An Angel All His Own (The Gifted Realm Book 5)

by Jillian Neal

  “Fi, honey, I’m…” he started to apologize, but she placed her index finger over his lips.

  “Perfect,” she concluded with an extremely contented smile.

  He kissed her finger and then pulled it away from his mouth. “That was too much. I should never have done…”

  “That was perfect. I feel amazing. Now cuddle me up so I can go to sleep and dream about it.”

  He tried not to let her words make him feel like a king. He shouldn’t have given in. She was going to be sore. He wrapped her up in the sheets and blankets and then in his arms.

  Noisy Reactions

  At five o’clock, a loud knock sounded on the bedroom door. Dan raised his head, furious at whoever was knocking, as he’d been in a deep, dreamless sleep.

  Fionna whimpered, “Go away; I’m naked.” She fussed almost unintelligibly, still mostly asleep.

  Dan chuckled. “Shh, baby. Nobody needs to know that but me.” He eased out from under her, crawled out of bed, and located his boxers. He covered her tightly by pulling the sheets up to her chin and then opened the door. He blocked her body easily with his own.

  “I’m so sorry, man.” Fitz had his back to the door and was staring down the hallway.

  “It’s fine; what’s wrong?” Dan slipped out into the hallway and closed the door.

  Relieved, Fitz turned back around. “I just shut off her gas valve. She’s got a leak. I heard it hissing from my room. I doubt she has any heat.”

  “Yeah, or hot water,” Dan sighed. “I’ll get somebody out here to fix it. Let me build a fire. Fi can take a shower at the stadium, and we can use the gym at work, unless you want to heat your own water.”

  Fitz shook his head. “That’s a pain. I’ll use the one at the gym. I could use a good workout anyway. Is that the only fireplace, though? Because that’s not going to keep her warm upstairs.”

  Dan appreciated the fact that his best friend understood that Fionna’s safety and comfort were his top priorities, and that he was perfectly willing to help him achieve his goals.

  “Yeah, that’s the only one. It’ll keep the downstairs warm so she can have her coffee and I’ll…” Dan paused with a slight grimace.

  Fitz gave him his customary smirk. “…Keep her warm until she’s ready to get up.”

  Dan nodded as he traipsed down the stairs. He stacked the small logs, from the hearth, inside the box, cupped his hand, drew in a tremendous amount of heat, and lit the wood. He shield casted the logs to keep them from burning out.

  “Oh, and by the way,” Fitz had followed him into the living room, “pretty sure her neighbors know your name. I think I’ll just get a hotel tonight.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?” Dan hoped the darkness covered his embarrassment.

  “You dropped the cast, there, near the end, stud. I don’t know what’s happened to you, but she is definitely your weakness.”

  “Do not say anything to Fionna!”

  “Like I would do that,” Fitz teased with an impish grin.

  Dan narrowed his eyes. “I’m not kidding. I will end you.”

  “I will try not to bring it up.”

  Dan’s mind raced. He knew he’d kept his shield over her. That required very little thought or effort. His shield was a part of him, but the sound wave cast required more attention to hold. He’d certainly been giving her all of his attention.

  “Sorry,” he managed to choke out.

  “S’ok, just glad you’re happy, I guess. You did sound very, very happy.”

  Dan ignored that. “You can’t get a hotel. She’ll know why. We’ll keep it down.”

  “I would really appreciate that.” Fitz’s laughter turned into a yawn. “I’m gonna try to get a little more sleep.”

  “You wanna sleep on the couch? It’ll be warmer down here.”

  “Nah, the house will hold the heat for a while.”

  Dan nodded and gestured his thumb up the stairs. “I’m just gonna go check on Fionna.” He wished he didn’t sound so thoroughly embarrassed.

  Fitz chuckled. “You do that.”

  Dan rolled his eyes and rushed back to Fionna’s room. He slid in through the smallest space he could allow as he opened the door and shut it firmly. He willed away the information Fitz had just given him.

  Slipping into bed beside her, he felt complete contentedness as she immediately cuddled up on his chest.

  “Why did you leave?” She fussed without even opening her eyes. Dan brushed his thumb over her cheek as he let heat push out of his pores.

  “Your heat went out, baby. I was building a fire. You must have a leak. I’ll see if I can get somebody out here to fix it.”

  She leaned up on her elbow and rubbed her eyes.

  “Are you kidding me?”

  Dan was taken aback by her mood. She normally ran steady somewhere between happy, thoughtful, or concerned. He hadn’t experienced her in a truly bad mood as of yet.

  “No,” he hesitated, still trying to learn her.

  She fell back on his chest after rolling her eyes. “Maybe I should just sell this place. Last year it was the plumbing, plus all of the renovations, but I love all of the projects I’ve done.”

  Realizing that in her recently awakened mind he was getting a picture into something she normally kept more guarded, Dan listened intently.

  “We’ll do whatever you want, but if you want to move in with me, I’d be thrilled. You can redo my house however you want it. I certainly don’t care. I just want you there.”

  She sighed and wriggled closer to him. “Dan, your dining room looks just like your office at Iodex. It’s sad.”

  Dan had to force himself not to chuckle at her bluntness so early in the morning.

  “Okay,” he agreed, “but I have three other bedrooms. If you want, we could move the office upstairs to one of those. You can bring your furniture, or we could buy new stuff,” he continued to bait her.

  “I don’t know, maybe.”

  A ‘maybe’ was not a ‘no,’ and she sounded much more open to the possibility than when he’d first brought it up.

  “Go back to sleep, honey. I’ll keep you warm, but we’re going to have to get up a little earlier because you don’t have any way to cook, and you aren’t going to have any hot water for a shower.”

  “Or any way to dry clothes,” she fussed.

  “We may have to stay at my place tonight. I can cast your pipes so they don’t freeze without heat.”

  She nodded against him, while poking her lip out in an adorable pout.

  “I really hope this week gets better.”

  “Me too,” Dan prayed fervently that he’d be able to stop the Angels’ takeover. Unable to go back to sleep, he let his mind go over everything that needed to happen before Friday evening.

  After going through a drive-thru for breakfast, where he only irritated Fionna further by asking her to sit in the back so that no one working at the restaurant would see her, Dan pulled the Expedition into the arena parking deck.

  Trying to make up for the drive-thru incident, Dan leapt out of the SUV, opened Fionna’s door, and grabbed her duffle bag and extensive toiletry kit for her.

  His brow furrowed as he took in Garrett, holding Chloe tenderly to his chest, leaning against the entrance doors.

  Chloe Sawyer was number one on a lengthy list of girls Garrett banged on a regular basis. They’d been doing this off and on since the Academy. As long as one of the women Garrett was bedding wasn’t Fionna, Dan genuinely didn’t care, but something about the situation seemed odd. Though he was visibly trying to tap into his tender emotional side, Garrett looked furious.

  He studied Dan and then Fionna. “You know Fi, if he did something wrong, you can kick him out of your house. You don’t have to move into the stadium.”

  Dan rolled his eyes but, after taking in Chloe’s tears, he decided against telling Garrett what he could go do to himself.

  “She has a gas leak. She’s going to shower here.” He was cu
rious as to what had caused Chloe Sawyer who, as far as Dan was concerned, was a willful, spoiled, wild-child, to cry.

  Garrett’s eye flashed in sudden understanding. “Really? That’s very interesting.”

  “Chloe, what happened?” Fionna was almost in tears just watching Chloe cry. This only served to make Chloe sob harder into Garrett’s chest. Fionna began rubbing Chloe’s arm as she shot a quizzical glance at Garrett. “What happened?” she mouthed.

  Emily and Rainer arrived before Garrett could answer. “What’s wrong?” Emily panicked. Rainer looked as confused as Dan felt.

  “You want me to tell them?” Garrett whispered a kiss on Chloe’s forehead and continued to rub her back. He was letting her draw from him almost constantly.

  Dan was actually impressed. He very rarely saw Garrett’s sensitive side, unless he was dealing with his mother or his little sister. She nodded against Garrett’s chest as her breath shuddered.

  Katie, Dana, and Vanessa had arrived by this point, all deeply concerned, but when Sasha’s husband pulled in the stadium and helped her out of the car, Dan felt his heart race as his stomach seized.

  Chloe, Fionna, and Sasha were the three senior players for the Angels and most certainly the ones the team looked to for guidance and leadership. Always being a man of instinct, Dan felt his left shoulder twitch as his Visium Predilected bands shifted his shield away. He pulled his cell from his pocket and called the Non-Gifted precinct.

  “This is Vindico. I need Sorenson now.”

  “Yeah, Dan, what’s wrong?”

  “I need a CSI fingerprint team at Fionna Styler’s home. I want the gas main outside of her house printed thoroughly, and then I want it gone over with a fine-toothed comb.”

  Fitz’s eyes closed, as he shook his head. He’d figured out what must’ve happened at the same moment.

  “No problem, Dan, but there’s probably frost all over the metal fixings. Not sure what we’re gonna find.”

  “Humor me.”

  “You’re the boss. I’ll let you know what we find.”

  “The drive belts in her car snapped this morning.” Sasha’s husband stated concernedly. “Thankfully they snapped in the driveway. I don’t think she could turn it without the power steering. I thought they’d just gotten worn out. I haven’t had it into the shop in a while.”

  “You mean somebody did this to Coco on purpose?” Chloe began sobbing again. Dan stared Garrett down.

  “Her dog was run over. She was in the house when I got there last night. She can let herself out, but she always waits on Chloe. Someone lured her out.”

  Dan felt sick. Vile revulsion washed over him, as Fionna and Emily rushed to try and comfort Chloe. Dan let his vast training kick in, as he shielded himself from the emotion and the fear around him. This was something he’d learned quickly after Amelia had been killed. It was how he’d existed for so long.

  “Her car still in your driveway?” he turned to Sasha’s husband. He nodded. His face held a mix of deep concern and confusion. He wasn’t aware of the attempted takeover.

  “Why would someone do this?” he appeared fearful to ask Dan too much. Fionna reached and took Dan’s hand. She not only wanted to draw from him, but she was trying to soften his scowl. With a deep breath, he forced his shield down; he let her in.

  After realizing what Fionna wanted, Fitz studied Dan. He did know him better than anyone else, and Fitz had been married for eight years, so he understood that Fionna needed Dan. Fitz willed him to let her in, and he understood how hard it was.

  “Not sure,” Dan lied to Sasha’s husband with ease as he supplied Fionna with peace and strength in heavy doses. “But I’d like to get her car fingerprinted and see if we can’t figure out what’s going on.”

  “Yeah, sure, no problem.” Sasha’s husband was still shying away from Dan. Not unaccustomed to other men being intimidated by his sheer strength and foreboding manner, Dan didn’t give it much thought. Being intimidating came with the job.

  “Chloe, I’m very sorry for you loss, but I would really feel better if we upped security here today. Would there be a conference room or somewhere my Elite team could meet that wouldn’t disturb practice?”

  Chloe was still wiping away tears as she turned to Dan and nodded. “There are several places you can use, for as long as you’d like.”

  Dan turned to Rainer. “Go back to the office and get the documents we’ve been working on.” Rainer nodded his understanding. “Tell Haydenshire, Portwood, and Ericcson to meet us here. Tell Tuttle and Ramier they’re running the office today, and that I want a report on everything going on there every hour on the hour.”

  “Yes sir,” Rainer kissed Emily’s cheek tenderly. “I’ll be right back, baby.”

  Earned the Title

  An hour later, Dan was pacing in one of the banquet rooms in the stadium. “We’ve been given permission to use the gym here, and it’s a hell of a lot nicer than ours, so I plan on making good use of it.”

  “Who cares about the gym? We need to figure out what we’re going to do about the girls. We have to keep them safe,” Rainer rolled his eyes with a huff.

  Dan was in no mood for disrespect. Rainer was an excellent officer, and a hell of a guy in general, but he also had a bit of a temper, especially when it came to Emily. If he didn’t remind Dan so much of himself at twenty-one, he would’ve been reprimanded for his mouth on several occasions.

  “I’m so sorry, Lawson, but last time I checked it was my name on the door right under the words ‘Chief of Iodex’, so if you’d do me the honor of shutting your face, I’ll tell you what we’re gonna do.”

  Rainer scowled, and Logan immediately shot Dan a look that said ‘if you want him you can take me, too.’

  “Just can it; he’s in a bad mood,” Garrett softened Dan’s blow for Rainer and his brother.

  Dan rolled his eyes and continued his relentless pace.

  “I don’t think I have enough officers to keep one at all of the players’ homes.”

  “What if we take three off of the list?” Garrett pointed out that Chloe, Emily, and Fionna essentially already had their own bodyguards.

  “Maybe.” Dan ran the figures in his head. He couldn’t shake the terror over the fact that one of Wretchkinsides’ thugs had been to Fionna’s home while he’d been in bed with her. He tried to order himself out of the suffocating distraction. Fitz and Garrett both eyed him suspiciously. Portwood joined their silent interrogation. They all knew him far too well.

  “Dan, chill. So, there was a black Expedition in her driveway. I take the SUVs out all the time. I was there. That’s the story. They weren’t paying any attention to who was at her house. They had to get in and out of her backyard. Let it go,” Garrett commanded. The order, coupled with the fact that Garrett had read him with such ease, irked Dan.

  “Frankly, I don’t think they’ll be any more attacks.” He continued his strategizing without responding to Garrett. “I think this was how they planned to get to Medio Sawyer. They know that if he thinks Chloe and her closest friends are in danger, he might agree to sell. This is classic Wretchkinsides. He loves for his victims to be in constant fear, never knowing what he’s going to do next. But I don’t think they have any intention of actually harming the players.”

  Dan’s cell rang, and he jerked it off the table. “Let’s see if I’m right. What’d you find out?”

  “Only got one print and it was a partial,” Sorenson explained. “Looks like it belongs to an International Iodex officer; print’s sealed. You’d have to put the order in to unseal it, Dan.”

  “You find out anything else?” He had no intention of explaining that he already knew which International Iodex officer’s prints were on Fionna’s gas hook-ups.

  “Dan, I couldn’t swear to you that it didn’t just crack next to the valve. That’s a pretty old house. If it was cut by someone, it wasn’t spilling into her house. It wouldn’t have hurt her unless she went outside to smoke or something. It would’
ve hissed pretty loudly; she would’ve noticed it. Basically it’s vandalism at best, cost her some money having the feeder replaced, and a day or two with no heat and no hot water, but that’s about it.”

  “Yeah, I figured. Have you gotten anything back on the car?”

  “Team’s just getting back in. Won’t have the fingerprints for a little while, but I can let you talk to Testarino. Hang on,” the captain called the head of CSI to the phone.

  “Heya, Dan,” Testarino barked in his heavy Boston accent.

  “Were they cut?”

  “Maybe, couldn’t say absolutely though.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Coulda been the weather. Dey were pretty dry. Coulda been yanked apart. Didn’t look like a knife. They musta been left by a thread. She weren’t meant to go far enough to get herself in trouble. If somebody did this to her car, they never intended for her to leave the driveway, see.”

  “Yeah, that’s what I figured. Let me know if you get any prints.”

  “No problem. We took a load, but I’m guessing they’re the owners.”

  “All right, thanks for your hard work.”

  “Anythings for yous, you know that.”

  Dan couldn’t help but grin. Testarino’s accent got him every time.

  Everyone waited to hear what Dan had been told. “No prints other than yours,” he huffed to Fitzroy.

  “Figured that.”

  “Everything that was done wouldn’t have hurt any of them. They don’t want to do anything that might shut down the board meeting Friday night. They just wanted to scare the leaders on the team and to terrify Sawyer into selling. I really don’t think they’ll make any more moves on the team, but that’s not a chance I can take. So, I suppose you two are getting a pretty sweet assignment,” he gestured to Garrett and Rainer.

  “I assume you’re just going to go ahead and include yourself in that with us,” Garrett finally achieved a genuine chuckle from Dan.

  “Yeah, I guess I am. Just remember that part of keeping Fionna safe means that you’re not out with Chloe too often.”