by K. M. Scott
Two hours later, he had finally stopped pacing and crawled into bed next to her. She got no sense that any of the feelings he’d shown her in the last bed they shared existed anymore as he silently turned his back to her.
Her heart ached to hear him say anything kind to her again. He lay there so close to her, and yet it felt like a chasm that couldn’t be bridged stood between them. Just like before, he’d pushed her away, but this time, she wouldn’t wait around for him to find his way back to her.
She listened for a sign that he’d fallen asleep and heard his breathing grow heavy. After a few minutes, she knew it was time and gingerly slid out of the bed, careful not to make any noise that could alert him to her intentions.
Tiptoeing around the room, she grabbed the laptop and then searched for Roman’s pants to get her phone. She spied them on the end of the bed near his feet and knew she couldn’t just reach into the pocket and grab them without risking waking him.
Frozen there at the foot of the bed, she stared at the covers for any hint that he may have awakened. When they didn’t move, she carefully slid her hand into the front pocket of his pants and grabbed a hold of her phone to pull it out.
Now that she had all she needed, she looked across the room to see her purse. Once she had that, she’d be free to leave. For a moment, she turned back toward where Roman slept and let herself remember how much she loved being with him. It wasn’t just the sex, either.
That had been incredible, for sure, but as much as she’d miss that with him, she’d also miss that honorable streak that ran a mile wide in Roman. She’d never had a hero in her life, and now that she had to leave him behind, she knew she’d miss that part of him the most because it was what made him truly a good man.
And men like Roman were hard to find.
Kate couldn’t think about that now, though. She’d already let her feelings dictate too much of what she’d done since running away from Eve that night. The time had come to take care of herself and not rely on anyone, including the man who lay in the bed in front of her.
Even if she’d fallen in love with him.
Never before in her life had she regretted something even before she did it, but as she watched him lying there in front of her, she already knew she’d regret leaving him. It didn’t matter, though. They were both better off apart.
Now all she had to do was convince herself of that.
With one final glance at him, she turned and tiptoed toward the door. She didn’t know exactly where she would go, but it was better this way for both of them.
“Why do you have a death wish, Kate?”
At the sound of his deep voice, she stopped and looked back at him. “It’s better that I do things alone.”
Chapter Nineteen
Roman wondered if he should just let her leave since she clearly didn’t want him around, but he couldn’t do that. Protecting Kate was his mission, but even more than that, he cared about her. He hadn’t cared for anyone like this in a long time.
Even more, he liked the feeling and didn’t want to be without it in his life any longer.
He got out of bed and walked over to where she stood clutching the laptop and phone he’d taken off her earlier. Looking down into her beautiful face, he shook his head and put his hands on her shoulders.
“I can’t let you do this on your own, Kate.”
She turned away so she didn’t have to face him. “Whatever you guys are, you aren’t expected to be my savior. You got me this far. You can tell your boss you did good.”
He slid his arms around her, and when she refused to look up at him, he said, “Kate, I want to say something. Look at me.”
She slowly lifted her head, and he said, “I can’t let you do this on your own because I care about you. I can’t stand the thought of you getting hurt.”
Her eyes grew wide, and then she narrowed them as a look of confusion came over her. “Are you supposed to feel that way about the people you help?”
Shaking his head, he quietly said, “No.”
“Then why?”
He kissed her to stop her from asking any more questions. At that moment, he didn’t want to think about anything but how good her lips felt against his. For the first time in too long, he felt something for a woman, and he didn’t want to lose that.
To lose her.
Pressing his forehead to hers, he admitted the truth. “Because even in this shitty motel room, I’ve never been happier anywhere else in the world and that’s because I’m with you.”
“Really?”
“Really. So I don’t have a choice. If you go, I go. So if you’re planning to leave now, you need to know I’m right beside you.”
She smiled and sat down on the bed. “I guess there’s no point in leaving then. Might as well stay in this luxurious suite we have here.”
Roman took a seat next to her, taking the laptop and her phone from her hold. “Might as well.”
Kate turned toward him and took his hands in hers. When she looked up at him, he saw real regret in her eyes.
“I am so sorry, Roman. I didn’t think when I called Eve. It was so stupid, but I never meant to ruin everything.”
He stopped her with a kiss and then whispered against her lips, “No more talk about that. We’re here together. That’s all we need.”
“Even though it’s nothing as nice as your friend’s house?” she asked sheepishly.
That was an understatement. One glance around the tiny, rundown room showed that. He couldn’t hold her mistake against her forever, though.
Kissing her, he pulled her close into his arms. “It’s okay, Kate. As long as the people after us didn’t find out where we went, we should be fine.”
Kate looked up at him and shook her head. “You said that wrong, Roman. They’re not after you. They’re only after me. I know you think this is your job to protect me, but you’ve already done so much. I would understand if you didn’t want to do anything more. I mean, I was just about to leave. No one would blame you.”
The truth of it was it didn’t matter if he didn’t want to do anything more to help her. He had to, and not just because he worked for Project Artemis. He couldn’t just let her go out there where someone could hurt her.
“I’m not going anywhere, so stop trying to push me away because it won’t work.”
With a chuckle, she said, “Says the man who has pushing people away down to a science.”
“Exactly, so I should know. Now let’s get to work and see if we can figure something out where to turn next.”
“Where should we start?” she asked as she sat down on the bed on her side.
“I think we need to figure out how the governor is involved. Your boss felt sure it went all the way up to the top, so that’s where we have to look,” Roman said, sitting down next to her.
“We could head up to Baton Rouge,” she suggested.
It sounded like a long shot to him. “We can’t just walk into the Governor’s Mansion and ask him.”
Kate’s face lit up. “No, but we can go to one of his campaign offices.”
“Why would we find anything there?”
“I don’t know, but if I can get a look on one of the office computers, maybe I’ll find something.”
“How? I can’t imagine they’re not password protected,” Roman said, still skeptical.
She kissed him and smiled. “New Orleans is a very small place when it comes down to it. I just a need a way to call someone, so I’ll be needing my phone back.”
Roman shook his head. “No way. Remember it getting traced? Burner phones only from here on out, and I want to know every last detail about who you’re thinking of calling because I can’t imagine this is something I’m going to agree to.”
“Then get me a burner phone so I can make my call.”
“Who are you going to call?”
“You’ll see,” she teased. “You get me that phone and I’ll get us to someone who might be able to help.”
&n
bsp; He shook his head. “We’re in this together, Kate. I need to know everything if I’m going to be able to protect you.”
She smiled sweetly and nodded. “Okay. I want to call someone named Jasper Carrollton. He’s someone I’ve known for years. If anyone can help us, it’s Jasper. He travels in circles up and down the social ladder of this city. I’ve known him forever. I would trust him with my life.”
Roman didn’t know how he felt about this Jasper person. Bringing anyone else into what they were already involved in didn’t sound like the best plan. Then again, they needed something to make some headway on this case.
“Okay,” he said as he moved to leave. “Give me a few minutes to go buy a burner phone.”
Kate reached out and tugged his hand to bring him back to the bed. “But first, maybe you should stay here for a little while.”
He had an idea what she meant and liked the way she thought.
“It might be better if I stay out of sight for a few hours anyway. The cop might still be out looking for us,” he said with a smile.
Lying back onto the pillow, she looked up at him with need in her eyes. “Then you definitely should stay here for a while.”
The way she looked so sexy and beautiful and wanting him made him forget how awful that tiny motel room was. He crawled into bed and kissed her with all the need he felt for her. When he saw her standing there planning to leave, all he could think of was how much he couldn’t let her go. She might get hurt, but even if she was able to take care of herself, he didn’t want to lose her from his life.
He hadn’t let himself feel this way about a woman since before he left for basic all those years ago. Then he’d been so young and naïve about life and the world. He believed in the concept of love and when he asked Emily to marry him, he thought his life had been planned and they’d live happily ever after.
That’s how it was supposed to be. Then events beyond his control took over and ruined his perfect life. The woman he thought he’d spend the rest of his days with was gone, and suddenly he had no one but himself to rely on.
At first, he saw being alone as his punishment for not being there for Emily when she needed him most. Then after a while, it became a way of life for him and he couldn’t imagine ever wanting another person to mean that much to him ever again.
The risk was too much. He might lose another woman he loved again, and he simply refused to let that happen.
So he remained alone.
Life in the service made it almost easy to never put down roots or let someone in. He could always justify not settling down by reminding himself of the danger he lived with every day. Better to be alone than leave a woman who loved him a widow to grieve him.
By the time he left the Army, being single had become a part of him. It was just who he was. Or more correctly, who he’d become over the years.
But the need to protect those who needed his help had remained and become a central piece of his personality, so when Nick offered him the chance to join Project Artemis, he didn’t think twice. Whatever he doubted about Persephone Gilmore’s desire to spend her millions on the idea, he never questioned how important that goal was and how much he believed in it.
He threw himself into each assignment he received, and as he had in the Army, he excelled. Not having ties served him well as it always had, but every so often he wondered how it would feel to have someone to love again. Protecting someone was one thing, but loving them was completely different.
That never happened in any assignment before he met Kate. Maybe it was because he never let himself fall for anyone, or maybe because he kept clients at arm’s length and they couldn’t imagine him as someone who could care for them like a man in love.
He could, though. No matter how far down he pushed the desire to love another woman, it always existed inside him. He acknowledged it sometimes when he lay in bed alone staring into the darkness of wherever he stayed. That recognition that he still secretly hoped that someday he would meet a woman who could love what he’d become after all that time didn’t change the fact that he simply didn’t believe he should let another one in.
Then Kate came into his life and all those reasons he had told himself over the years began to sound like excuses to not let himself be happy. He fought against letting those reasons go because they’d been part of him for so long that they were who he was.
How she broke through a wall he thought had become impenetrable he had no idea, but she had. Slowly at first, knocking a hole in it here and taking a few blocks down there. And then, without warning, that wall came tumbling down, leaving his heart exposed for the first time since Emily’s death.
Now he couldn’t imagine life without Kate. He didn’t want to either. Just as everyone had warned him, it took the right woman and he fell head over heels before he knew what happened. He’d never believed them, never believed it could happen to him because he’d always made sure it couldn’t.
Or at least he thought he had. He wasn’t sure of much of anything anymore since he met Kate, other than he didn’t want to live without what she made him feel ever again. And he’d do whatever it took to keep that in his life.
He watched her as she curled up next to him, her naked body pressed to his, fitting like she was made just for him. Wrapping his arms around her, he held her close and closed his eyes. That burner phone could wait a little while longer.
For now, all he needed in this world he had right there.
Chapter Twenty
Just as she finished dressing from her shower, Kate heard the door to the motel room open. Peeking her head out, she saw Roman walk in and toss a bag on the bed.
“I’ll be right out,” she called from the bathroom as she tried to make her hair look at least presentable.
This whole living on the run lifestyle did nothing for her look. Clearly, she wasn’t a ride or die type of chick.
Staring into the mirror, she mumbled, “You’re more of a can we stay somewhere nice chick.”
Her hair had decided that flat with a dash of frizzy would be the way she’d look that day, and it didn’t matter how much she tried to give it some volume. Nope, it would just stay like it was, so no point in fussing with it any more.
She found Roman sitting on the bed with the phone in his hand as he activated the burner cell. She’d never seen this before, just like she’d never been on the run from the law before, so she watched intently.
Looking over his shoulder, she asked, “So who were you when you bought this? Roman or that other name?”
“Michael Trenton,” he said flatly, as if she should know that name.
“Who’s that? Another one of your aliases?”
He handed her the phone and nodded. “Yeah. That’s one of my names. Here you go.”
“At the rate we’re going, you’re going to go through all your names by the time this is over,” she joked as he stood up to open a can of soda he’d brought back from the store.
Turning to face her, he smiled and shrugged. “No worry. I have a lot more. We’d have to be on the run for years to go through all of them.”
That statement right there made her more curious about him than anything else he’d told her about his job or his life, but she didn’t bother to ask him about it. Maybe later or when they were finally safe. For right now, she had to call Jasper.
One of her oldest friends, she felt certain they could rely on him to help them and keep it all quiet. She just hoped he was back in the city.
“I’m going to need my old phone to find the number.”
She watched for any sign that Roman still didn’t trust her, but he handed her the phone without a second thought or a single word. Scrolling through her list of contacts, she found the one she wanted and typed the number into the burner phone.
Jasper Carrollton. She’d known him since middle school, and they’d been friends from the first day he sat down at her table in the cafeteria and asked her if she wanted to be friends. After a few seconds of star
ing at him, she’d said yes. The rest, as they say, was history. If anyone could get her into the governor’s campaign office, it was Jasper. He knew everyone, mostly because he’d slept with so many people, male and female.
In matters of love and lust, Jasper didn’t discriminate.
On the second ring, he answered in his heavy southern drawl and she said, “Hey, Jasper! It’s Kate. I need your help with something.”
“Katybird! Baby girl, that’s no way to begin a proper conversation. Don’t I at least warrant a how do you do, Jasper?”
“I’m sorry. I’m a little distracted today, so I forgot my manners. How’ve you been, Jasper?”
“I’m fine, as always. Thanks for asking. I’ve been out of town for a couple weeks and just got back home this morning. What did I miss that got you into trouble?”
“How do you know I’m in trouble?” she asked.
With a chuckle, he answered, “Let’s just say I know you, Katybird. So what do you need?”
“I need you to promise you won’t breathe a word of this to another living soul.”
He inhaled sharply, like what she said surprised him. “I can’t believe you would even say that. You know me. I’m a vault. I think I’m insulted.”
“Okay. I need to get into someone’s office. The governor’s campaign office downtown. Tonight.”
Kate waited a moment before continuing. “And I need to get into one of the computers.”
Jasper didn’t say anything at first, and she wondered if he’d had some religious conversion or something while he was gone from town. Normally, he’d be perfectly fine with helping her on something like this.
“Interesting. Okay, give me a few hours and come by my house tonight at ten. I’ll have what you need by then.”
Relieved, she let out a big sigh. “Thanks, Jasper. I’m going to owe you huge.”
“I’ll add you to the list of people I can blackmail. It’s a pretty prestigious group, so you should be honored.”
“I love you. Thanks! I’ll see you at ten. And Jasper?”