by Sybil Bartel
Copyright © 2018 by Sybil Bartel
Cover art by: CT Cover Creations
Cover Photo by: Paul Henry Serres
Cover Model: Charles
Edited by: Hot Tree Editing
Formatting by: Champagne Book Design
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Books by Sybil Bartel
Merciless
Dedication
Prologue
Part One
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Part Two
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Books by Sybil Bartel
The Alpha Bodyguard Series
SCANDALOUS
MERCILESS
RECKLESS
RUTHLESS
The Uncompromising Series
TALON
NEIL
ANDRÉ
BENNETT
CALLAN
The Alpha Escort Series
THRUST
ROUGH
GRIND
The Alpha Antihero Series
HARD LIMIT
HARD JUSTICE
HARD SIN
The Unchecked Series
IMPOSSIBLE PROMISE
IMPOSSIBLE CHOICE
IMPOSSIBLE END
The Rock Harder Series
NO APOLOGIES
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MERCILESS
Bodyguard.
Mercenary.
Gun for hire.
I didn’t care what you called it, the end result was always the same.
You paid me for a job, you got results. The Marines trained me to shoot, but life taught me to aim. Working for the best personal security firm in the business was a stepping stone. Put in my time, build the résumé, then move on. I didn’t do attachments, on any level.
Until a smoking-hot former one-night stand crossed the street in front of me, holding a kid who was my spitting image. She tried to play it off, deny he was mine. She said she didn’t remember me, right before she turned around and ran. She thought she’d made a clean escape.
But she was about to find out how merciless a bodyguard could be.
*MERCILESS is a sexy new standalone book in the Alpha Bodyguard Series
The Alpha Bodyguard Series:
SCANDALOUS
MERCILESS
RECKLESS
RUTHLESS
For My Family
MY HEART HAMMERING, I LAY whisper still.
His breathing had evened out an hour ago, but I wanted to make sure. I needed to make sure. Shirtless, his jeans still on, he’d come to bed late after spending hours in the kitchen with two men I didn’t know.
I never knew them.
He purposely kept it that way. Everyone in his life had their place and he liked layers of separation between all of us, because he was cunning. I just didn’t know how cunning until it was too late.
A deep breath rattled through his chest as he exhaled and rolled toward me.
I quickly moved to the edge of the bed.
His arm reached out because even in his sleep he kept tabs on me.
Holding my breath, my heart threatening to stop, I took the pillow out from under my head and fitted it under his arm.
He immediately pulled the pillow to his chest and settled back in.
I let out the breath I’d been holding as I watched him. His blond hair messy, his features softened by sleep, his bare chest cut with lean muscles, he slept like an angel. There was no denying he was a beautiful man.
But he was ruthless.
I silently counted out five minutes, then slow, millimeter by millimeter, my heartbeat pounding in my ears, I slid off my side of the bed. When my knees touched the floor, I pulled my last arm free and reached under the bed for my backpack.
The nylon material slid easily across the carpet, and as the last strap cleared the cheap metal frame holding the mattress, I silently stood.
One step, two, I backed up.
He slept.
Three steps.
His chest rose with an inhale.
Four.
He exhaled, and I turned for the door.
My hand sweaty, I grabbed the old doorknob and turned it. Feeling the tension in the spring inside, I held firm and slowly pulled. Hinges I’d oiled earlier in the week with cooking oil silently did their job, and the door opened without a whisper.
Moving my foot to the right, just inside the doorframe for balance, I stepped clear over the squeak in the floor. My other foot followed and I was in the living room. Letting out a small breath, I moved silently across the floor to the slider to the porch.
Then my heart stopped.
The glass door I’d purposely left ajar was not only shut, it was locked.
The lock would click, and the slider would whoosh if I opened it now. In a panic I glanced at the front door. It’d been warped since before we’d signed the lease three months ago. It stuck every time we opened it. We’d laughed about it when we’d moved in, joking we’d hear a burglar from a mile away.
Now the joke was on me.
I looked at the two windows in the living room that faced the front of the building, but it was a two-story drop to the front walkway.
I looked back at the slider.
I didn’t have a choice.
Determination sinking into my frayed nerves, I shouldered my backpack. Holding my free hand over the lock in an attempt to muffle the sound when it unlatched, I pushed the lever down as slow as possible.
A click sounded, and I froze.
One second, two… ten. I counted to thirty but no movement came from the bedroom.
My heart in my throat, I peered out at the
dark porch and rickety steps that led down to the inky blackness of the overgrown backyard. The moonlight cast sporadic shadows as it tried to filter through the tall scrub pines lining the property.
Saying a silent prayer, I pulled the slider open.
A whooshing, suction sound echoed like it was a thousand decibels, and I flinched as I slid the door open a heart-stopping inch. Then two… five… seven… a few more inches and I could squeeze through sideways.
Almost… almost there.
My hands shaking, my pulse pounding, I hit my invisible mark and turned to squeeze out.
“Going somewhere?”
Shrieking, I jumped and my backpack thumped against the glass. One arm, one leg, and half my body out the door, I lurched, but I wasn’t quick enough.
He grabbed the straps of my backpack and hauled me back inside. His face contorted with anger, he yanked me in front of him. “I asked you a question.” Cool, distant, his tone belied the lethal expression on his face.
“I….” I didn’t have a response. I was caught. He knew it. I knew it.
“You what?” he demanded, his biceps flexing as he held me by my backpack straps. “You were just going to leave without saying goodbye?” The anger in his features dangerously morphed into a calm I feared more than anything. “Who got to you?” he asked quietly.
Oh God. “No one.”
“Who is it?” he demanded.
“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Who’s telling you to leave?” Paranoid, always paranoid, he glanced out the window. “Who’s waiting for you?”
“No one. You know there’s no one else.” There never had been.
His insane stare fixed on me, he switched gears. “I’m not good enough for you?”
“I never said—”
Interrupting, he didn’t give me a chance to respond. “You think you can run away from who we are?”
“I’m not try—”
“You were working two jobs to pay your old man’s bills when I found you.” He leaned close and the smell of mint and cigarettes drifted over me. “I saved you from that.”
Misplaced guilt consumed me. “I’m sorry.”
“This is how you repay me? By walking out?”
“Please,” I begged. “You know what I want.” I’d asked him repeatedly. There was no reason for me to stay anymore. We both knew that.
“No,” he stated firmly, as if we’d never talked about this. “I really don’t.”
“I can’t do this,” I whispered.
“Can’t do what?”
It was now or never. I’d made the decision. I was halfway there. I wasn’t going to back out now. I just wasn’t.
“I can’t be with you anymore,” I dared to say.
He didn’t blink. His expression didn’t change. Not one muscle in his face moved… but he let go of my backpack straps.
I exhaled the breath I was holding, confident in the fact that he’d never laid hands on me. “Thank y—”
Quicker and faster than a flash of lighting, he palmed the switchblade he always kept in his front pocket and released the knife. Grabbing my left hand, he threw my arm against the slider doorframe and held it.
“You can’t be with me?” he quietly seethed.
Fear exploded like a grenade. “Stop!”
With two swift, cruel slashes of the tip of his knife, he carved into the flesh of my inside wrist.
Bright red welts appeared a split second before the pain.
Holding my arm, leaning into me, he got in my face. “You think you can’t be with me?” Insanity twisted his features. “I own you.” His fingers tightened, crushing my hand as blood dripped down my arm. “I own you.”
FUCKING EXHAUSTED, I WALKED INTO the bar. It wasn’t even fifteen hundred hours, but I didn’t give a shit. I needed a beer.
Daxton, the brother of one of my Marine buddies, looked up. “Holy fuck.” He came out from behind the bar. “Garrett Collins.” He shook his head. “Shit, man. It’s good to see you.” He slapped me on the back as he one-arm hugged me, then he glanced at my civvies. “You home for good?”
“No.” I dropped to a stool. “Long story,” I lied. “You got a beer?”
“Yeah, of course.” He reached over the bar and grabbed two beers from the cooler. Opening them, he handed me one as he took the stool next to me. “Cheers.” He tipped his beer toward mine. “How long you home for?”
“Cheers,” I muttered as a brunette came out of the back hall.
Holding a pile of bar towels, wearing clothes two sizes too big, her hair was a fucking mess of curls. Her gaze cutting to Dax, then me, she faltered. Pulling her arms in close, she rasped out an apology. “Sorry. I didn’t know we were open yet.”
Scratchy, sleep rough, and sexy as fuck, her voice went straight to my dick.
Dax gentled his tone. “It’s okay, Brookelyn. This is my friend, Collins.”
Unable to look away, I stared at her deep blue eyes. “Hey.”
Skittish like a cornered animal, her stormy-eyed gaze locked on mine for a split second then darted to Dax. “I’ll finish up later.”
Dax held his beer up. “You want to join us?”
Before he’d even finished asking the question, she was shaking her head. Her silky, almost black curls bounced around, and she tossed the towels on the cooler. “I gotta go.” She hightailed it back the way she came.
I stared after her, feeling like I’d just been sucker punched. “Where the hell did you find her?” Dax was forever taking in strays at the bar, but she was… different.
He shook his head. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
“Try me.” Anything was better than talking about my shit.
He circled the bottom of his beer in a ring of condensation on the old wood bar. “Dumpster, out back.”
What the fuck? “You serious?”
“Yeah.”
“She’s homeless?” It would explain the clothes that didn’t fit.
Dax shrugged. “She says she isn’t, but who the fuck knows. She was pulling boxes out of the dumpster, and when I offered her a meal, she split. Next day she was back, just standing by the dumpster like she was waiting for me.”
“What’d you do?”
“Fed her.” Dax glanced down the hall. “Then gave her a job. She’s been here ever since. Shows up early, cleans shit up, restocks, then disappears before we open.” He glanced at me. “But it took me a week to get her to say five words to me, let alone not flinch if I came within three feet of her.” Dax rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. “I thought at first it was me, or men in general. But she avoids everyone here, doesn’t matter if it’s male or female. And forget about getting within arm’s reach of her. She’s like a feral cat. She’ll skitter off quicker than you can blink.”
“Damn.” I took a long drag of my beer, then said more than I should. “She’s pretty.” Even in her baggy clothes I could tell she had curves that’d make a man weak.
“Don’t even think about it,” Dax warned, practically growling at me. “She doesn’t need your brand of trouble.”
“I’m not trouble. I don’t fuck with women.” I was never around long enough.
“The only thing you do is fuck with them.” He leveled me with a look. “You pick them up, screw them for a week straight until they’re convinced they’re in love, then you redeploy and lose their number.”
Okay, so he wasn’t lying. I shrugged. “I’m not here a week this time.”
Shaking his head, Dax snorted, then his expression sobered. “So why are you home?”
I didn’t have time to answer. A loud crash came from the back.
Both of us were on our feet faster than you could blink as the sound of breaking glass echoed through the bar.
“Brookelyn!” Dax yelled. “You okay?”
Another crash and we were both running.
We rounded the corner, and at the end of the hall a wire shelving unit holding dozens of cases
of empty beer bottles was tipped at a forty-five degree angle.
Desperately trying to shove the heavy shelf back up, the brunette stood under it as three more cases fell to the floor, one narrowly missing her head.
“Collins,” Dax snapped, reaching for the shelf.
“Right behind you.” I jumped over the mess of broken glass, caught the far end of the wire rack, and Dax and I shoved the heavy shelf back upright.
Her eyes wild, the brunette glanced toward the back door.
I followed her gaze just as the rear fire exit clicked shut.
“Shit, Brookelyn, you okay?” Dax shoved a case back on the shelf that was hanging half off in front of her head. “What the hell happened?”
“I, um….” Her gaze darted from the back door to the floor. “I’m sorry. I was putting a case up and the shelf tipped over.”
It didn’t tip. She was lying. The stabilizing brackets were ripped out of the wall. I threw Dax a look before going for the exit. “Stay with her.”
My bullshit meter off the chart, I pushed out the back door and scanned the alley. A black Mustang with tinted windows was peeling out of the lot. I made a mental note of the plate and went back inside.
Dax looked up from picking broken bottles off the floor and raised an eyebrow at me.
I shook my head once. “You should keep the back door locked, Dax.”
“Thought I did.” Dax glanced at the brunette. “You okay, Brookelyn?”
“Yeah, fine.” Keeping her gaze averted, she picked up a case and put it back on a lower shelf as the bell over the front door chimed.
Dax glanced at his watch. “We’re open. I need to get behind the bar.”
“Go.” I nodded at the mess. “We’ll handle this.”
With one last glance at his employee, Dax shook his head and went up front.
I waited until he was out of earshot. “Your boss is gone. You want to tell me what really happened?” I grabbed a case and tossed it on the shelf.
“There’s nothing to tell. The shelf fell.” She kicked a few broken bottles into a pile.