“You’re crazy.”
“Be patient, princess.”
Ava stopped walking. “Don’t call me that, Tabon.”
He turned around and looked at her. “Sore spot?”
She nodded. “Very.”
“Who called you that, Ava?”
She studied him, her eyes didn’t blink.
“You can trust me,” he murmured.
She crossed her arms and looked back out at the ocean. “My mother.”
“Tell me about it.” Again he kept his voice soft, hoping she would trust him enough to share why it affected her in the way it did.
“She didn’t use it in a positive way.”
He walked over and put his arm around her shoulders. “Go on.”
“I didn’t have an ideal childhood,” she said, moving away from him.
“I’m sorry to hear that.” Tabon stood his ground next to her, wishing she hadn’t moved out of his reach.
“Don’t feel sorry for me,” she muttered. “Boarding school was the best thing that ever happened to both Aine and me.”
He continued down the dirt trail, and Ava followed.
“Tell me about boarding school,” he prompted.
Ava told him about meeting Tara and Penelope first. “Quinn didn’t arrive until a month later.”
“Did you know right away that you’d be friends?”
“Definitely.” Ava smiled and then told him about their first year together. There was a certain amount of sadness underlying her story, but he sensed it wasn’t due to being away from her parents.
“Oh!” she said, suddenly seeing where he’d led her. “It’s built into the hillside.”
The coffee bar had once been an ice cream place that was, as she’d said, built into the hillside near the estuary. Back in the day, it was a tourist destination, but once the ice cream part of it closed and the coffee business took it over, it became a locals’ only hangout.
“Well, if it isn’t Razor Sharp,” said Andie, the owner.
“Hey, darlin’,” he said when she came around from behind the bar to hug him.
Razor caught Ava raise an eyebrow when Andie hung a little longer than necessary, and winked.
“What can I get you?” Andie asked, looking only at him.
“Before we order, Andie, I’d like you to meet my dear friend Ava. Ava, Andie and I went to high school together.”
“He was my prom date. We were king and queen, as a matter of fact.”
Razor inwardly cringed and wanted to throttle Andie when he saw Ava’s reaction. Was any of that necessary information?
“How’s Steve?” he asked.
“You’d have to ask his new girlfriend,” said Andie, foiling his attempt to let Ava know his one-time prom date was off the market, not that he had any interest in her.
“I’m sorry to hear you aren’t still together.”
“Sometimes it’s meant to be, sometimes it’s not, if you know what I mean.” Andie looked directly at Ava and Razor found himself wishing he’d never brought her to get coffee, at least not here.
“You from around here?” Andie asked Ava, who shook her head.
“I’m from New York.”
Razor put his arm around Ava’s shoulders. “So, let’s order. We have a lot planned this afternoon. What would you like, sweetheart?”
She smirked. “A latte, please, dah-ling.”
“Oh, are you two…”
Razor turned his head so he could see Ava’s face, surprised to see she was smiling. He’d seen that twinkle in her eye one time before, and knew she was about to let a zinger loose on Andie.
“We haven’t told my family yet, so, shh,” he answered.
“Oh! Right. So a latte for the young lady, and Razor, the usual?”
“I’ll have a latte too, please.”
Andie rolled her eyes before going back behind the bar, which was the exact response Razor had been looking for.
“I can’t wait to hear what Mama Sharp thinks of your new girlfriend. We play mahjong every week with the ladies from book club.”
“I’m sure she’ll love her just as much as I do.” Razor leaned over and kissed Ava’s face, right near her temple. “Who wouldn’t love her?” he added.
When Andie turned her back, Ava looked at him with scrunched eyebrows.
“It’s the truth,” he murmured. While most of what they’d said was to fire back at Andie, the last thing he’d said wasn’t. Ava was as lovable as they came.
She wasn’t just beautiful. She was smart and funny, the kind of friend who would always be there when she was needed, and even though no one else may see it, Razor knew exactly how much of the weight of the world Ava carried on her shoulders.
“Ready to head back?” he asked once Andie finished making their lattes.
“Sure,” Ave answered. “It was nice to meet you,” she said to Andie, giving her a little wave as they walked away.
When they got to the top of the hill, Razor reached out for her latte. “May I?” he asked.
“Okay,” she answered, handing him her cup.
Razor set both hers and his down on the trail, stood back up, and cupped her cheek with his palm. His eyes met hers before his lips did. What he saw reassured him that she was feeling the same heated intensity he was.
The way Ava clung to him made him want to pick her up and carry her back to his house where, after he ravished her body with his, he would promise to protect her and keep her safe, not just now, but for the rest of her life.
He remembered the day he and Mercer sat in a bar in the middle of New York City, and Razor realized his friend and teammate was in love. He’d been the first of the four to find someone he wanted to spend the rest of his life with. At the time, Razor doubted the same thing would ever happen to him. His life wasn’t set up to accommodate a relationship, or so he’d thought.
After watching Mercer and Quinn make it work, followed by Doc and Merrigan, he realized that it was possible; all it took was finding a woman who made him want to. Admittedly, he’d thought about Ava in that moment of clarity, but brushed the memory of their brief encounter away.
When he’d left that night—so Mercer could take over Quinn’s detail, but also because she still believed he was her boss, not her fill-in bodyguard—he’d stuck around long enough to see if any of Quinn’s friends showed up. And they had. He’d caught a glimpse of Ava that night, and regretted that he couldn’t go back inside, buy her another drink, and spend the evening getting to know the woman he couldn’t forget.
A year later, here she was, by his side, her hand in his. Nowhere in his wildest dreams could he have predicted this outcome.
Once her ex went to trial, and K19 brought down her father, what would be left between them? Would she still want to be with him, or would she celebrate being able to return to the life she led before she became a witness in a trial so much bigger than she could ever imagine?
She’d said she hadn’t had an ideal childhood, but he’d seen her with her father, and she loved him. So did her twin. If Razor was part of the team that not only brought him down, but also exposed his real identity, would either woman ever forgive him?
“I really do want you to meet my family,” he blurted.
“Are you sure about that?”
“Absolutely. I’ll call when we get back to the house and let them know we’re in town.”
Ava nodded, but she seemed distracted. Razor put his arm around her shoulders.
“Tell me what you’re thinking.”
“It’s just…how will you introduce me?”
“Let’s see. My girlfriend, my lover, the best thing that ever happened to me. Any of those work for you?”
She smiled and rolled her eyes.
“I could also introduce you as the love of my life.”
She wasn’t smiling anymore.
“Ava?”
“Don’t make fun of me, Tabon.”
He stopped walking and turned her so he could look in her eyes. “Ho
w is that making fun of you?”
She tried to shrug away, but he wouldn’t let her.
“I get that you don’t take…relationships seriously. But that doesn’t mean you have to make a mockery of them.”
“Hey,” he said, stroking his finger down the side of her face. “That was awfully presumptive of you, wasn’t it?”
“Am I wrong?”
“Couldn’t be more so.”
“I’m hardly the love of your life, Tabon. You don’t even know me.”
“I disagree with that assessment. I know you very well.”
“You know about me. That’s different than knowing me.”
“Again, I disagree. I know when you say you’re not hungry, you are. And I even know when you really aren’t. I know that you make sure the world sees you as independent and completely self-sufficient, and you are anything but. You rely on your sister to reassure you that you are so much more amazing than you know.”
“That isn’t—”
Razor stepped closer so he could feel her staggered breathing on his face and chest.
“I know how to make your body sing, Ava, in a way that no one else has or will again.”
“You have a high opinion of yourself, Tabon.”
“You’re wrong. The reason no one will again is because I have no intention of ever letting you go.”
“You don’t mean that.”
“Oh, I do, Avarie. Do you think the things I’ve told you aren’t true? I haven’t misled you. I’ve shared things with you that I never dreamed I’d share with anyone. And I’ve broken every cardinal rule of my job to take care of you and protect you in a way that I know is risky.”
Ava tried again to shrug away from him, and this time he let her.
“Do you think I’m lying to you, Ava?”
“No. I know you’re not.”
“How do you feel about me?”
It may not be fair for him to ask when she was in such a vulnerable state of mind, but he had to know. If she didn’t think she could love him, it would devastate him.
“Ava?”
“Don’t do this, Tabon.”
“What am I doing?”
“You’re…this…isn’t real.”
“It is to me.”
13
When they got back to Tabon’s house, he said he had calls to make, and told her to make herself comfortable.
“I’ll bring your bags in.”
“Thank you,” she said, feeling bereft by his distance.
“They’re in here,” he told her, pointing to the first doorway she saw down a hallway.
She murmured her thanks a second time, and went in to organize her new clothes and other belongings. She breathed a sigh of relief when she looked in the closet and saw his clothing filled more than half of it. For a minute she’d worried he’d relegate her to a guest room.
Running her hands along the shirts hung in his closet, Ava took a deep breath of Tabon. For a guy who said he didn’t like doing laundry, his clothes were meticulously cared for. The scent that she now identified with him was clean and woodsy, like the cedar lining the floor of the walk-in closet almost as big as her bedroom in New York.
Granted, apartments were typically small and outrageously expensive in places like the Big Apple, but still, the place set aside for holding his clothes had to be at least four hundred square feet.
Ava remembered him saying he’d inherited the house from his grandparents. Did that mean he was an only child? He’d also said he wanted her to meet his family, but he hadn’t been specific about who that might include.
Instead of wandering around in the rest of his space uninvited, Ava decided it might be best if she stayed in the bedroom, even after she’d gotten her belongings as organized as possible back into her suitcase.
Since she had a few minutes to herself, Ava tried to call her sister, but Aine didn’t answer.
She found two books on Tabon’s nightstand. One about significant battles of World War II, and the other about Oregonian hiking trails. Neither sounded that interesting, but she thumbed through the trail book until she felt her eyes growing heavy. Instead of fighting it, Ava let herself drift off to sleep.
—:—
Razor heard sounds of Ava moving about his bedroom, wishing he could wind back the clock and unsay everything he’d said to her this morning.
Clearly, she hadn’t taken his statement about her being the love of his life seriously, but then what twenty-something woman would have when it was said by a thirty-something man?
If someone had asked him his thoughts on age a week ago, he would’ve said it didn’t matter. His philosophy had always been, “you’re only as old as you feel.”
There weren’t many days he felt much different than he had at twenty-five, although he did recognize he was more mature.
In the last hour, he felt like he’d aged ten years, at least.
How foolish had he been to think someone like Ava—young, beautiful, smart, and funny, just starting out in life—would be as interested in him as he was in her?
She’d actually gone so far as to ask him to stop embarrassing himself. Don’t do this, Tabon, were her exact words.
He felt like such an idiot that he came downstairs to hide out in his office, telling her he had calls to make. So far, he hadn’t made a single one. He needed to get his head back in this mission, because that’s what it was. At the end of the day, his assignment wasn’t solely to protect Avarie McNamara, it was to bring down the man who’d lied about his identity her whole life.
Shit. Was that what Ava meant when she’d said that he reminded her of her father? Jesus. The man was married to a woman younger than she was. She must have been trying to tell him not to make a fool of himself over her, like her father did with his constant stream of younger women.
“Hey,” said Gunner, answering Razor’s call.
“Where are you?”
“Two doors down on the right.”
“Do you think you and Monk really need to stick around?”
“Nope. I’m sending him to Seattle.”
“Bring me up to speed on the Petrov investigation.”
Fifteen minutes later, Razor was itching to get out of Yachats and back out into the field. He’d never been the lead on asset protection, because everyone knew what he’d refused to acknowledge. If he hadn’t been interested in sleeping with Ava, he never would’ve accepted the assignment in the first place.
“When is Monk leaving?”
“As soon as I can make the arrangements. An hour tops.”
“What do you think of him?”
“In what way, Raze?”
“Asset protection.”
“I see.”
“You want me to tell you that you were right, Gunner, and I was wrong?”
Razor waited, but Gunner didn’t even crack a joke.
“I can’t do it, man,” Razor finally said.
“Where is she now?” Gunner asked.
“Upstairs. I’m in my office.”
“How do you want to handle the exchange?”
“I have no idea.”
“We’ll be over in a few minutes, and I’ll handle it.”
Razor had never in his life felt like a bigger pussy than he did right now. He was like a dog scurrying away with his tail between his legs. That’s not who he was. Was he really going to let a twenty-two-year-old woman bring him to his knees? Hell, no.
He bounded up the stairs to let Miss Avarie know that he would be much more effective out in the field rather than playing her goddamn nursemaid. He stopped in his tracks when he found the most beautiful woman he’d ever known in his life, sound asleep on his bed.
Sun streamed through the window, casting its rays on her body. If he touched her skin, he guessed it would feel heated, and oh, how he wished he could touch her. But he couldn’t.
He couldn’t be that guy who wanted her more than she wanted him. How many women had he felt the opposite about over the years? The
more they tried to convince him how right they were for him, the more he hated being in their presence. Knowing she thought of him that same way made him nauseous.
“Tabon?” she said, rolling over and finding him staring at her.
“I’m sorry I woke you, Ava,” he said from the doorway. “There’s been a change in plans. Monk will be taking over for me. He’ll be here in a few minutes.”
Ava sat up straight and wrapped her arms around her stomach. “Oh. For how long?”
“Indefinitely.”
The last thing he expected was for her eyes to fill with tears, or for her to try to hide her face from him. As much as she’d hurt his pride when she rejected him, he wasn’t that much of an asshole that he’d let her cry and not try to comfort her.
He strode over to the bed and sat on the edge. “Come here,” he said, taking her into his arms.
“I’m sorry…” she gulped. “I’m sure there are more important things than babysitting me.”
“It isn’t that, Ava. I crossed a line I shouldn’t have, and I regret it.”
“Oh,” she said, pulling away from him and wiping at her tears. “Um, excuse me.”
He watched her walk into the bathroom and close the door behind her. How else should he have said it? I’m sorry I thought that sex between us meant something. I’m sorry I came on too strong, professing my undying love for you, when we’ve known each other less than a week. I’m sorry I’m the asshole who thought sex meant love when I’m the one who has been insisting it doesn’t all my life.
When she came out of the bathroom, she had what looked like a toiletry bag in her hand. She walked over to the suitcase she’d left on his bedroom floor, put the bag inside, and zipped it up.
“I’m ready,” she said, standing it on end and wheeling it to the doorway.
“Where is everything we bought yesterday?”
She looked at him like she didn’t understand the question.
“Didn’t you put anything away?”
“Oh,” she said again, laying the suitcase flat on the floor and opening the zipper. “I’m sorry.”
Razor knelt down beside her. “Ava, what are you doing?”
“I’m taking the clothes out that you bought. I never should’ve put them in my suitcase in the first place. I just didn’t realize…” She put her head in her hands.
Razor (K19 Security Solutions) Page 11