Guarding Sierra: (Soldiering On #2)

by Aislinn Kearns

  He was getting off on this. On her fear.

  Well, she couldn’t let him win.

  She took a breath, tried to keep her voice steady. “So, you’re not going to talk, huh?” she asked.

  He didn’t reply, but the tense readiness of his body language implied he was focused on her.

  “My bodyguard will be back any minute, and my Thai food is due to arrive.” Keep it casual. Unconcerned.

  He cocked his head.

  “You didn’t think he’d gone for the night, did you?” She tried to laugh, but it came out hollow and unconvincing.

  The leather of his gloves squeaked as he tightened his grip on the knife. The blade dug in further, and she felt a trickle of blood travel down her throat. A small thrill of triumph whizzed through her, blocking out the sting of pain. She was getting to him.

  “Whatever you’re planning to do, you better do it quick. I estimate you’ve got another five minutes before we’ve got company.”

  He froze, considering. Then, quick as lightning, he spun her around and pulled her back against his chest. One arm anchored her to him, the other again pressing the blade to her throat.

  She was trapped.

  But she would not panic.

  His quick breath was loud in her ear, even through his balaclava. He was almost panting with excitement, obviously enjoying this new position.

  He began dragging her back to the door, careful in his steps as he turned his head back, watching his path.

  Now was her opportunity.

  They passed the sideboard, and the large Murano vase that her father had given her as a gift—valued at over a thousand dollars—caught her eye. She just had to time it right.

  He manoeuvred her, nearly within arm’s reach of the vase. But not quite.

  Her blood thundered in anticipation as her eyes glued to the vase. One more step and—she snatched her hand out, grasping the delicate rim. With a heaving movement, she swung her arm up, aiming the vase directly behind her head.

  The rim cracked at her strong grip, losing some of the power of the swing. She felt him jerk right before the glass connected as he ducked out of the way. Her manoeuvre hadn’t quite had the impact she hoped for, as her attacker didn’t drop to the floor unconscious. But he did loosen his grip, allowing her to slip free.

  She twisted out of his reach and crossed to the other side of the room, keeping her eye on her attacker all the while. The knife was still clutched in his hand, a thin line of her blood darkening the edge. He stalked towards her, and Sierra dodged his reaching fingers, putting the coffee table between them.

  They both hesitated, bouncing on the balls of their feet, waiting for the other to make a move.

  Where the hell was Blake? Since she was free of her attacker’s clutches, she called out his name but heard no reply.

  She needed another weapon.

  Sierra glanced around. A lamp! Good enough. She lunged for it, going down onto her knees, her fingers wrapping around the smooth metal stand just as her attacker came into her peripheral vision.

  She rolled, taking the lamp with her, and knocking into the coffee table. A decorative fruit bowl wobbled and slipped off the table, falling on the tiles of the fake fireplace. It shattered with a loud crack, spraying glass everywhere. Sierra clutched her lamp like a lifeline.

  She heard pounding and wondered if it was her heart as she stared up at her attacker. He loomed over her, a figure of ominous darkness. Still utterly silent.

  But the pounding wasn’t her heart. She heard that, too, but this was further away. The door. Someone was trying to get through the door.

  Her attacker must have heard it as well, because he turned towards the noise as the sound of splintering wood echoed through the apartment.

  Sierra couldn’t allow herself to be distracted, though. She swung the lamp at her attacker’s knee, the impact jolting her arm. He gave a yell—the first sound she’d heard him make—and turned towards her. She was sure he glared at her.

  But it didn’t last long. He sprang into action, running towards the kitchen just as the mangled door to her apartment swung open, revealing Blake with his chest bellowing from exertion.

  He was a glorious sight.

  Blake’s eyes riveted immediately on her and he strode towards her without even looking at his surroundings.

  “The kitchen!” she told him, pointing. But it was too late. Her attacker darted from the kitchen and out the door. Blake turned, tried to grab him, but missed. He followed for a few steps, then froze in the doorway. She could hear the pounding of her attacker’s footsteps growing fainter as his disappeared down the hall.

  “Go after him!” she cried.

  He turned back towards her. “I can’t leave you unprotected. You have to be my first priority.”

  “Forget me.”

  He shook his head, and made his way over to her. She sighed in resignation. Blake knelt beside her, laying his hand on her arm. “Are you okay?” His voice was rough.

  She nodded. “Yeah. He didn’t hurt me.” She pushed herself up in a sitting position, her hands crunching in the glass littering the floor. A small, sharp sting told her she’d probably cut herself, but she couldn’t bring herself to care.

  Blake’s eyes darkened as her hair swung back, revealing her neck. She’d forgotten about the blood.

  “I’m okay,” she repeated.

  He nodded, but still didn’t look away. He brushed his fingers delicately over the wound. His eyes were a storm of emotions, only some of which she could distinguish. They stayed like that, staring at each other, as their breathing slowed.

  “I’m glad you’re all right,” he said eventually. “I should have been here.”

  “I should have asked who it was before answering the door,” she retorted, trying to soothe him.

  He took a breath, looking like he was going to argue, when Duncan appeared in the doorway, his eyes wide with shock as he took in the damage to the door.

  “I came back when I saw a guy in a gimp suit running down the street. Thought it seemed a bit unusual for this part of town.”

  Blake glanced up as Duncan came towards them, careful where he put his feet.

  “He got in when we were talking around the corner,” Blake told him.

  “Fuck,” Duncan muttered eloquently. “Did he do that to the door?”

  Blake shook his head. “That was me. Lucky we hadn’t yet installed that new security door we talked about, huh?”

  Duncan gave a relieved nod.

  Sierra cleared her throat. “I let him in. I thought he was Blake. Or the Thai food.”

  Duncan gave her an admonishing look. “And you’ll know better for next time?”

  Sierra nodded enthusiastically.

  Duncan apparently took her at her word as he glanced around the apartment. “How did he escape?” he asked.

  “He slipped out behind me when I went to check on Sierra.” Blake’s gaze was still on her, watchful, as if he still wasn’t quite sure she was as fine as she said she was.

  “You didn’t check the place first?” Duncan was incredulous.

  Blake frowned. “I needed to get to my client.” Apparently sensing this might turn into an argument, Blake stood so the two men were eye to eye.

  “You needed to make sure she was safe, first.”

  “I needed to make sure she was alive first.” Blake crossed his arms over his chest, defensive.

  Sierra held still, trying to be invisible.

  “Whether she’s alive or dead doesn’t make a whit of difference if someone can come up behind you and stab a knife in your back.”

  Blake scoffed. “Not a chance. Besides, I can protect her better if I’m by her side.”

  Duncan practically growled. “I know you tend to march to your own tune, Blake, but we have rules. We’ve talked about this.”

  “Well, your rules can go fuck themselves if they don’t make any sense.”

  “Bullshit. You know they make sense. You just chose not t
o follow them because once again you let your dick do the thinking.”

  “And what’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Exactly what you think it does. Right after I chew you out for letting your personal feelings get in the way, you do the same thing again. This time, it compromised the job and let the bad guy escape.”

  “We’ll have another chance to find him.”

  “And he’ll have another chance to get at Sierra.”

  The two men faced off against each other, powerful bodies straining forward as if they wanted to fight and were barely holding themselves back.

  They were both right. Sierra had hired Blake as a bodyguard, and his job was to stay by her side and protect her as his first priority. But Duncan wasn’t wrong when he implied that Blake let his personal feelings get in the way of his rational thought. It would have been better if Blake had checked the apartment first—at least cursorily.

  Sierra struggled to her feet and planted her hands on her hips. “It’s fine. I’m safe, and we can always catch him at a later date.”

  Both heads swivelled towards her, but neither of them looked convinced.

  Amongst all that chaos, a young Asian-American man appeared in the doorway, holding two plastic bags. He glanced at them, at her ruined door, and the broken glass on the floor, then back at them.

  “Delivery?” he asked.

  Chapter 24

  Blake was in a sour mood.

  He didn’t need Duncan questioning his judgement. He’d done what was right for his client, nothing less. It was just unfortunate that it had happened immediately after Duncan had spent five minutes chewing him out over sleeping with Sierra.

  Now, he oversaw her packing. She wasn’t choosy, just grabbing items and shoving them into her suitcase without folding them.

  “So, where are we going now? One of the company safe houses?” she asked him.

  Mandy must have told her about the numerous secret houses they had scattered around Portsboro.

  “We can’t.”

  Sierra paused. “What do you mean, we can’t?”

  “I mean that last night there was a break in at the Soldiering On offices. Duncan has no way of knowing what information was compromised, including the locations of our safe houses. Until he’s taken steps to find out who it was and what they might know, he’s not trusting that the safe houses are actually safe.”

  She slowly turned to face him. “So, what are we going to do?”

  “I know a place. It’s remote. Pretty much off the grid. We’ll be safe there.”

  “Remote?” she asked, placing her hands on her hips. “How remote are we talking? I don’t want to have a ridiculous commute tomorrow.”

  Blake let out a laugh. It was only when he saw her stern face that he realised she was serious. “You aren’t going to work tomorrow.”

  She gave him an incredulous look. “You’re kidding, right? I can’t just disappear. I have clients, and responsibilities. That big presentation, the one I’ve been working towards for the last few weeks, is tomorrow. I have to give that presentation.”

  “You just got attacked in your own home. He’s not just escalating now. He’s made his move. You can’t stay here.”

  “I’ll stay in a hotel. Or we can go tomorrow, after the presentation in the morning.”

  “I can’t guarantee your safety in a hotel.”

  She planted her hands on her hips. “I need to work. I can’t miss this meeting.”

  “You need to live.” He stepped forward, trying to impress upon her the gravity of the situation.

  “I can do both at the same time.” Her jaw was set. “Don’t make me give this up. I’ve worked too hard for too many years to torpedo this deal now. It’ll ruin everything.”

  “Not without me, you can’t.” Not that he’d leave her unprotected, but she didn’t need to know that. “If you stay, I won’t. I know this presentation is important to you, but your life is important to me. And I can’t protect it without your cooperation.”

  “You’d do that? Abandon me?”

  “Yes. I’m a professional. If my client ignores my advice and does something stupid, then I am not going to risk my—or Soldiering On’s—reputation.”

  She narrowed her eyes. Stared him down. He figured she was gearing up to fight some more. He was right.

  “You are such a domineering asshole. I can’t believe you won’t even compromise.”

  “Believe me, you wouldn’t want me to.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Blake stepped forward, frustration bubbling over. “If I made compromises, my clients would be dead. I know you hate to admit it, but I know what’s best.”

  “You are willing to risk destroying my future just because you can’t accept that there might be another way to do things?” Righteous fury flashed in her eyes.

  “There will be another chance to impress your father and colleagues. But only if you live.”

  Frustrated tears sprang to her eyes and she spun away, blinking rapidly. “Men are such assholes,” she muttered, so low he knew he wasn’t meant to hear. She exhaled gustily, then turned back to him, her features controlled.

  “Fine. But I’ll need to make some phone calls to my dad and my assistant. Hopefully he won’t mind me working out of the office for a few days. And I hope I can reschedule that presentation.” It was clear that she was equally devastated and angry by this decision. Her hands clenched, her lips pressed tightly together. Blake’s eyes softened, but he didn’t change his mind. Her life was his priority. She couldn’t fix things if she was dead. Surely she saw that.

  “You’ll have to leave your phone behind, though, once that’s done.” Blake braced himself for her reaction.

  “No. No chance. How would you expect me to get any work done? Since Annie won’t have a chance to call the company until tomorrow, I won’t even know whether they agreed to reschedule.”

  “You’ll just have to take a well-deserved holiday.”

  “Why?”

  “Why what?”

  “Why do I have to leave it behind? If you give me a good reason, I won’t argue.”

  Blake sighed. “Fine. Your attacker knows your phone number, since he sent you that text. It wasn’t so much of an issue when he hadn’t made his move, yet. But now that he has, it’s pretty clear he’s not going to stop. When we go to the location, we need to go dark. Nothing that can be traced back to you, no bugs, nothing.”

  She hesitated. “Not even my laptop?” she asked, hopefully.

  “No.”

  She folded her arms across her chest, narrowing her eyes. “So you’re saying I won’t be able to work.”

  “Pretty much.”

  “Are you sure there isn’t another way?” She glared at him now. Good. Her anger was preferable to the misery.

  “No,” he told her. Definitive. If she hated his brusqueness, then, well, it was better than her misery. She glared at him, but threw another pair of socks into her bag. It was clear that she’d run out of fight, but wasn’t happy about it.

  Good enough.

  He left Sierra to finish her packing and went to tour the apartment, seeing if there was anything else he could take that might be useful. Two types of glass still littered the floor. He couldn’t help but be impressed by the way Sierra had fought off her attacker. She’d shown as much bravery and ingenuity as many of his colleagues would have.

  He had been so close to losing her. So close to fucking up irreparably. Maybe Duncan was right, and he should have chased down her attacker. At least then it would all be over.

  But then she wouldn’t still be in his life. They would part ways as soon as this job was done. It was clear that she had no intention of forgiving him for sleeping with her and then dropping her the next day. And his autocratic demands tonight would only make things worse.

  But he still wanted her. God, he still wanted her.

  He wasn’t looking forward to the challenge of the next few days. Alone with Sier
ra, in an isolated location.

  It would, unfortunately, be quite romantic.

  Chapter 25

  The drive to the cabin was longer than he remembered. To be fair, it was the early hours of the morning, and he longed for his bed. Sierra had fallen asleep within minutes of him starting the journey, and her heavy breaths were the only sound in the hushed cabin of the SUV.

  Blake’s shoulder ached something fierce, reminding him that he’d pushed it way too far the last few days. But he couldn’t deny that despite all the issues, it was good to be back out in the real world, doing some useful work for a change. Three weeks in the hospital was about five too many.

  He breathed a sigh of relief as he spotted the sign for the turn half-hidden behind a tree. He eased the car down a narrow road, soaring trees guarding each side. The headlights of the car barely penetrated the darkness.

  The cabin appeared up ahead in a clearing, more trees surrounding it on every side. A large stack of firewood sat beneath the slanted roof of the lean-to. The cabin itself was small, but cosy. It had been too long since he’d made this trip.

  “We’re here,” he murmured gently to Sierra. She came awake with a startled intake of breath. She blinked, warm and sleepy-looking. His heart did an odd flip at the sight. He wanted to stroke her cheek, run his fingers through her hair, pull her towards him for a soft kiss.

  “Where is here?” she asked groggily, rubbing her eyes as the last word trailed off into a yawn.

  “A place I stay sometimes,” he replied. He chose not to elaborate. “Let’s get you inside.”

  Blake opened the car door and the shock of the cold night air restored some of his senses. He had to remember that this was not a romantic trip. He had to keep this strictly professional.

  He hauled both their bags out the back of the car and made his way to the front door. Sierra followed just behind, and he made sure to adjust his long stride so she could keep up. The cold moonlight gave enough illumination for them to move confidently in the night.

  Blake dumped the bags at the doorstep with a dull thump.