Protecting His Beautiful Lover: Southern Soldiers of Fortune Book Three

by North, Leslie

  “Hey, I was just kidding,” she said, trailing after him.

  “I know,” he said, his thumbs flying over the screen again. “Why don’t you go on to bed? I’ll be in in a minute.”

  “Oh.” She walked to the other end of the sofa and perched on the arm. “I can stay up with you. Maybe we can talk some more.”

  He glanced at her then, his expression remote. Gone was the heat in his eyes from moments before, replaced with a cold stare. Polite, but chilly. Her heart sank, along with her hopes for them working through all this together. Yeah. Something was definitely wrong and she didn’t know what. Nor did she know how to fix it. All Tara knew was that Clint had more important things to deal with than her. He’d made that abundantly clear just now, and damn if she wasn’t right back to feeling like she wasn’t a priority at all. Same as she had growing up.

  Then he looked away again and shook his head. “You go on. Have a nice bath. Relax. I’ve got work to do tonight before I sleep. Need to keep you safe.”

  Resigned, she got up and headed for the bedroom, stopping at the end of the hall and looking back to where he sat in the living room, laptop out now too on the coffee table. She’d never felt more alone or rejected in her life. Over her shoulder she said, “Don’t work too hard.”

  No response.

  Tara doubted he’d even heard her. She shuffled down the hall, feeling totally isolated and defeated. Clint might be able to protect her physically from whoever was trying to stop the legislation from passing, but she feared it was already too late to keep her heart safe from him. And in the end, he might just hurt her far more than any unknown attacker.

  17

  Unfortunately, the next day proved even more frustrating for Tara than the night before. She’d fallen asleep way before he’d come to bed and he’d been gone when she woke up. He’d left a note, saying he was going into the office and to have a good day.

  So she was trying to do just that, but it wasn’t easy. Especially given the fact that her own employer seemed determined to side-line her even more.

  Then there was the fact that since they’d moved into her place, she’d gradually become more and more Ashley’s caretaker. She liked Ashley and all and didn’t mind helping out, but she had a life and work of her own to do and it felt like Clint was using her as a free babysitter sometimes.

  “When can we go outside?” Ashley whined for what felt like the umpteenth time from the kitchen table where she was coloring. “I want to ride my bike again.”

  Tara sighed and rolled her neck, glancing at the little girl from over the top of her computer. She’d been working from the sofa all morning, which was probably her first mistake. The thing was comfy with its overstuffed cushions and great for lounging. Not so good for keeping your posture aligned when working. She winced slightly as she unfolded her half-asleep legs from under her and set her computer aside to stretch.

  Considering she was only making herself more frustrated by sitting there and butting heads with the Go Green Energy board of directors or waiting for their email responses that never seemed to come, maybe a break was in order. She looked out the window at the bright sunny day and blue sky for miles, then stood. “All right, kiddo. Let’s do it. Go put on your shoes.”

  “Yay!” Ashley bounded off down the hall and Tara shook her head, smiling. She really was a good girl. Smart too. She slid her feet into her own shoes and waited by the door for Ashley to return. “Got your helmet?”

  “Darn.” The little girl ran back to her room and came back with the bright pink helmet on her head. “Ready!”

  They walked out into the warm midday and Tara took a deep breath. Blue sky for miles, and it helped to bolster her spirits and restore her faith that everything might work out okay.

  Ashley wheeled her bike around from the garage where it was stored and climbed on. She’d been riding for about a week now with the training wheels, and was doing well and building her confidence. Tara stood by and watched the little girl pedal back and forth around the patio, her mind returning to the problem with the legislation.

  Even though Clint hadn’t said much about his meeting with Bartlet the day before, other than mentioning the lead about John Berger, she couldn’t help wondering if Bartlet wasn’t part of the reason why GGE was withdrawing support from the bill during these last, crucial days before the vote. It made sense, considering his business had a vested interest in making sure the legislation went nowhere. If Clint didn’t want to include her in his investigations, maybe she’d just do some snooping on her own. A girl had to be proactive, after all.

  And speaking of proactive…

  “Hey, Ashley,” she called, walking over to where the little girl had stopped to take a break. “How’d you like to try riding on your own for once?”

  Ashley blinked up at her, her eyes wide and uncertain. “You mean without the training wheels?”

  “Yep.” Tara crouched beside the bike and smiled. “You’ll never know you’re ready unless you try, right? And you’ve gotten really good at riding the past few days. What do you say?”

  The little girl seemed to consider it a moment, then gave a solemn nod. “If you think I can do it, then yeah. Let’s try it!”

  Tara grinned and straightened to set aside the tools she’d used to remove the training wheels from the bike. “Okay. Now don’t think about it. Just ride like you have been and you’ll be fine, okay?”

  “Okay.” Ashley’s smile faded into determination. “You’ll stay with me though, right? Catch me if I fall?”

  “I’ll be right here. Promise.” She placed her hand over her heart. “You can do it!”

  Small shoulders squared, Ashley stared straight ahead and began to pedal. Tara followed behind her, ready to assist if needed, but it wasn’t necessary. Ashley made it to the end of the patio and turned to come back toward the house all on her own. Pride swelled inside Tara and she couldn’t keep from cheering.

  “Yes! You go girl!” Tara clapped and jumped up and down. “That’s it! Go a little faster, it’ll make it easier to keep your balance. There you go. Yes. Just like that. Watch out for the crack there. Be careful!”

  She’d no sooner said the words than Ashley wobbled slightly, the bike’s front tire going crooked as it dipped into a rut in the concrete. Before Tara could grab the rear of the thing, it toppled over, sending Ashley crashing to the ground.

  For a moment, the little girl looked as stunned as Tara felt, but then she sat up and noticed the scrape on her knee and the slight amount of blood welling on it and wailed. “You said you’d catch me but you didn’t!”

  “Oh God, honey. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry!” Tara raced to her side and gathered her up in her arms, the fallen bike left behind, forgotten. “Shush. Shhh. It’ll be okay.”

  She carried the little girl inside and set her down on the sofa in the living room, her heart aching.

  “Why did you let me fall?” Ashley said, between hiccupping sobs. “You were supposed to be there.”

  “I know, sweetie,” Tara said, wiping away Ashley’s tears, then cupping her cheeks. “And I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry. It’s my fault. I should’ve paid closer attention. I shouldn’t have taken off your training wheels so soon.”

  Tara pulled the little girl back into her arms and let her cry it out, feeling awful. She’d pushed too hard, too fast, just like her own mother used to do to her. She’d put her own needs ahead of Ashley’s. She’d not made her a priority. God. What an idiot. She of all people should’ve known better.

  Once Ashley quieted, she pulled back and gave Tara a teary look. “My knee hurts.”

  “I know, honey. Sit here a minute, let me run to the bathroom and get the first aid kit. We’ll get you all patched up, then how about we work on a new social media campaign. Would you like that?”

  Ashley gave her a shaky nod, then buried her face in the sofa cushions.

  Feeling about two inches tall, Tara went and grabbed the first-aid kit and got Ashley’s knee cleaned
and bandaged, then went back out to put the bike away before returning to the house. It took some effort, but she managed to put aside her guilt and focus on Ashley and making her happy again.

  “What theme should we focus on today?” Tara asked, getting out her camera equipment and setting it up near the windows for the best light. “More rainbows? Or something new? I saw the hydrangeas are blooming outside. Maybe we can cut some of those and do a flower motif?”

  Ashley seemed to consider this, then said, “Both! Flowers and rainbows!”

  Glad to see her excited again, Tara grinned. “Both it is. How about you work on the backgrounds again, and I’ll go collect some flowers for our shoot.”

  “Sounds good!” Ashley ran back to her bedroom for her art supplies.

  Tara went back out front and cut several bouquets of flowers from the bushes in front of the porch. The previous owners had done a great job with the landscaping, putting in these gorgeous hydrangea bushes in various shades of pink and blue and white. She took some of each color and returned inside to find Ashley had created more vivid backgrounds for them to use.

  Together, they set up several different motifs for Tara to shoot and by the end of the afternoon, Tara had uploaded them all to her social media account. She and Ashley crashed back on the sofa to watch as the reactions poured in.

  “Look!” Ashley pointed to the computer screen. “That’s a good number, right?”

  Yep. It was. Tara’s pulse sped as the number of likes kept rising exponentially. Seemed people really loved their bright, upbeat content, and soon the new posts had gone viral. They got so wrapped up in watching the likes increase that they barely noticed when Clint walked in later.

  “Hey,” he said, tossing his keys on the side table and bending down to kiss the top of Ashley’s head, then Tara’s lips. “How are my girls doing today?”

  “Good, Daddy!” Ashley squealed, pointing at the laptop screen. “Look! We went viral again!”

  “Wow.” Clint leaned in closer, sending Tara’s already racing heartbeat skyrocketing, darn him. He didn’t even have to try to make her acutely aware of him. “That’s fabulous.” He gave Tara a side glance and a wink. “I’m not surprised, though. I already knew you both were awesome.”

  “Oh, Daddy.” Ashley giggled when he reached over and tickled her. “I rode my bike without the wheels today!”

  “You did?” Clint scooped her up to carry her with him to the kitchen. “How’d that go?”

  “Good. Until I fell.” She pointed at her knee. “I hurt myself and everything.”

  Tara’s buoyant spirts sank once more. She winced and followed them into the kitchen. “Sorry. I tried to keep an eye on her, but it all happened so fast, the bike hit the ground before I could stop it.”

  Clint grabbed a soda from the fridge and faced her once more, holding his daughter in one arm while opening his can with the other. He kissed Ashley’s cheek and let her have the first sip of his soda before taking a huge gulp himself. “Well, if a scraped knee is the worst that happens to you, I’d say you’re a lucky kid. Did you know your daddy broke his arm once, falling out of a tree house?”

  “Really?” Ashley’s eyes got big as saucers. “Did that hurt?”

  “Oh yeah. It hurt a lot.” He grinned over at Tara, giving her another coy little wink that made her toes buzz and her nerve endings spark. “But I learned to be more careful. Sometimes it’s not fun getting hurt, but that pain can teach us something, if we look at it the right way.”

  Ashley quieted, then said, “That’s true, Daddy. Can you put me down now so I can check our stats again?”

  Laughing, Clint kissed her once more and put her down. “Six going on thirty-six, that one.”

  Tara bit her lip as the little girl streaked past her and back into the living room. “I’m really sorry about the fall. I didn’t—”

  He cut her off with a kiss, then leaned back and drank more soda. “Don’t be. She’s just fine and seems overjoyed to be the new Internet sensation with you, so it’s all good. And thank you for watching her today. I really appreciate it.”

  “You’re welcome,” she said, heat rising in her cheeks. She felt bad now for being frustrated with him earlier. He could be so sweet sometimes, when he opened up and let her in. Eager to keep it going, she sidled past him to look in the fridge herself. “What should we have for dinner? There’s some steaks we can cook on the grill out back, or burgers, or—”

  Clint wrapped an arm around her waist from behind, his warm back pressed to her a stark contrast to the cold of the fridge. “Whatever you want, baby. How about we cook together again as a family? That was fun.”

  It was. She pulled out the steaks and set them on the counter. “Sounds great to me.” She turned and kissed him, all worries about her work or the bill or the future left behind, at least for a little while. “Hey, kiddo,” she called out to Ashley. “Want to help us get dinner ready?”

  “Yes!” Ashley replied from the living room. “We’re up to 10K likes now too!”

  Happiness blotted out her earlier doubts and Tara rose on tiptoe to kiss Clint again, then grinned. It might not be much, but tonight seemed pretty damned perfect to her. Maybe too perfect, but she’d worry about that later. For now, they had a meal to make.

  18

  Two more days passed and Tara’s warm fuzzy feelings from the family dinner they’d shared gradually faded back to a low-grade sense of dread. There wasn’t any one specific thing she could point to that was wrong in her life, she just knew that something was off, and it was bothering her more and more.

  On the surface, things seemed to be moving along at a fast clip. Ashley was getting better and better at riding without her training wheels and the little girl was blossoming with helping Tara on her social media posts. Her teacher had even commented on how cheerful and happy she’d seemed lately at school. The board was still stonewalling her on publicly endorsing the bill again, but they had no say over what she did with her personal social media accounts, so she continued being as active as she could. Public sentiment still seemed to be in support of the law, though the numbers were closer than they’d been a few days earlier. The battle wasn’t over yet, but she remained hopeful about the outcome. As for Clint…

  Well, he hadn’t been around much since their last family dinner together. Maybe that was what her anxiety was about, but Tara didn’t like thinking that way. She missed him, sure, but she didn’t need him around, did she? That would mean she’d started to depend on him, and that wasn’t an option. Falling for a man like Clint would just be absurd, right? Yes, he was handsome and smart and funny and caring. Yes, his daughter was adorable and had Tara fantasizing about having a kid of her own someday. But she’d known going into all this that it was temporary, and the last thing she wanted to be was a cliché. Woman loses heart to man she can never have. Gah.

  Stupid, Tara. So, so stupid.

  If only she could get out of here for a while, go work in her office again, that might shake loose the lurking anxiety at the back of her mind. She was going stir-crazy, that was all. She was used to being around people and going out into the world. Things would be better once she got her old life back.

  Except as she sat in the living room, staring out at the overcast day, her old life seemed very far away. Especially with Ashley getting crankier by the hour since she hadn’t been able to show her dad the new biking skills she’d honed the past two days.

  “Where’s Daddy?” the little girl whined, crossing her arms and giving Tara a pouting frown. “I want my dad.”

  “I know, sweetie.” Tara set her laptop aside and joined Ashley on the floor, where she was building what looked like a spaceship out of Legos. “But your dad’s working right now.”

  “You’re working too, but you’re here.”

  Well, damn. Couldn’t argue there. Tara picked up a couple of blocks and snapped them together. Too bad everything in life didn’t fit so easily. “He’ll be home in a little while and you can sho
w him your riding then.”

  “He doesn’t want to see it,” Ashley said, the sadness in her tone breaking Tara’s heart. “He’s always too busy.”

  “I don’t think that’s true,” Tara said, old pain pinching her heart. She’d been in the exact situation little Ashley was in now more times than she cared to admit, growing up. Her own parents’ work had kept them apart a lot of the time. Unfortunately, Tara hadn’t had anyone to really talk about it with, so she’d just internalized all that, figuring out how best to deal with it on her own. And sure, maybe it hadn’t done her any favors on the personal front, considering she was still single at twenty-seven without a happily ever after in sight, but hey. She was making a difference, right? That was what she’d really always wanted. To make a difference. To be relevant. To be a priority.

  Isn’t it?

  “Is too!” Ashley cried, her bottom lip quivering. “Daddy told me he’s too busy right now. He doesn’t love me anymore. He’s going to leave me just like Mommy did.”

  “Oh, sweetie. No!” Tara reached over to pull the little girl into her arms. “Your daddy’s not going anywhere, honey. And he does love you. So, so much. He’s just got a lot on his plate right now and sometimes grown-ups don’t always deal with stress the way they should. Sometimes—”

  “Sometimes what?” Clint said, walking through the front door, looking about as harried as Tara felt at the moment. Things weren’t easy on any of them at the moment, she supposed. He tossed his keys aside and grabbed a soda out of the fridge in the kitchen. The white dress shirt he’d worn was a tad wrinkled now and the sleeves were rolled up. A button was undone and the collar and his tie were loosened and askew. Even rumpled, he was still the best looking man she’d ever seen close up. Tara swallowed hard, noting the shadows beneath his eyes and the tightness near his jaw. “What’s going on here? Sorry I’m late. Got caught up in something at work.”