Hot Protector: A Hostile Operations Team Novel - Book 10

by Lynn Raye Harris

  He’d gone too far though. Telling her he’d make her feel good if she let him. He hadn’t meant to do it, but the way she’d said that she couldn’t wear a bikini at her parents’ pool parties and that she’d had to be careful what she ate—well, that pissed him off. Immensely. And he’d wanted her to know that she was desirable the way she was, that the Southern California environment she’d grown up in had been wrong, not her.

  Then there was the revelation that she’d never been intimate with Androv. That had floored him, made a hard stab of need twist in his groin. He couldn’t begin to figure out what was wrong with a man who didn’t try to get Sophie in bed as quickly as possible.

  Gay or impotent. That about covered it.

  Chase gave up trying to sleep and sat up. A message pinged onto this phone and he opened it. It could only be from Hawk at this point. His personal cell phone had perished in the apartment, but he’d get a new one and restore it tomorrow. Until then, it was the emergency burner—which he’d also discard and replace tomorrow. Just in case.

  *

  Mendez notified. Team notified. Be there at 0800.

  *

  Chase took a deep breath. They knew now and the wheels were in motion.

  Copy, he answered.

  He went into the kitchen and rummaged in the refrigerator for a beer. One would be enough to relax him and then maybe he could sleep. He closed the door and popped the top, then went back into the living room—and stopped when Sophie emerged from the bedroom.

  She wasn’t wearing the robe anymore. She’d found a T-shirt and some shorts in one of the drawers and put those on instead. Her arms crossed defensively over her breasts when she realized he was there.

  “I didn’t know you were awake.” Her voice was raspy.

  “Yeah. Couldn’t sleep.”

  “Me neither.”

  “Want a beer?”

  “I think that would be good, yes.”

  He went back into the kitchen. When he turned around with the beer, she was there.

  “Hungry?” he asked.

  “I could eat something. You?”

  “How about some of those potato chips?”

  She was silent for long enough that he thought she was probably warring with herself. But then she shrugged. “Why not? It’s been a rough couple of days.”

  He got the bag off the counter and led the way back to the living room. He settled on the sofa bed and picked up the remote. She stood as still as if a canyon had suddenly opened between her and the bed.

  “It’s a couch made into a bed, Soph. Sit on the other side and prop your legs up. Think of it like a recliner.”

  She hesitated, but then she came around and perched on the opposite side of the bed from him. He leaned against the back and crossed his legs before offering the open chip bag to her.

  She reached in and took a couple. He noticed that she didn’t stuff them in her mouth but rather sat them on her lap and ate one at a time. Slowly. Making it last.

  “Did you meet a lot of movie stars?” he asked, unaccountably annoyed at how careful she was with a fucking potato chip.

  She swung her gaze to his. “What?”

  “Movie stars. Living in LA. Do Tyler and Justine hang out with Brad and Angelina?”

  She snorted. “Hardly—but yes, I’ve met a couple. Mostly they hang out with other musicians.” She shrugged. “LA is like any other big city—you don’t know everyone.”

  He took a sip of his beer and thought back to the few times he’d been there. “That’s how my mom talked me into going for a visit. She told me I’d meet movie stars like Pamela Anderson, who I was enjoying regularly in Baywatch reruns. Didn’t happen though.”

  Sophie laughed. He liked the sound of her laugh.

  “Actually, I think Mom and Pam know each other. Mom was on Baywatch once. The Hoff saved her from drowning.”

  “No kidding.”

  She nodded. “It’s true. Mom wanted to act, but she’s not really that good at it. Stick her in a bikini and it doesn’t matter though.”

  “Why do you want to act?”

  Her smile faded and she toyed with a chip. He wished she’d eat it instead of playing with it. It was as if she was arguing with herself over every single bite. She hadn’t done that with the MRE, probably because it had been nearly twenty-four hours since she’d had anything besides a few crackers. But she had done it with the soup and grilled cheese.

  “It’s just something I always wanted to do.”

  He didn’t believe her for a second. “There’s got to be more to it than that. Come on, Sophie. Spill it.”

  She leaned her head back against the couch and closed her eyes. “What’s it matter?”

  He started to reach for her arm to give it a squeeze, but something stopped him. “It matters.”

  “Fine…” She sighed. “I used to pretend to be someone else when I was growing up. I hated being fat, hated being made fun of—so I pretended I was someone prettier or more interesting. A princess, a movie star, an orphan—didn’t matter so long as I wasn’t me. It felt good to get lost inside another life, so I decided that’s what I wanted to do. I want to pretend to be someone else.”

  He didn’t know what to say. He’d thought her life so fucking perfect. Resented her for it. And here she was tearing his theories apart. Making him feel sorry for her. He could tell her she was perfect as she was, but he’d already done that once. He could tell her that Tyler and her mother were fucking fools for making her feel less than important, but he’d already done that too.

  “Are you pretending now?”

  She turned her head on the back of the couch and fixed him with those remarkable eyes. “I’m always pretending, Chase. I’ve been pretending for so long that I don’t even know who I am anymore.”

  “So stop pretending. There’s no movie script that can compare to what’s going on in your life right now. You’re on the run with a handsome and brilliant dude who makes Rambo look like an amateur—that’s me if you didn’t know—”

  She laughed and he kept going, trying to be serious though he wanted to laugh too.

  “And there’s an evil Russian trying to track us down. We’re on the run, desperate, hiding out in a hovel—”

  She snorted. “This is not a hovel. It’s a very nice little house.”

  “Fine, hiding out in a very nice little house. Waiting for daybreak. Subsisting on potato chips and beer—anything could happen, anything… But we’re the good guys, Sophie, and the good guys always win.”

  She was smiling as she gazed at him. He liked that. “Do they really?”

  He thought of all the mudholes, all the rotten missions in all the war-torn places he’d been, and he knew it wasn’t true. Sometimes the good guys didn’t win. Sometimes the good guys got killed. He’d seen it happen more than once. Marco and Jim—God, that was a long time ago now, and he still remembered it like it was yesterday. They’d lost Marco and Jim, and they’d gotten Sam “Knight Rider” McKnight and Garrett “Iceman” Spencer in their places. Time moved on, people came and went, and justice didn’t always prevail.

  He wasn’t telling her that, however.

  “Yeah,” he said softly, holding her gaze. “They do.”

  “I hope you’re right.”

  “I am. It’s my job.”

  She was silent for a while, watching the TV as he flipped through the channels. There was nothing on, but he kept going. Finally he settled on a hockey game rerun.

  “I’m sorry that I made you feel bad when we were kids,” she said.

  He turned his head to look at her. Her face was in profile, the light from the TV illuminating her skin.

  “You didn’t know. It’s not your fault.”

  She met his gaze then. “Do you really mean that, or are you just trying to make me feel better?”

  He blew out a breath. “No, I mean it. It was easy to blame you for having everything I didn’t… but the truth is that Tyler chose to abandon my mom and me. It was nothi
ng to do with you. Hell, he married Justine years after we were both born, so there’s that too.”

  “It had to hurt when you heard he’d adopted me… but Chase, he did it because my mom pushed him. He did it to make her happy. It wasn’t because of me. Truthfully, he’s always felt like just a guy my mom lives with.”

  Now he felt like the one who needed to apologize. “Does that bother you?”

  She shrugged. “It used to, but no, not anymore. I’ve had a good life and I’ve had advantages. I know that. And I’m sorry you feel like those advantages were denied to you.”

  “When you say it like that, I sound like a fucking whiny asshole.”

  Her eyes widened. “That’s not what I meant—”

  “No, I get that. I’m kinda ragging on myself here. But you know why I hate Tyler? It’s not because he failed to buy me a car or, hell, every fucking thing I wanted, which is what I thought rich people did. No, I hate him because of what he did to my mother.”

  He watched as the Bruins scored again, wondering why in hell he was telling her these things. She hadn’t said anything, but he knew she was waiting for the rest of the story.

  “Tyler and my mother met in Nashville. She was a waitress, and he was just starting to play the clubs. He wasn’t famous. Hell, he wasn’t even in demand. He was good on a guitar and he had a couple of songs he’d written. But he needed to go to the next level, and he wasn’t getting there. He was stuck in a rut. Until he met her. Until they started living together and she listened to him and encouraged him. She wrote lyrics for him and he set them to music. They were a team, and he promised her the world.

  “But then she got pregnant, and he got his big break. He left her to play with B.B. King, promising he’d come back when the tour was over. He didn’t. He met someone else, and he didn’t come back.”

  “He’s an asshole,” she said, her voice breaking.

  He swung his head to look at her, surprised to see tears on her cheeks. He had a sudden urge to tug her into his arms and hold her close. But he wouldn’t do it because he was afraid he wouldn’t stop at that.

  “She was too proud to ask him for anything. He sent money from time to time—and then one day he decided I should visit him and she agreed. That’s when the California trips began. I have no idea why he suddenly wanted me to spend time out there. But when I was sixteen, I told him I wasn’t coming back. And I didn’t. End of story.”

  “She should have sued his ass for child support. You deserved that.”

  She sounded angry, and he swallowed the sudden lump in his throat.

  Fuck. This shit was getting too deep. Why had he delved into the depths of his painful childhood? And why did he feel kind of stunned by her vehemence on his behalf?

  “Yeah, maybe she should have. But I think she was more afraid he’d try to take me away from her. And maybe he would have out of spite.”

  Her eyes glittered and her jaw was set in a stubborn line. She was pissed, and it kind of awed him.

  “She was probably right. He’d have gotten custody of you and then ignored you while he partied and had a good time. You were better off, even if you didn’t have all the things you wanted.”

  “Did they ignore you, Sophie?”

  She snorted. “Let’s just say that sometimes the adult in the room was not Tyler or my mom. They would drink until they were falling-down drunk, smoke weed, and fight until they passed out or started ripping each other’s clothes off so they could make up. I stayed in my room and pretended my real parents were coming to get me.”

  “Jesus, I’m sorry.”

  She shrugged. “We’ve said that a lot to each other tonight. Maybe we should talk about something else for a while.”

  He could only stare at her. Her eyes flashed and her cheeks were high with color. She was beautiful, fiery, and he wanted her right now.

  But taking her when they were both angry and hurt was not the thing to do. If he hadn’t known it before her revelation about Tyler and her mom fighting and fucking, he definitely knew it now.

  Instead, he reached for her hand and twined his fingers in hers. She stiffened for a moment—and then she relaxed and squeezed his hand in return.

  14

  Sophie snuggled into the covers and fought the first currents of wakefulness. She was comfortable, warm, and safe. If she woke up, she didn’t know if she’d be any of those things.

  The bed was small, narrow, and she was crowded up against the edge on one side and the wall on the other. Definitely a narrow bed. Perilously narrow.

  She opened an eye and tried to focus on her surroundings. There was a table and a lamp… and the soft glow of a television. There hadn’t been a television in her room—

  She gasped and spun over in the bed. The wall she’d been pressed up against was definitely solid. It was also human. She sucked in a breath at his nearness. His utter perfection.

  Chase lay on his side, one arm slung across her body, his naked chest a study in ideal human anatomy. She followed the line of dark hair that arrowed down his abdomen, disappearing into his shorts.

  Oh, where did anyone on this earth get abs like that? Hard, defined abs that she wanted to trace with her tongue just to see if they tasted as perfect as they looked.

  He never opened his eyes as his hand wandered from her waist to the curve of her ass where he tugged her in close. So close that she didn’t have to wonder if he was hard or not.

  He was. Gloriously, hugely hard. Her gaze shot from his chest to his face. His eyes were still closed, and she swallowed.

  Oh fuck, now what? She hadn’t intended to fall asleep out here with him, but after they’d spilled their guts and he’d held her hand, she’d felt such a sense of belonging that it had stunned her. They hadn’t said another word as the hockey game played on. She’d focused on their hands, on the warmth and rightness that flowed over her. It had been comforting in a way she couldn’t ever remember experiencing.

  She didn’t remember falling asleep, but she was surprised he hadn’t wakened her. No, he’d gone to sleep beside her. And now he was really beside her.

  “Mmm,” he said, and her heartbeat quickened.

  “Um, Chase. Chase.”

  “Yeah, baby?” he whispered. “You want it again?”

  Again? What the hell?

  No, no. Calm down. If they’d had sex, she’d damn well know it. They had not had sex. He was asleep and dreaming. Or something.

  “No, I do not want it,” she said. “It’s me, Chase. It’s Sophie. Your, um, stepsister. Kind of.”

  “Whatever game you want to play, honey,” he murmured before spearing his other hand into her hair and pulling her face toward his.

  Sophie put her hands on his chest and pushed. “Chase! Wake up!”

  His eyes popped open then, and he looked her over in that lazy way he had. “Hi, Sophie.”

  He had not let go of her ass, she noticed. “Hi, Chase. Can you let me go?”

  “You sure about that?”

  His erection nestled against her pubic bone, burning into her. Her body responded with a surge of heat and moisture between her legs. Her sex sizzled with electric tingles every time he shifted his hips in the slightest. She wanted to grab his ass and rub herself against all that delicious hardness while pressing her mouth to his chest.

  Before she could find her voice, he squeezed her ass one last time. “Much as I’d like to convince you otherwise, we gotta get up. Hawk will be here soon.”

  He rolled away from her and sat up on the edge of the bed. After grabbing his phone and presumably scrolling through his messages, he stood and stretched, his bones cracking and muscles rippling as he reached skyward.

  Then he grabbed his T-shirt and dragged it on over his chest, covering everything she’d been staring at. Her gaze dropped lower, and her heart flipped in her chest at the evidence of his arousal. Wow, that was quite an impressive bulge in his shorts. It lay against his body, pointing toward his heart… and it reached almost to the edge of his
waistband.

  Holy shit.

  “See something you like?”

  Her gaze shot to his. He’d arched an eyebrow, staring at her with a smirk on his handsome face. Daring her, she supposed.

  She pushed herself up on an elbow and yawned. “Don’t be so full of yourself,” she said lazily. “I saw tons of hot guys growing up in LA. You’re nothing special, Chase.”

  He snorted. “Liar. You’ve been staring at me since you walked into my apartment two days ago.”

  Oh, he was irritating. And confusing as hell. Prickly one minute and sexy the next. Pulling her to him and pushing her away. Being so sweet it hurt and then being angry and defensive.

  “That’s because I’m not yet convinced you won’t get tired of this and ditch me. I’m watching you in case you leave me.”

  He sobered instantly. “I’m not leaving you, Sophie. I’ll protect you with my life. You can count on that.”

  A knot formed in her throat. After the past two days, she knew it would be no small task to protect her. “Thank you.”

  He shrugged. “No need to thank me. It’s what I do.”

  She pulled her knees up to her chest and sat back against the couch. “You do this all the time? Run from bad guys and try not to get killed?”

  His look was so intense it took her breath. “No, I don’t run from the bad guys. If they’re smart, they run from me.”

  “And if they don’t?”

  “I kill them.”

  A chill skated down her spine. He was serious. Deadly serious. “What happened to bringing them to justice?”

  “What I do is war, Sophie. Innocent lives depend on me and my team. If someone takes Americans hostage, we’re not making sure they get due process before we bust in and take the hostages back. It doesn’t work that way. Due process is a bullet in the brain of our enemies and no man or woman left behind.”

  The hair on her arms stood up as another chill rippled through her. Somehow she hadn’t understood how deadly he was until that moment. How frightening. “You seem awfully certain.”

  “I am. Not everyone in this world is kind, and not everyone believes everyone else has a right to live. Some people think killing innocent Americans is justified—well, I’m there to make sure they don’t get to do it.”