Guarding Kinsley: Brotherhood Protectors World (Texas Guardians Book 3)

by Barb Han

  “This one,” he pointed to the round scar two inches above his left nipple. “Came from shrapnel. I was flying in a Blackhawk, being dropped into territory that we knew was hot but there was an important target that we had to get to safety. It was supposed to be a stealth mission, but they were ready for us. It seemed they wanted to take down an elite force as a badge of honor and to show their people that the big American machine could be defeated. One of my brothers in arms was shot getting off the chopper, so I jumped to get him before he hit the ground.”

  He lifted his jeans leg to reveal his ankle.

  “When I did, I broke two bones in this ankle. But I managed to grab him and strap him into a basket that was being lowered, not unlike the one we rode in to get here. My break never did heal properly.”

  “What happened to him?” She ran her finger across the bumps. Anywhere Kinsley touched him left a fiery trail.

  “Got an early out after spending some time in a hospital,” he said.

  “You saved him,” she said and there was admiration in her voice that made his chest swell with pride.

  “He’d have done the same for me.” He dismissed the comment. He didn’t think of himself that way. “I did my job. We take care of our own.”

  She eyed him carefully, and he could tell that she was assessing him.

  “Go ahead and ask what you want. I’m an open book tonight.” He quirked a smile.

  She dabbed his injury and then put pressure on the leaky side.

  “Okay.” Kinsley didn’t look up at him. “Have you been married?”

  “No time for a wife,” he answered honestly.

  “What about kids?” she asked.

  “What about them?” He was confused.

  “Do you have any?” She looked at him this time.

  “No.”

  She must’ve been satisfied with his answer because she went back to work on his wound. “Have you taken a life?”

  Before he could answer she waved her free hand.

  “Don’t answer that,” she said. “Obviously, you’ve been in a war. That’s not a fair question.”

  “Would you think less of me if I did?” For some reason he needed to know. Her life made sense to her. It was all about studying and books and living like there wasn’t a war going on halfway across the country.

  “No.” That one word offered more comfort than he should let it.

  “You said you worked for a Blackwater-type organization. Why?” she continued.

  “Because that was the only job I was qualified for.” It was an honest answer. Granted, he’d worked a farm and knew how to do that but he’d had no interest in following the footsteps of the fosters who’d taken him in.

  She frowned.

  “What else could I do? I was good at being in the military,” he said honestly.

  “I can see that,” she said. Why was that a gut punch?

  “Are you saying you don’t approve of my career choice, Kinsley?” He figured he might as well go ahead and ask. He cared about her answer but he was trying to play it off like it didn’t matter.

  She studied him. “It fits you and you’re good at it. I guess I just wish there was something less dangerous for you to do. It’s the selfish side of me.”

  “It’s not selfish to want someone else out of the line of fire.” There was a softness in her words that touched him. It had been a long time since a woman had cared about him this much, a long time since he’d let anyone. He never stuck around in one place long enough to develop a real relationship. He’d been with plenty of women over the years and they’d enjoyed a night—or sometimes several nights strung together—of amazing sex. Somehow, he imagined being intimate would be different with Kinsley.

  He normally stayed far away from a woman who could penetrate his armor, from a woman like her. But then, there were so few that it hadn’t been much of an issue.

  Spending the next few hours, days or weeks with her would put him to the test. Because he could get lost in those cobalt eyes of hers and it would be a mistake to let his guard down with anyone.

  Gabriel didn’t do long-term and Kinsley had always been the marrying kind.

  “So, why haven’t you settled down yet?” He turned the tables.

  “How do you know I’m not already married?” Kinsley didn’t remember talking about her personal life. Oh, right, he knew she was about to be attacked by a terror cell. Maybe he knew everything about her.

  She must’ve given away her thoughts by the way she looked at him because he was already shaking his head.

  “There’s no secret file on you, if that’s what you’re thinking,” he said. “What kind of jerk would I be for making love to another man’s wife?”

  “But how’d you know?” she asked again.

  “I checked your wedding finger out. There’s no gold band, and you would wear it if there was, and there’s no tan line, either.” He smirked like he’d just won the big prize at the county fair.

  “Okay, smarty-pants, why couldn’t I be married?” she asked.

  “Considering there’s a PhD in front of your name,” he motioned toward her book, which was sticking half out of his backpack, “I figured you’ve devoted the better part of a decade on that achievement.”

  “My mom didn’t exactly make having a family look appealing for an intelligent person,” she admitted.

  “You’ve always been one to make up your own mind,” he cornered her.

  She put her hands up in surrender. “Fine. No one has come along that I stay interested in for more than a few weeks. I keep dating the same uninteresting guys. We keep having the same disagreement. It got old.”

  “Which is?” he asked.

  “It starts by him asking why I work so much and then goes downhill from there.” She’d had that conversation more times than she wanted to admit. There’d been Jaime sophomore year. She’d dated him to ‘get back on the horse’ after spending freshman year certain that Gabriel would randomly show up on campus. Yeah, she’d been naïve back then but she’d learned her lesson. Gabriel didn’t show. His social media page went radio silent. And he didn’t try to contact her one time.

  As far bad years went, freshman had been the worst. She’d been so lonely in the New England school she’d gone to. Most of her friends went to University of Texas at Austin or Baylor in Waco. She didn’t know a soul at her school. The fresh—and large—scar on her face had made her self-conscious when meeting new people. Her dorm roommate had a boyfriend who liked to stay in their nicer room and Kinsley had become very acquainted with the library.

  Being alone in a study room, keeping her head down and making good grades had been her oxygen that year.

  Sophomore year started looking better when she’d met Jaime and the two started seeing each other. But then the conversation had come when she had to stay in and study over meeting him for a party. The relationship had gone downhill from there.

  “And why do you work so much?” he continued.

  “Because I have to,” she said. “Getting those alphabet letters behind my name took a lot of focused effort. Universities don’t just hand them out to anyone. You have to actually work for them. You have to study until you fall asleep on your books. You have to sacrifice any kind of a life outside of school. Especially if you have a part-time job like I did. You don’t go to parties or have relationships because you can’t afford to let anything distract you from your goal because if you slip, if you take the easy way out and go to the movies instead of stay in and study it gets easier to do it the next day. And the next. Suddenly, before you realize, you’re behind and there’s no catching up. That’s how you wash out of a program.”

  Kinsley could feel the tension rising in her body. Gabriel seemed to pick up on it, too.

  “People don’t understand that, and they walk out when they realize they aren’t going to be the center of your life,” she continued. That was the most she’d said about her past in any one conversation in longer than she could rem
ember.

  Gabriel had put his hand on her shoulder to comfort her and his thumb drew circles. She didn’t want his touch to be so electric or make her body ache for him to touch her all over.

  It did.

  “There’s nothing wrong with being focused,” Gabriel said.

  “You have to be if you want to accomplish something that’s not going to be handed to you.” Kinsley was defensive. She could hear it in her own voice. And she needed to redirect the conversation. “As much as I hate this idea why can’t we just scrap the book?”

  “These guys won’t take you on your word. Besides, others have seen it and they’ll worry that news will spread,” he confirmed.

  “But, why? I mean, why come after me? Blake sent the advanced copies out to dozens of people. Would these people even be able to get the list of names?” She shuddered thinking about anyone being associated with her book dying.

  “My gut reaction is that these guys could’ve killed you quietly at any time,” he stated.

  A shiver raced down her spine thinking about it.

  “They wanted to make a statement and that’s why they’d planned on killing you in front of the Presidential Library at your book launch talk.” He made good points.

  Kinsley drew in a shaky breath. “What are the chances they’ll leave me alone now?”

  “Anything’s possible.” He shrugged.

  “As in it could snow in July here?”

  “Afraid so.” He seemed reluctant to admit it and she appreciated that he wanted to soften the news.

  “You have friends working on my case right now, don’t you?” she asked.

  “These guys are some of the best I’ve ever had the pleasure to work alongside.” She heard the respect in his voice.

  “I’d actually like to meet them someday to thank them personally.” She knew that Gabriel didn’t take trusting others lightly. If these men had won his trust and respect then she really did want to meet them.

  Gabriel didn’t respond right away. He just sat there looking like he was solving world hunger. When he finally spoke, he changed the subject. “The men who are after me won’t stop until they find me.”

  “Can I ask what you did to make them this pissed off?”

  “The leader thinks I killed his brother,” he said, and she could sense that he didn’t like talking so casually about taking a human life.

  “Why does he think that?”

  “Because I did.” Gabriel looked down at his injury. The bleeding had stopped. “I can finish this. There’s a couple of power bars in my rucksack. That and a bottle of water should give you enough sustenance for the night. It won’t taste like much.”

  Had she just been dismissed?

  If he thought that he could get away with that he had another thing coming. “You said before that we have to talk to each other.”

  “What do you think I’ve been doing?” He picked up a pad and tape. He ripped open the pad with his teeth while keeping one hand on the small pad that was stemming the blood flow with continued pressure.

  “What are my chances of getting out of this alive?” she asked.

  He stopped what he was doing but didn’t make eye contact. In fact, he seemed stunned by the question.

  “Do you really want to know what I think?”

  Chapter 11

  Gabriel leaned forward and clasped his hands. Kinsley sat on her heels in front of him. There was no way he was going to let some jerk take her life away from her. “The person after you will have to kill me before he gets to you. And that’s not going to be easy for him to do.”

  “This puts you in more danger, doesn’t it?” she asked.

  “I’ve been trying to negotiate a truce with The Russian. I still have a few cards left to play but some favors cost more than others,” he admitted. He hadn’t even talked to Jaden and Daniel about what was really going on with The Russian.

  “Whatever you have to offer him to make this go away you should,” she quickly said.

  “If I do that innocent people will die.”

  “Oh.” She paused, looking like she was letting that sink in. “There has to be something else he wants.”

  Gabriel blew out a sharp breath and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Yeah. Me. Dead. But I’m not willing to give him that, either. And especially not since I found you again.”

  He hoped for a response, a smile. Instead, Kinsley stilled. “I missed you, too, Gabriel. But we don’t know each other anymore. This cloak and dagger lifestyle is crazy. I mean, I can admit to not really being alive in a very long time. I realized that in the past twenty-four hours as crazy as this has been. I see that I’ve been living too safe but—”

  “You can relax. I’m not asking you to marry me.” He said the words and he should mean them, so why did they feel hollow?

  Another, “Oh.”

  And then her cheeks flushed with embarrassment.

  “I’m sorry. Wow. You must think I’ve lost my mind.” She blinked up at him. “Seriously, we’re strangers for all intents and purposes. I mean, strangers is not really the best way to put it. We’re somewhere in between. Familiar strangers. Does that make any sense?”

  He cracked a smile that he didn’t feel. “Sure. We knew each other once but you don’t know the guy who can kill a man and not talk about it later.”

  “I wasn’t saying—”

  “Not out loud. But you thought it.” He’d always been able to read her.

  “You can talk to me about that, Gabriel. Or anything else. I don’t know if it’s too late but I’d like to be friends. The best part about this whole ordeal has been seeing you again,” she said.

  He reached out and ran his finger along her jawline. “Yeah, for me, too.”

  “We can build on that, right? Become friends again,” she offered. “No matter how hurt I was or how angry, I missed you.”

  “We were never just friends,” he fired back with a little more ire than he’d intended.

  “Is it too late for a fresh start then?” she asked.

  “Once this is over, you might just change your mind.” He hated the thought but it was true.

  “How can you say that to me?” There was genuine hurt in her voice but she didn’t give an inch. Instead, she pushed up to her knees to face him.

  “Well, damn.” He locked gazed with her and a need to kiss her again was a physical ache.

  “What really happened to us when we were kids?”

  “People make mistakes. We were young and insecure. We didn’t have enough sense to hang onto a good thing when we had it,” he said.

  “And what about now?” Those cobalt blue eyes of hers bit right through him. “Are we too stupid to hang onto a friendship?”

  “I don’t want friendship from you right now. You’d be better off if you went to sleep and forgot about this conversation,” he said, and he could hear the gruffness in his own voice.

  “Why is that?” she asked, and he could tell at this point that she was enjoying the power she had over him.

  “Because if you don’t, I’m going to kiss you. With your permission,” he added.

  “Then do it,” she said boldly.

  That was all the encouragement he needed. Gabriel tilted her chin up toward him and peppered a trail of kisses along her jawline, the scar. And then he claimed her lips, covering that full pink mouth of hers with his.

  She teased his tongue inside her mouth and all rational flew out the window. Gabriel knew better than to want this but, God help him, he did. His body trembled with need for her, for Kinsley, for his Kinsley.

  He brought his hands up to her face and cupped her cheeks as he drove his tongue inside her parted lips. She mewled with pleasure and he swallowed the sound.

  She brought her hands up to his shoulders, electricity firing through her fingertips as she traced his muscles. And then she gripped his shoulders and pulled him flush against her body. Her sweet full breasts had a thin layer of silk from touching his skin—skin that was aliv
e and aching with a need to be in physical contact with hers.

  Gabriel unbuttoned her blouse and she shrugged out of it a moment later. He released a guttural groan when he palmed her lacy bra and her nipple beaded.

  She unhooked her bra and shrugged out of that next, tossing it on top of her shirt.

  Kinsley was all curves and creamy skin and beautiful woman.

  She stood up and shimmied out of her pants. Her panties were teal lace, his new favorite color. She started to take those off, too, but he stopped her.

  “I want to do the honors.” Gabriel’s voice was deep and gravelly. His eyes darkened with need.

  Kinsley wanted to feel his strong masculine body on top of her, pushing her into the mattress. Her stomach quivered as he hooked his fingers into the sides of her lacy underwear and tugged them down. About halfway, they freefell and she stepped out of them.

  She should feel awkward standing naked in front of her high school boyfriend but being with Gabriel was the most natural thing. She couldn’t imagine feeling anything but a sense of rightness with the world and a burning desire for him to touch her.

  And he did.

  He smoothed his hands up her hips, leaving a scorching hot trail. He took his time standing to his full height again. She already brought her hands up to unsnap his jeans. He helped her and his denim along with his boxers ended up in the pile of clothing next to their feet.

  “You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, Kinsley,” Gabriel said in that low, hungry voice.

  Her skin goose bumped as electricity skittered across her skin. He was all glory and masculinity. “You’re not bad, either.”

  Those words didn’t begin to cover just how glorious his body was. And it was. But there was so much more to her attraction to Gabriel than that. The connection went so much deeper and that scared the hell out of her. If she was in her right mind, she’d stop this while she still had a prayer. But this was Gabriel. All grown up. All danger and muscle and sex appeal in buckets.

  And she’d be damned if she could deny herself one amazing night with him.

  “You have protection in that backpack?”