The Billionaire's Prize: Taken & Tempted: (Book 3 Billionaire Bodyguard Series)

by Kristi Avalon

  “You know me better after last night.”

  His inference made her furious, and she ended her rant with, “I don’t even have a passport!”

  His expression held genuine empathy. “Don’t worry about the passport. I can pay people to look the other way.”

  Seething, she shoved his hand off her leg. “That’s not the point.”

  Turning at the waist, he faced her. A hard light shone in his eyes. “Fine. Here are your choices. Go back to Las Vegas and face Ramos on your own. Stay in Denver and put everyone around us, including my employees, in danger. Or let me take care of you and keep you safe at a distance.”

  “Isn’t there a fourth option?” she mumbled, curling her fingers around the hem of her skirt.

  “Not that I can see. You find it, you let me know.” Tension rippled from him as he faced the front of the vehicle. “Until then, we do this my way.”

  “The guy has made a career out of this type of thing,” Slone added. She frowned, because he was right. “You’re in good hands, Kylie.”

  Slone’s word as a former U.S. soldier held credibility. So far Cade’s swift actions and quick decisions, not to mention his affluence, had kept her alive. Maybe she shouldn’t be so hard on him. She trusted Cade. She just wasn’t used to relying on anyone, she’d always taken care of herself, and the idea felt foreign and uncomfortable.

  Unfortunately, right now she had no other choice. It was Cade or death. That was a no-brainer. “Sorry. You’re right. I’m not thinking straight.”

  “You just had a bomb explode in your face, and you were the target,” Cade said. His hand returned to her thigh, his warmth melting the ice in her bones. “You’re shaken. It’s normal to feel unsure when things happening around you are beyond your control.”

  It wasn’t normal, not for her. She hated the claws of insecurity digging into her mind, making her question everyone and everything. Including herself.

  She sighed. “When do we leave?”

  *

  The Miami warmth was a welcome contrast to the cool altitude in Denver. Humidity made her tweed jacket stick to her skin. Hot sunlight bathed her face as she strode along the sidewalk toward a boutique clothing store.

  After purchasing two nondescript disposable phones at an outdoor kiosk, Slone had called Cade at the office and then checked himself into a small urgent care center. She had offered to wait with him, but he refused. She’d stayed anyway, until the doctor on staff confirmed his injuries weren’t too severe, he’d live. Slone had appeared highly annoyed by her hovering, handed her the credit card Cade had given him, and told her to go shopping for an hour.

  Conflicted, she’d taken into account his scathing attitude versus her need to find something other than a tattered suit to wear. Finally she’d agreed to go with Slone’s suggestion. She told him she’d be somewhere in the strip of shops next to the urgent care.

  As she walked to the closest boutique, people she passed sent her odd looks. She’d tried to clean herself up during the jet ride to the South Florida coast. Still, she couldn’t hide the scrapes on her knees or the shredded edges of her skirt and sleeves.

  She definitely required a change of clothes. And some time alone to make a very important call.

  Selecting an armful of essentials during a quick walk through the store, she asked the clerk for a dressing room. Inside, she hung the clothes on the hook and dialed Dominique’s number. It took her a minute to remember the digits in the right order using the burner phone.

  “Dominique! It’s Kylie.”

  “Oh, I didn’t expect you to call. How are you?”

  “I’m still alive, amazingly.” She trailed her fingers over the scratches starting to scab on her leg. “Did you hear about the explosion in Denver?”

  “I heard.” Her friend’s voice sounded strange. Detached and formal, unlike her usual vivacious personality.

  “I know it has to do with Bruno Ramos, the man we believe murdered Maria. Did you contact Professor Carlton? Did he give you good advice?”

  “I’ve been advised how to proceed.”

  Kylie held the phone away from her ear and stared at it, wondering if she had dialed the right number. She pressed it to her face again. “Are you okay?”

  “Fine. Everything is under control, nothing to worry about.”

  “I’m always going to worry about you. Whether there’s a threat or not. How’s Jayda?”

  “Happy. Playing.”

  “Oh, that’s good.” Kylie wondered if Dominique was angry because Kylie had left her alone in Vegas with the danger still looming. “I’m sorry for everything,” Kylie murmured. “I tried to take the threat away by leaving. Since the explosion, Cade’s flown me to Miami Beach. We’re about to set sail on a yacht.”

  Muffled sounds came from Dominique’s end. When the noise cleared, the phone held a trace of an echo. “You said you’re leaving on a yacht?”

  Relieved to be able to confide in someone, Kylie said, “We’re around the corner from the Sunset Harbour Yacht Club. The marina is impressive.” And expensive.

  Like everything in Cade’s world.

  She thought of something. “You know who you could contact for advice? The defense attorney I interned with, Skip Deluca. He represents Bruno Ramos. I’ll bet if he learned the reign of terror Ramos is inflicting, he’d drop him as a client. At least Mr. Deluca might know where Ramos is, so you can be better prepared. Just in case.”

  “Mr. Deluca,” Dominique repeated, her voice clipped. “Good thinking. He’s a great guy, respectable, reputable. Just like Roger Webber.”

  Taken aback, Kylie didn’t know how to respond. Roger was Dominique’s ex, who’d gotten her pregnant and left her without a forwarding address and without looking back. What did Roger have to do with anything? “Dominique—”

  “I have to go,” Dominique whispered. “Don’t call back.”

  The line went dead. What the…?

  “Kylie!” The surly bellow belonged to her bodyguard.

  She tucked her burner phone away and walked out of the dressing room. “Over here.”

  “Were you talking to someone?” he asked, narrowing his eyes.

  “No.” She fidgeted with a price tag. “No one important. Just my friend Dominique.”

  He looked furious. “Didn’t Cade tell you to contact people by email? Even a burner phone can be tracked.” He reached out his palm. “Hand it over.”

  Her jaw dropped. “You’re not serious.”

  “Dead serious. Phone. Now.”

  Throwing her shoulders back, she laid into him. “I know you just went through a lot of pain. I know that’s my fault. But you can’t order me around just because Cade isn’t here to do the honors.”

  The dark flash in his eyes sent a shiver up her spine. She took a step back. His expression told her arguing was futile. He wasn’t going to let her win this one. “Fine.” She slapped it in his palm. “When do I get it back?”

  “When we’re out on the ocean. Harder to trace.”

  She peered at him. “Were you bullied as a kid?”

  He arched an eyebrow, and the corner of his mouth quirked. “What do you think?”

  “I guess not, but that would explain a few things.”

  His eyebrow dropped. “What things?”

  “Never mind.” She rolled her eyes and went to the counter to pay for the clothes she hadn’t tried on, figuring she couldn’t go wrong with size Large. On the way she grabbed a pair of size seven sandals, a pair of sunglasses, and charged the entire purchase to Cade’s credit card. Then she and Slone walked to the marina.

  As they approached the slips crammed with elaborate yachts of all shapes and sizes, she watched the sunlight dance on the tips of the waves, smelled the brine in the wind. Despite the concern weighing on her mind, a pleasant memory sprang up. Daddy had taken her and Linds to the California coast three times, each time more special than the last. He’d let his daughters bury him in the sand and pour buckets of water on his head. F
ollowed by their girlish squeals of delight and Daddy’s rich laughter. They’d created sandcastles that slid away with the tide, and happy memories that would never fade. She recalled the shapes of their footprints side by side, his so large compared to hers. She had believed nothing could defeat him.

  But even the strongest of hearts, once broken, never quite healed completely. She swallowed hard, gazing out at the pier.

  A lone figure caught her attention. He stood with his hands in his pockets, hips tilted in a thoughtful stance, staring at the horizon. Like a lion surveying his Savannah. His posture and the slant of his chin told the world he owned the future he gazed at, everything he desired within reach if he stretched out his hand to claim it. The salty breeze tossed his sun-kissed hair and the sunshine reflected off the glossy threads of his fine suit.

  It could only be Cade.

  Except she hadn’t expected him to arrive so soon.

  She sighed. He was so pretty to look at, even nicer to touch. But she’d seen what happens when a heart breaks all the way through. If she let him, Cade would do that to her. Even if he didn’t mean to, the attraction she felt for him could easily turn into something deeper. For her.

  When it came to his sex life and partners, he seemed like a no strings attached kind of guy. He had anything in the world—any woman he wanted—at his fingertips. She had no illusions, no doubt that if they slept together it would mean more to her than it would to him.

  Then she’d go back to Nevada and he’d move on to his next conquest. Not because he was callous, but because that’s what men like Cade did. Men like her mother’s husband. Even though Kylie knew in her soul Cade would never hurt her physically, her emotions were a different story. In her vulnerable position, dependent on him to keep her safe, she needed to separate her desires from her ability to act on them.

  Last night Cade had invited her to explore a sexual relationship with him. But just because she could didn’t mean she should.

  Why did men always complicate things?

  Slone went up to Cade. “We need to leave stat. Kylie used the burner to call her friend in Vegas.”

  Case in point, she groaned inwardly. “You said it couldn’t be traced,” she reminded Cade.

  “Makes it harder,” Cade said, “but not impossible.”

  “Traced is different than tracked.” Slone headed down the dock. “You have no idea how easy it is to track a person through a cell phone.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t want to know why you know that.”

  Slone shrugged. “Probably not.”

  “I thought bodyguards are supposed to be seen and not heard,” she called after him.

  “Usually,” Slone said.

  She turned to Cade. “Of course I get stuck with the exception.”

  “He just cares about you.” Cade fixed the ruffle on the front of her suit coat. “So do I.” Then he took the bag from her hand and walked her down the private dock bordering two yachts. He peeked inside the bag. “Change of clothes?”

  “And shades.” She ripped the tag off her new sunglasses and slid them on in place of her glasses. Her regular glasses corrected distance vision, and at the moment blocking sun glare was more pressing than seeing the far end of the pier.

  Cade grinned. “Hey there, rock star.”

  “This was the best pair they had. You should’ve seen the others.” She wasn’t thrilled with the fake pink gemstones on the tortoise shell rims, either, but they did the job.

  “I stopped by the house to pack some clothes for this trip. You didn’t need to buy anything.”

  “Oh.” She hadn’t expected that. “How did you have time…?”

  The sequence of events from that morning ricocheted through her mind. The explosion. Visions of black smoke. The stinging rain from shards of glass. Fire engulfing the limo. People screaming and running. The thrum of fear in her veins.

  “Kylie?”

  Between reliving the scene and experiencing the terror all over again, her logical side kicked in as a coping mechanism. Procedural law sprang to the forefront.

  She gasped. “Cade, I never gave my statement to police.”

  Pausing next to her, his eyebrows drew together. “That was the point. To get you out of there before anyone linked the bomb to you.”

  “But that’s illegal! I can’t flee the scene of a crime and then flee the country.” She started trembling. “They could send me to jail. I’ll have a criminal record. They’ll ban me from ever working in a law office. Oh, God, we have to go back.”

  “Sweetheart, calm down.” Cade gripped her shoulder with a steadying touch, his voice smooth and even. “No one will link you to the scene.”

  “What about the cameras?” she demanded, dangerously close to a meltdown. “You said there were dozens at your building. The police will see me on the video footage.” She saw her career flash before her eyes then swirl into a black hole created by Bruno Ramos.

  “No, they won’t.”

  “Of course they will! Surveillance cameras are everywhere, at intersections, on storefronts—”

  “I took care of it.”

  “How could you erase all that evidence?”

  He offered a reassuring smile. “Cash and connections, baby. I made some calls, sent some of my guys to collect footage before the police got to it. Positioned a few people to give eyewitness accounts that don’t involve you. Gave the limo driver the story he’s going to tell police when they question him at the hospital.” He nodded. “All taken care of.”

  Though relief leveled the worst of her worries, her conscience balked. “Money doesn’t make you above the law.”

  Or did it?

  A gut-wrenching realization crippled her. If Cade made all that evidence disappear, had her mother’s husband done the same thing? No wonder…

  In all these years Kylie had collected so little proof linking that man to her mother’s death. Now she knew why. That man had the motive, the money, and the means to dispose of her mother like last week’s garbage. Without even getting his hands dirty. A sickening sensation swelled in her throat.

  “Talk to me.” Cade leaned his forehead close to hers, blocking the harsh rays of the sun. “What’s going through your head, sweetheart?”

  A little dizzy, she released the breath she was holding. “I had no idea you could do that. Make things go away because they’re inconvenient. I thought justice worked, but I was wrong.”

  “Hey. It’s not like that.” He slid a hand into her hair, angling her chin up to him. The sun struck her face and her eyes watered. “Think about what would’ve happened if you’d stayed at the scene. The police would’ve launched an investigation with you as the star witness. We’ve seen what Ramos does to witnesses who go up against him.”

  Unsteady, she held onto his wrist, held onto the truth wrapped in an ugly disguise. A truth Cade’s father had learned too late.

  “You’d be mired in legal red tape with no way out. No escape from his constant threat. The police might offer some assistance, but they can’t defend you against a guy like Ramos. You’d be an easy target.” He sighed. “I did this to protect you, Kylie. Not because I think I’m above the law.”

  Torn between regret and gratitude, she nodded. She also needed to rethink her strategy for going after her mother’s husband, but that would come later.

  “I did say stat, right?” Slone’s voice carried to them from the yacht’s second floor balcony.

  “You did,” Cade acknowledged. He slid his hand down her back. “Ready?”

  Nodding, she turned to the bridge plank.

  Once onboard, Cade gave the bag with Kylie’s purchases to the deckhand, Antonio, who introduced himself to Kylie. The young man welcomed her aboard.

  Cade had already met him thirty minutes ago when he’d arrived with their luggage and confirmed their destination with the yacht captain. A small crew for a yacht this size, totaling four crewmembers plus the captain, but the fewer people who knew about this trip the better.


  They had at least two days of travel ahead, covering 1,200 miles at 15 knots before they reached St. Thomas Island. He didn’t need any surprises. Or fallout resulting from Kylie’s phone call to her friend back home.

  But why did she call her friend instead of family?

  Curiosity heightened, he went in search of her. First he checked the bedrooms on the main deck in the owner’s quarters, figuring she’d want to change out of her cold weather suit into lighter clothing. He knocked and entered the room where Antonio had hung her clothes in the closet hidden behind sleek walnut panels. He found her suit and beige shirt folded neatly at the end of the bed, and the empty boutique bag, but no Kylie.

  “Huh.”

  Then he checked his bedroom three feet away. A hot fantasy rose in his mind, and as he opened the door he imagined seeing Kylie lounging naked on his sheets. Her honey-brown hair spread across his pillow. Her curvy body bared for him. Her unforgettable breasts taunting him. The scent of her need heavy like dew in the air. One finger beckoning him.

  Damn, I want you. Instantly he was hard. He wanted to dive onto the bed, wrap her thighs around his shoulders, lower his mouth, and go down on her. For the next two days.

  But he found his bedroom empty, too. He groaned in disappointment.

  The yacht wasn’t that big with only four tiers. How could he lose her in the first ten minutes? He made a necessary adjustment in the crotch of his pants, slid out of his suit jacket, and rolled his shirtsleeves back on his forearms.

  Then he continued the hunt.

  Leaving the two bedroom owner’s suite, he entered the rest of the living area on the main deck. The compact yet fully appointed kitchen sat opposite a glass-topped dining table and eight chairs. Fitting since the yacht slept eight—four in the owner’s suites, four in the guest staterooms on the lower deck. Fourteen if he included the crew’s quarters. He passed the bar lined with stools straddling the center of the main deck. He paused at the edge of the living room, amidst the u-shaped couch and four leather chairs, watching out the windows as the Miami coast became a gray blur in the distance. Unless she was hiding behind a plant or swimming in the saltwater aquarium embedded in the wall, Kylie wasn’t on this level.