Cap chuckled and nodded for the door. “Conference room, thirty minutes.”
I walked over to Knight, who was preparing for his next training session and cleared my throat. “Thanks, for helping me.”
He shrugged like it was no big deal. “I knew you could do it.”
“But I didn’t. I really thought that this would haunt me forever and because of you believing in me and trying your less than orthodox practices on me…” He raised an eyebrow in challenge. “I finally feel like I can work past my issues and move forward.”
He nodded, not saying anything else and I walked away. Knight wasn’t exactly the touchy feely type and I hadn’t really expected him to say anything, so I was shocked when he grabbed onto my arm and pulled me back into him, giving me a tight squeeze before pushing me away and glaring at me.
I quickly showered and headed up to the conference room. The rush of the fight was still thrumming through my body, but I felt more confident than I had in a long time and nothing would stop me now.
After getting our assignment, we loaded up the Reed Security SUV and headed out for our three hour drive to our protection detail. It was at least a week long trip, so we swung by our houses and packed our bags. Derek was driving and I was sitting up front. Hunter leaned over the back seat and tapped me on the shoulder.
“So, this thing with Ryan, is it serious?”
“What?”
“Cap told us about you going to help him out the other day.”
“He did, huh?”
I didn’t picture Cap just going and running his mouth about someone else. It just wasn’t his style.
“Yeah, well, I kind of tricked him into telling me what was going on. You know, when you rushed out of the building, it just had me wondering. So, I pestered him until he told me what was going on.”
I nodded. That sounded a whole lot more like what had really happened.
“So? Are you going to tell me?”
“Tell you what?”
Hunter growled in frustration and pushed back in his seat. “Fine, don’t tell me.”
“Why do you even care? You’re engaged to Lucy.”
“Because, if this is just some casual thing, then it’s none of my business. But if this is more serious, then I need to go have a talk with that fucker.”
I turned around in my seat and glared at him. “Okay, first of all, this is none of your business no matter what. Second of all, Ryan is one of the most decent men I’ve ever known and he sure as hell isn’t a manwhore like you.”
“That’s not what I’ve heard,” he grumbled.
“His wife died. I think he’s allowed to do whatever the hell he wants if it makes him feel better.”
“Not with you,” Hunter said firmly.
I turned to Derek. “Are you this concerned about my relationship with Ryan?”
“Not really,” he shrugged. I turned back to Hunter.
“I think this has more to do with the fact that we slept together than anything. You know that you don’t have to protect me like some big brother, right?”
He just stared at me for a moment. “I’m pretty sure that no big brother would do the things that I have to you. I know that you’re a big girl and you can take care of yourself, but I still care about you and I want to make sure that he doesn’t fuck you over.”
I grinned. “Believe me, he fucks me over good.”
✯✯✯✯✯
After a week away on the job, I was ready to see Ryan again. I was torn because I was so happy to be back to work, but whatever this was with Ryan was the first positive relationship I’d had in years. Even his son seemed pretty cool, and while I wasn’t the least bit interested in being a parental figure, it was still early enough that I could see where this went. Besides, the kid was almost sixteen. At the pace Ryan and I were moving, the kid would be off at college before we really took things too seriously.
We had unloaded the SUVs and were ready to head home, but it wasn’t unusual for us to stand around bullshitting for a few minutes before we hit the road.
“Oh, damn.” Derek was looking at his phone and grinning.
“What?” Hunter asked.
“It’s just Claire. She’s been missing me.”
Hunter groaned and grimaced as he caught sight of the photo on Derek’s phone. “Dude, you two are so fucking weird. Why do you keep showing me that shit?”
“I didn’t show you anything. This is just what we’ll be doing later tonight.”
“What will you be doing?” I was suddenly very curious about this. I had heard a little about Derek and Claire’s extracurricular activities, but I hadn’t heard first hand.
“We’re going to a cabin in the mountains for the weekend.”
“Well, that sounds…not at all like you.”
Derek grinned. “It’s all Claire. She wants a mountain man to come rescue her.”
“Wait, what happened to the whole bad boy thing she wanted to try?” Hunter asked.
“Well, after what happened with the Night Kings, it kind of ruined the fantasy a little for her.”
“So, where did she get mountain men from?”
“A book she was reading. Ideally, there would be a blizzard and we would be stranded up there together, but since it’s not snowing, we’ll just have to improvise.”
“Do you guys ever think of having, you know, normal sex?” I asked.
“We do occasionally, but this is fun. Besides, you should have heard the last thing she wanted to try. Voyeurism.”
“What the hell is that?” I asked.
“It’s when you get off watching other people get off.”
“And she wanted to watch?” Hunter asked incredulously.
“You know, I’m not sure if she wanted to watch or have others watch us. Either way, that’s just not something I’m into.”
“Well, sorry to be boring, but I’m just going home and fucking Lucy the old fashioned way. Hard and fast.”
“What about you, Lola? Do you have plans with Ryan tonight?”
I shrugged, trying to play it cool. I didn’t want them to know how much I liked spending time with Ryan. Then they would start ragging on me all the time. “I don’t know. It’s not like we make plans a whole lot.”
“So, this is a booty call situation,” Hunter said reproachfully.
“Hey, what I do with Ryan is none of your business. We’ve already talked about this.”
“Yeah, yeah,” he grumbled. “Alright, I’m heading home. Have fun with whatever you’re doing.”
He turned and headed for his truck and I barely heard Derek talking to me and wishing me a good weekend. My mind was firmly set on Ryan and getting to him as fast as possible. I thought about heading right out to his house, but I wasn’t sure we were really at the stage in our relationship where drop ins were okay. Instead, I went home and showered, taking my time on calling him. I didn’t want to seem too eager.
This was ridiculous. Why was I acting this way? I was an adult. I could call him and let him know I was back from my trip. If he wanted to see me, he would say so. Brushing off my girly idiocy that was so unlike me, I dialed his number and waited for him to pick up.
“Hey, Lola. How’s it going?”
“Good. I just got in a few hours ago.”
“Everything went well?”
“Yeah, it was a pretty simple job. What are you doing tonight?”
“Um, James is going to his grandparent’s house for the weekend. Do you want to come over in maybe an hour?”
“Yeah, that sounds great. Should I bring anything?”
“You mean like lingerie?” Ryan asked in a husky voice.
“I meant like food. I don’t do the whole girly shit lingerie crap. What you see is what you get.”
“Hey, I’m not complaining.”
“So, food,” I said, grinning into the phone.
“Food, sorry. I’m just not really thinking of food at the moment.”
“Okay, well, I’m going to let
you go and I’ll see you soon.”
I needed to get off the phone before I started to talk dirty to him. His son was still there.
“I’ve got dinner covered. See you in an hour.” He hung up and I bit my lip, trying to stop the smile that was quickly becoming a permanent fixture on my face when I talked to Ryan.
“Stop it,” I scolded myself. “Don’t be such a girl.”
I shook it off and wandered around my house, trying to do anything to distract myself from thoughts of Ryan until it was time to leave. This was ridiculous. I was not this girl. I was not going to start swooning over a man.
Still, when it was close to time to leave, I couldn’t grab my keys fast enough and head for the door. It took me all of ten minutes to get to his house and before I knew it, he was swinging the door open and pulling me into his arms. My clothes were torn from my body as he shoved me back toward his bedroom. We were barely inside when he was lifting me up and shoving me down on his hard cock. I was so wet for him and there was absolutely no foreplay. I didn’t need it with him for some reason.
It was quick and dirty and completely satisfying. I didn’t like to go slow all the time and drag out sex. Sometimes I just needed to be fucked good and hard. Tonight was one of those nights. And when he shoved me down on the bed and took me from behind, I was ramming my ass back into his hips so that I could get every last centimeter of his cock inside me.
When we finished, I collapsed on the bed, barely able to breathe. He only let me have a short reprieve before he was crawling over me again, fucking me harder than he had the time before.
✯✯✯✯✯
We ate leftovers from his fridge after hours of having sex. I was standing in just his t-shirt and he had on some low hanging pants that had me licking my lips at his sexy V. I knew where that led and I wanted more.
“I see that look in your eyes, Lola, but it’s not gonna happen. My dick needs a break.”
I raised an eyebrow at him. “Having trouble getting it up?”
“Not at all, but we’ve already fucked three times and I need food.”
“Fine,” I pouted.
“So, how’s work going?”
“Work?”
He shrugged. “It’s not the least bit sexual.”
“I don’t know,” I said, walking around the counter. “I work with a lot of big guns.”
He grinned and shook his head. “That’s only sexual for women. Seriously, how’s it going?”
“Good. I’m out in the field again and that’s a relief. I hated being stuck behind a desk. I don’t know what I would have done if Sebastian had kept me from getting back out there.”
“Do you think that could have happened?”
“Possibly. If he thought I was a liability to the team then he would probably offer me something at the office, but I don’t think I could do that. I need some action. I can’t stand the boredom of working in an office all day. No offense.”
“None taken. But I don’t work in an office all day. I’m constantly going and checking up on job sites. Even though I run the business, I still have to make sure that the quality of our work is as it should be.” He started shoving his food around his plate with his fork, frowning like he was thinking about something.
“What?” I asked when he didn’t say anything.
“Nothing. I was just thinking…are your jobs dangerous?”
“Not usually. I mean, there’s always the chance that something will go wrong, but most of our jobs are pretty tame.”
“It just seems like the past few years have been intense. I mean, Sebastian doesn’t really talk about what kind of shit happens at Reed Security, but with what happened with Maggie, it just seems a little crazy.”
“Well, that was a special circumstance. That wasn’t so much about Reed Security as Chris’s ex-girlfriend coming back into the picture.”
“Yeah, but didn’t someone get shot a few years back?”
I could see where this was going and I didn’t want to sugar coat it for him. “Well, we’ve had a few cases that have gotten pretty intense, but they were mostly connected in one big tangled web. It was pretty insane, but when you look at how often something like that happens compared to the number of boring jobs, it’s really not that frequent that something happens.”
He didn’t say anything for a minute and I got worried that he was starting to freak out about the dangers of my job. I knew that it could be difficult for him considering that his wife had died, but since I wasn’t sure what was really happening between us, I hadn’t really thought about it too much.
He picked up his plate and shoved it in the dishwasher. Grabbing my hand, he dragged me back to the bedroom, tossing me down on the bed and stripping me of my t-shirt. The time for talking was over.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Ryan and Lola
RYAN
“Hey, big guy.” Logan strolled into my office with a little too much cheer in his voice.
“Big guy? Do I look that bad?”
“No,” he scoffed. “You look great. Like a million bucks.”
I scratched my forehead as I leaned back in my seat. “Out with it.”
“What do you mean?” He took a seat across from me, his eyes running discreetly over my body, like he was expecting slash marks or something.
“I mean, you’re acting like you need to handle me with kid gloves.”
“Psh. Nah. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Logan, cut the shit and tell me what’s on your mind.”
“Look, I’m just worried about you. I haven’t seen you that bad in a long time and I just want to make sure you’re not going off the deep end.”
“Well, I was really thinking of going and crashing my truck and leaving my kid all alone. You could take him.”
“What? Dude, no. I think after our talk with him about sex, it’s pretty clear I’m not ready for a teenage kid.”
“You don’t have too many more years. How old is Archer again?”
“Eight.”
“Yeah, you know, James was asking questions about his dick when he was ten and I considered him a late bloomer. Face it, you have maybe two more years before you start having to deal with this shit.”
“Whatever. You’re getting me off track here.” Damn, I thought I had evaded him. “Are you okay after what happened?”
“I’m fine.” I sat up and pulled some papers out that I had to go over.
“Because if you need some time off-”
“Logan. I’m fine. I had a moment and that moment passed.”
“I just want to make sure that shit’s okay. You know, you never talk to me about that and you can.”
“You’re right. We should grab a bottle of wine and some chocolate. We can light a fire and I’ll tell you my feelings.”
His face turned hard and he leaned forward in his seat, staring me down. “You don’t have to be an asshole. I’m serious here. You hold all that shit inside and you don’t have to.”
I threw the papers down on my desk and sighed. “Okay, you want to know what’s going on? I took Lola home. We’ve fucked a few times and it’s fucking fantastic. But then she had a little meltdown of her own and she needed some space. So, I took her to my place since James was out of town. She stayed the night and I thought, damn, I could actually move on finally. Then Cassie’s parents showed up and it was a little uncomfortable, but they were all for it. Then, I took James out driving and I came upon the intersection where she was killed and I fucking flipped out. I had a panic attack or something and I lost my shit. It was like I was seeing her in the morgue all over again and it fucking tore my heart out. So, now my head’s a little fucked up because I really want to be able to move on with Lola, but I’m still torn up over Cassie and I don’t know where the hell to go from here. On top of all that, Lola’s back in the field and after all the shit that went down with all of them not too long ago, I’m wondering if I can deal with her job or if it’s going to freak me out.”
I laughed at his humor. Logan always had a way of making me laugh when I needed it most. He was a pain in the ass, but the best friend a guy could ask for.
“You know, it doesn’t have to be one way or the other. You don’t have to stop thinking of Cassie in order to move on with Lola.”
“That’s the thing, Lola told me that I could talk about Cassie with her. You know, she came over after Sebastian told her what happened and she stayed the night with me.”
“You were able to get it up after that?”
“No sex,” I said. “She just sat there with me. I told her about Cassie and I, and it was so great to talk about her again. I’ve been avoiding it because it always kills me, but with her…I don’t know. She didn’t know Cassie. She couldn’t tell me any stories or remind me of times that something happened. And she gets the pain. She lives with things that torment her. I don’t feel like I’m talking to a wall.”
“Is that how you feel with us?” he asked, almost offended.
“No. I’m just saying that it’s different with her. You all knew Cassie. You watched me fall in love with her. This thing with Lola is the one thing in my life that doesn’t have anything to do with Cassie. Even James, it kills me to be with him day in and day out because he’s hers. Not that I don’t want to be his dad. He’s what holds me together most days, but he’s also what makes it so difficult.”
“That makes sense. I mean, he’s a constant reminder of her. You know, you could have told us all this shit a long time ago. You pushed us all away for a year and even when you let us back in, you only really let us in on the anniversary of her death. You’re gonna end up like Drew, talking to imaginary people, if you don’t start to work this shit out.”
“So, what do you suggest I do?”
“Bring her out with us. We’ll get to know her,” he grinned.
“You know she could kick your ass, right? I mean, total beat down, leaving you a bloody mess. She’s a trained killer.”
Lola: A Reed Security Romance (Reed Security Series Book 8) Page 10