, if her insides didn’t actually start to hum with desire.

  She needed him like water in the desert. She hadn’t even known it, but her soul had been dried up, shriveled and parched, until he came along and breathed life back into her.

  She all but inhaled him, right there on the spot. Her leg started to creep up, to wrap around his hips, to press her core against the hard bulge at her belly.

  A sound that was part groan and part chuckle came from his throat. He lifted his mouth away from hers.

  No, no, no! She had to have more of him right now! All of him!

  Gently, his fingers wrapped around the back of her knee, disentangling it from around his thigh. His thumb gave a single caress to the sensitive skin behind the joint, sending white heat shooting up her thigh and straight to her core. Her breath hitched and his gaze snapped to hers, his eyes blazing black fire.

  Oh, yes. They definitely had a spark between them. More like chain lightning.

  He cleared his throat.

  She clung to his shoulders, not because she was needy and trying to seduce him but because her legs were so weak she wasn’t sure they would bear her weight.

  “Uh, well then,” he mumbled, “I think that pretty much seals the deal.”

  “How’s that?” she managed to mumble back through the buzz of lust filling her ears.

  “When Frick and Frack report to your old man that I just examined your tonsils with my tongue, in public, I’m betting daddy dearest will stick a shotgun in my face and make me marry you if I don’t beat him to the punch.”

  Abruptly, she became aware of several hundred people staring at her as avidly as if she’d just grown horns and a third eye. Why was her skin crawling all of a sudden at the idea of all those gazes locked on her and Joe? She’d made a spectacle of herself plenty of times. She’d even laid hot kisses on guys in public before, back when Eduardo didn’t watch her every move, back before Julia disappeared. But tonight, the party-girl mask just wouldn’t stay on. It kept slipping away, leaving her raw emotions unprotected, her heart on display.

  Her heart. Not an act. Not the public image that everyone always saw. But her. Carina. For real.

  She never, ever, showed her true self to anyone. Not to her father. Not to rooms full of cynical, voyeuristic jetsetters, and certainly not to Joe. He was practically a stranger, for goodness’ sake! She barely knew him at all. And what she did know of him didn’t inspire a girl to think of happily ever after.

  She vaguely realized that she was still bent half-backward over his arm, his strength supporting most of her weight. His body, hard and hot, pressed into her, branding itself on her memory, marking her as his.

  And then with a quick bunching of his muscles, she was upright once more, whirling off onto the dance floor into a kaleidoscope of light and color. Music throbbed in time with the pulsing desire between her thighs. Her breasts ached for his hard chest against hers once more. She craved the taste of him on her tongue, and the feel of him on her skin.

  With a snap of his strong wrist, he spun her away from him and pulled her back again. And then his other hand landed in the middle of her back, anchoring her sinfully tight against his body.

  For all of her wild ways, she really had very little experience at seducing men. They always came on to her, the rich, spoiled brat whom they were sure would spread her legs for any man with the cash or the cool factor to earn the privilege.

  God, she was jaded. How had she gotten that way at twenty-four? She felt a hundred years old.

  For a change, she went with her instincts and went on the offensive with Joe. She wanted more of what she’d felt when he kissed her. A lot more. She ran her fingers up the back of his powerful neck into his silky hair and undulated her body against his.

  It turned out her feminine intuition was right on target. Joe half growled, half laughed and pulled her even closer. He maneuvered her into the thick of the crowd of dancers, out of sight of her bodyguards, and his mouth descended, capturing hers again. He kissed her with his entire body this time, surrounding her in his strength and grace as they danced, locked together in a sizzling embrace.

  She was so dizzy she could hardly stand by the time the song ended. Another tune cranked up and the people around them gyrated as Joe tore his mouth away from hers and stared down at her.

  He looked as thunderstruck as she felt. Thank God.

  In the din, she barely heard him say, “We definitely have to get married right now.”

  He sounded like he was talking about a whole lot more than their plan to escape her father. Her heart stuttered in shock. Was he really as attracted to her as she was to him? The thought sent her head reeling even worse than it already was.

  “C’mon,” Joe shouted over the music.

  She followed along as he tugged her hand. He led her quickly off the dance floor and toward the back exit of the club.

  They cleared the dance floor and the direct blast of the speakers. “What are you doing?” she asked him.

  “Getting out of here,” he replied as he hustled her toward the door.

  “But Neddie…”

  “Is still wading across the dance floor with Freddie. Hurry!” he urged her.

  “But the other guards…in the SUV...”

  “Exactly. They’re in the SUV. Out front.”

  “How do you know that?” she demanded. “They could be in the alley out back right now.”

  “Only one way to find out. C’mon!”

  The wildness he’d set loose in her still prowled in her veins, hungry. Insistent. She wanted this man. No matter what the cost. No matter what the consequences.

 
; This was really dumb. Dangerous at best, suicidal at worst.

  But she let him lead her off the dance floor and rush for the rear exit.

  They burst outside, into the muggy warmth of the night. The sultry air stoked the lust zinging across her skin.

  “This way,” he muttered.

  She broke into a run beside him as he raced toward a side street. They ducked around the corner, out of sight of the club. She didn’t have any illusions about being safe, though. Freddie and Neddie were bulldogs who would never let go of their bone.

  But when Joe yanked open the door of a dark, armored Mercedes with tinted windows, parked at the curb, and urged her inside, that did surprise her. The vehicle’s driver pulled away quickly. She looked out the back window in time to see Freddie careen into sight, huffing. But then their car turned a corner and her bodyguard disappeared from view.

  She turned around to face front. Joe lounged casually beside her. He lifted an armrest and pulled a soft drink out of a concealed mini-cooler. “Thirsty?” he asked.

  Joe had this whole escape planned before he came inside the club! Otherwise, he wouldn’t have had this car waiting for them. She ignored the soda, outraged. “You knew all along you were going to pull me out of there tonight, didn’t you?”

  He frowned. “I wasn’t sure. I had a car waiting, just in case. An opportunity presented itself, so I seized it. Your father’s men are too careful to give us many chances to get away from them.” He peered at her in the dim interior. “Are you angry at me? I thought this was what you wanted.”

  Joe’s hand captured hers gently, stilling it against his chest. She was arrested by the slow, steady thud of his heart under her palm. Not the heartbeat of a frightened man.

  He said soothingly, “This plan isn’t only about getting you away from your father. It’s also about getting him to let you live your own life once and for all.”

  Cari’s outrage subsided. She couldn’t blame the guy for being prepared. This was what she’d said she wanted, after all. “Where are we going?”

  Joe looked her directly in the eye. His dark gaze was warm and compassionate. “You’re so beautiful,” he murmured, “and so damned young.”

  Young? She hadn’t felt young in a long time. Living with her father aged a soul. Joe’s smooth voice caressed her, raising the fine hair on her forearms. She tingled all over.

  “We’ve got an appointment with a judge, princess. We’re getting married, remember?”

  She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. She looked up at him uncertainly. “Tell me this will work.”

  “It will work. Trust me. I’m a thorough man. Careful.”

  This car was ample evidence of that.

  “Are you sure about this?” she asked. “This is your last chance to back out. You don’t owe me anything, Joe. I can’t be responsible for your death, too.”

  “I’m not going to die. And neither are you, Carina.”

  “Promise?”

  “I promise.” His smile would have lit the whole night sky if they were standing outside. “Last chance for you, too, Princess. Once we do this, we’ll be all in and have to follow through on the plan. Are you sure about this?

  She stared at him, losing herself in the midnight depths of his eyes. He would take care of her. Keep her safe. Give her freedom. All of those promises swam in his gaze. But she saw something more in his eyes, too. Something male and possessive that made her hands tremble and her breath come in unsteady jerks. Something that made her pause a long time before she answered.

  Finally, she took a deep breath and replied in a shaky voice, “Yes. I’m sure. Let’s do this.”

  Chapter Four

  Breathe, Cari, breathe.

  If only her body would listen to her brain. But she was so nervous she could hardly sit still. She’d just agreed to marry Joe. Right. Now.

  Lord, bolting from that club had been a risky thing to do. She was supposed to be a wild child. Adventurous. The kind of girl who would take eloping in stride or, at least, take it as a big joke. Drawing what shreds of courage she could around herself, she peered at Joe in the car’s dark interior.

  “Since we’ve got wheels and have already ditched my watchdogs, why don’t we just head for the airport? We can hop the first flight to anywhere.”

  Beside her, one of Joe’s silhouetted shoulders shrugged. “We would never make it far enough out of the city to reach the airport. There are police checkpoints everywhere, and military patrols are crawling all over St. George. Plus, as soon as your pet thugs report to daddy, you’d better believe Eduardo’s men will be racing all over this city looking for you, too.”

  “But—” she started.

  Joe interrupted. “Any unscheduled takeoff by an extraction airplane or helicopter stands a good chance of being shot down by the Gavronese army. Just because there isn’t much fighting in St. George at the moment, there still is a civil war going on in this country. I could haul you out into the jungle, but it’s crawling with rebels and would put you at grave risk. Especially if you were caught with me.”

  “Why’s that?”

  Joe grimaced. “Let’s just say I’m not well loved by the rebels these days. I was involved in a little run-in with them a while back that took a whole lot of their people out of action.”

  Her eyebrows shot up. He must be referring to that fiasco last year where the high-tech rifle Eduardo had stolen from the Blackjacks was mysteriously stolen back from the rebels he’d hired to take it. Her father had been furious when the rifle slipped through his fingers. He’d also been livid that nobody seemed to want to tell him exactly how it had happened or how dozens of the rebels had died in the process.. Maybe someday she would manage to pry the story out of Joe.

  “Look,” she argued, “I’m no wilting lily. I can stand tromping around in the jungle for a while if it wins me my freedom.”

  The driver shocked her by interjecting, “Joe’s right. It’s too dangerous to try to move you out of the city right now. Believe me, he has examined every option. And the war severely limits his options.”

  She frowned. “But the government regained control of the capital months ago. It’s safe enough for us to fly out of the airport. If you’re worried about the cost, I have credit cards that would easily cover the cost of hiring a jet--”

  Joe cut her off. “It’s not about the money. It’s about the danger. There are still nightly bombings, kidnappings and assassinations in St. George.”

  “Why haven’t I heard anything about crimes like that?”

  “Your father is undoubtedly not interested in seeing news outlets report on the atrocities being committed by the revolution he’s funding. You’re more isolated at his estate than you realize, Carina.”

  “My father is funding the rebels?” she exclaimed.

  Joe replied, quickly, “Forget it. Forget I said anything.”

  Not bloody likely. Her father was paying to take down the government of Gavarone? Actually, it made a certain kind of sense. It was exactly the sort of thing Eduardo would do. His ambitions certainly extended to buying an army and controlling a small country. Nausea rumbled in her gut. She didn’t want to think about the hundreds or thousands of people he was responsible for killing with this newest little venture of his.

  And as for Joe…his act had slipped for a minute there. His mask of casual reserve had fallen away to reveal the passionate man beneath.

  But then he commented lightly, “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were trying to avoid marrying me, princess. What’s the matter? Aren’t I your type?”

  “Oh, you’re my type, all right,” she blurted out before she realized what she was saying. Her gaze snapped to his. Sure enough, he was staring a hole through her, his eyebrows hovering up around his hairline. His only response was to reach over and take her hand in his.

  The interior of the car went silent. Her entire awareness focused on her palm pressing against Joe’s bigger, warmer one. Lord, even the smallest touch from him
did funny things to her pulse.

  They drove for a while toward an affluent residential section of St. George. Large homes nestled behind tall fences and iron gates and thick landscaping that hid most of them from view.

  “Where are we going?” she finally asked, breaking the thick silence.

  The driver answered from up front, “To pay a little visit to a man named Miguel Cabot.”

  She gasped as the name of one of her father’s most loyal supporters congealed in a knot of horror in her throat. “Judge Cabot?” she managed to choke out.

  The driver glanced at her in the rearview mirror. “You know something about him that we don’t?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she replied. “He’s got his hand so deep in my father’s pockets he could scratch Eduardo’s…kneecaps.”

  Joe smiled beside her.

  “This isn’t a joke,” she hissed at him. “He’ll run straight to my father.”

  He nodded. “That’s the idea.”

  Huh?

  Joe explained, “Who better to marry us? Your father will believe Judge Cabot immediately when the man tells Eduardo we’re legally and properly married.”

  “But what if he calls my father before the ceremony to ask if it’s all right?”

  The driver answered casually, “He won’t.”

  “I’ll bet you a hundred bucks he talks to Eduardo first,” she retorted.

  “I’ll bet you a thousand he doesn’t,” the driver shot back.

  Carina blinked. For the hired help, the guy was pretty hostile toward her. She was generally well liked by the working classes in Gavarone because she tipped lavishly and was forever giving away ridiculous sums of money to the poorest among them. If this driver was Gavronese, he ought to be delighted to drive her in anticipation of a hefty reward.

  Suspicion that he was another member of the Blackjacks hit her and, just as quickly, froze into certainty. The driver had good reason to hate anyone with the name Ferrare. As did Joe.

  Her horrified gaze swiveled to her fiancé. Why hadn’t she seen this before? She’d guessed he was with the Blackjacks, but she’d let her attraction to him blind her to the reality of who he was and what it actually meant.