by M. S. Parker
I looked over at the woman next to me. Her face was white, her lips pressed into a nearly invisible line. I could feel Jake and Ryan shifting behind me and knew it was taking all of their self-control not to intervene.
“You’re serious,” I said, turning back to Detoine. “You think this woman is paying me to sleep with her?” If it’d been just Detoine and me, my question would’ve been a lot less polite.
“Sex for money has been known to happen.” Detoine looked pretty damn uncomfortable with the situation, and that was the only thing that let me keep my temper in check. His gaze skittered away from mine, and he busied himself tidying up his desk. “I realize this is terribly personal and uncomfortable, but the question needs to be answered.”
“Why?” Carly demanded coldly.
I glanced at her and saw that she had two spots of color high up on her cheeks. I suddenly realized that she might have been embarrassed at first, but now she was pissed off. Like swing-her-purse-at-someone’s-head pissed off.
Detoine looked up, but didn’t meet her gaze. “It just does.”
“No.”
Carly whipped her head around and glared at me, anger turning her eyes to blue fire. “Don’t you dare give him the satisfaction of an answer.”
“I have to,” I said softly. Then I looked back at Detoine. “The answer is no, Detoine. I’m not being paid for personal services. And you can also tell Dale Mitchell to fuck off.”
His facial expression didn’t change, but his lashes flickered. That was all. Just the quickest flicker, not even a blink, really. But it was enough to confirm what I’d suspected.
Dale was the entire reason I was here. The fucker.
“Some detective with a grudge questions my motives for hiring a bodyguard and the two of us have to be subjected to...” Her hands gestured in front of her like she couldn’t find the words to describe what was happening.
“Now, Ms. Prince,” Detoine said, moving to defuse the situation. “This is just a routine interview. Considering the rather exorbitant fee you’re paying him, I had to make sure there was nothing else involved. That’s my job.”
“Exorbitant?” She laughed, but the sound was brittle. “Five thousand is pocket change to me, Mr. Sampson. I’ve spent that on a spa day without blinking. Hell, I might’ve spent that just on clothes for Bobby yesterday. I don’t even look at the bill for things like that.”
Blood rushed to my face and I found myself staring at the soft, steel gray trousers that had been delivered to the hotel just that morning. Five thousand dollars? That hadn’t been the number I’d seen...
Fuck. The suits. She’d put a rush job on the suits. For all I knew, the damn suit they expected me to wear later that day cost five fucking grand on its own.
Detoine cleared his throat. “What’s pocket change to you is several months’ income to others.”
She stood up abruptly and leaned across the desk. “That’s not the point. We’re here because a cop with a grudge got his jockey shorts in a twist and you fucking know it. Don’t you? But you can’t tell that cop to fuck off, can you? You have to act like me wanting Bobby to work for me is something...sordid.”
I stood up.
“Carly.” I caught her elbow. She stiffened, and I knew she was going to pull away. Leaning in until I could smell her apple-scented shampoo, I whispered, “You asked me not to quit. Now I’m asking you to do something for me. Let this go. It won’t help.”
Slowly, she straightened. A shudder wracked her body and she turned to face me. “It’s not fair,” she whispered. “You went to jail. You did your time.”
My heart twisted. What had I done to deserve her protection? Her faith?
“You don’t get it.” I brushed her hair back from her face, forcing my hand not to linger. “Whether or not I did my time doesn’t change the fact that his brother is still gone. Nothing brings him back. He’s always going to hate me. And he has a right to.”
“So he gets to abuse his badge?”
I didn’t have anything to say to that.
“No.”
I looked up at Detoine’s quiet voice, except he wasn’t looking at me. He was focused on Carly and his eyes were gentle, understanding even.
“No cop has a right to abuse his badge, not for anything.” He sighed and then leaned back in his seat, skimming one hand back across the neat crop of short black hair. He focused hard on the wall for a moment, and then shifted his attention back to me. “Bobby, if you would, sit. Please. Ms. Prince.”
I sat. A moment after I did, Carly did as well, but it was pretty clear from the rigid line of her spine and the way she swung her foot that she wasn’t happy about any of this.
Yeah, well, neither was I. Shame twisted my gut up as I shoved back out of the chair to pace the small confines of the office. I knew exactly how many strides I could take before I had to turn around. Three. Pivot. Two strides – he had a massive file cabinet and it blocked the western wall. Turn. Three strides back.
“Bobby.”
He came out from behind the desk and intercepted me on my third lap. “Come on, kid. You know as well as I do that I’ve got a job that needs to be done.”
I shot him a look.
Yeah. He had a job. His job, too often, involved questions or actions that were embarrassing as hell, but dignity wasn’t a part of my life anymore. I’d given up that right when I’d taken a life. I got to piss in a cup on a regular basis, and any time some cop decided he didn’t like the look of me, I ended up with my face against the wall while he searched me for weapons or drugs.
“I know you’re doing your job,” I said levelly. Turning my head, I stared out the window as I answered his question. “No, I’m not being paid to have sex with Carly Prince.”
Then, because I was worried about her, I slid her a look. Her eyes were snapping and hot, staring lasers straight into Detoine’s head. But he was still looking at me.
I sighed, “Hell, just look at her. You think she needs to pay somebody for sex? Men would sell their soul to share her bed.” The last bit just slipped out, but I didn’t take it back.
It was true, after all.
I heard, and felt, the reaction coming from Jake and Ryan, but I didn’t look at them. Never let it be said that I didn’t know how to burn my bridges in spectacular style.
Detoine looked even more uncomfortable now, and he rubbed his hand across his scalp. “Like I said, kid. I’m just doing my job.”
“Your job sucks.”
He gave me a grim smile that said he sometimes thought the same damn thing.
Chapter Seven
I waited until we were outside before I looked at them, but it was only in their general direction. I couldn’t meet anyone’s eyes.
“I can find my own way back.”
“Back where?” Carly hadn’t looked at me, not even once, since we’d left Detoine’s office, but her wide blue eyes swung around to meet mine now and she scowled.
“Back home.” I jerked my shoulder in a shrug, my gaze sliding away from hers. “I know this wasn’t what you thought you’d be getting when you...” Ridley was the only one not staring at me and, after a moment, it hit me. “You still want me to work for you.”
“Why wouldn’t I?” Carly sounded confused.
Blowing out a breath, I shifted my gaze to Jake. He was the logical one of the bunch, and definitely the one in charge. If Carly would listen to anyone, it’d be him. He looked tired today, but what did I know? “Talk some sense into her.”
“I’ve been trying to do that since she was just a kid, Bobby.” He shook his head, a fond smile on his face. “It’s not going to happen.”
She rolled her eyes at him, and came toward me. “Look, you think I’m going to change my mind because some asshole cop decided to jerk your chain? I’m not.” She made a dismissive motion with her hand, her expression serious. “All it does is make me that much more determined to keep you with me. I bet you anything he did this because he thought it would make me wr
ite you off.”
Carly came closer, so close now that I could smell something soft and gentle on her, something that complemented the apple shampoo. Maybe the lotion she’d put on a few minutes ago. I didn’t know what it was, but I liked it. It was...soft. Soft and gentle. There was no room for soft and gentle in my life. Maybe it was stupid, because standing there, close to her while the wind teased her hair and she studied me, I felt that loss keenly. My mom hadn’t been soft, but she had been gentle. Sometimes too gentle. Life had chewed her up and spit her back out, too. I’d learned young that gentle didn’t survive in the real world.
Carly had a look in her eye now, the kind of look that made me think that life had tried to do the same to her, but it hadn’t worked. Still, she had that soft and gentle feel to her. Not weakness. Hell, no. She was one of the strongest people I knew. With her, it was caring, compassion. Hope. Some people, they never really lost it, no matter what the world did. Somehow, they just kept believing in things. In people.
And, for some crazy reason, Carly had decided she was going to believe in me.
“Why are you doing this?” I asked, my voice gruff.
“Because.” She shrugged and turned away.
“That’s not an answer,” I said to her back.
She swung around, walking backward with a grace that belied the four-inch spikes she called shoes. With a wide, easy smile, she said, “That’s the best you’re going to get for now. Ask me again in a few days.”
* * *
That night sucked even worse than the morning had, and it was far worse than the past night. It was so bad I was ready to gouge out my eye with the dessert spoon before we’d been there thirty minutes. I knew it was the fucking dessert spoon because Jake had hammered that fact, and several others, into my head over the span of two hours. We were attending a dinner banquet, and while Jake, Ryan and the ever-silent Ridley would get to stand in the shadows, I would, apparently, be dining with Carly.
“If I’m supposed to be a bodyguard, why am I sitting at the table and eating?” I asked during a break in the conversation. I kept my voice low. I was getting the hang of the subtle thing, I thought.
Carly didn’t seem to agree. She kept a smile on her face even as she leaned in closer and murmured, “Not here.”
I pinned a glare on her, but I didn’t ask again.
She picked up her wine glass and took a sip. Then she held it to her lips and sighed. “It’s complicated. You’re doing more than being a bodyguard at the moment. I’ll explain later.”
Before I had a chance to press her to explain now, some guy who had to be twice her age said her name. He was standing on my other side with the sort of look that said he fully intended to take the seat at her side as soon as I moved.
Carly clutched at my arm and gave him her signature smile. “Oh, it’s so good to see you, Hank. I hope you understand if I keep Bobby with me, though. It’s his first time to one of these and he’s nervous.”
“Of course.” The smile Hank gave back didn’t fit his words.
He walked around the table and took the seat across from her as I pulled out her chair, pushing it back in the way I’d practiced.
I sat next to her, stiff and uncomfortable, but ready to do what needed to be done for my job. When I felt her tense ever so slightly when Hank leaned forward, I realized that I no longer needed her to explain why she wanted me to sit next to her. Although the width of the table separated them, something about her body language was subtly broadcasting it was nowhere near enough space.
I shifted my attention to the guy, my jaw clenching.
Hank was staring at Carly the same way I would have stared at her if we’d been alone back up at the hotel. He didn’t let the fact that he wasn’t alone with her bother him. Nor did he let the fact that she was clearly not interested bother him. This guy didn’t know how to take a hint. My hands curled into fists. Maybe I needed to make the hint a little less polite.
“I’ve been hoping we might have a chance to have a drink together while you’re in town. It’s been a long time since we’ve talked, Carly.” His voice was so oily, I could’ve run a car on it.
I didn’t look directly at her, but I could see how her nails were digging into her palms. Going on instinct, I curled my arm around her shoulder. She leaned into me and I felt the tension drain out of her body. Carly smiled at Hank.
“My schedule is pretty full this trip, Hank. With the foundation meetings and the opening of the school, I’m slammed.”
Then to my surprise, she reached up and touched my cheek. Electricity shot through me and I tried to keep it from showing.
“I had a little bit of time, I thought, but...” Her thumb brushed against my bottom lip. “Fate sort of intervened.”
When I tipped my head down to look at her, she was staring up at me. The look on her face was enough to remind me that it had been a damn long time since I’d had a woman beneath me. Or on top of me. Or caught between me and a wall. Bent over a table. Any position at all.
Her breath caught, a blush rising on her cheeks and I forced myself to look away. Shit. This was definitely not the time or the place.
“You look at a woman like that for too long, she’s going to start thinking she needs protection,” Carly said, her voice soft and silky.
I tensed. She couldn’t think I’d ever hurt any woman, let alone her. “I would never–”
“I meant a different kind of protection.” She tossed me a quick look. “I feel like you already know what size bra and what color panties I’m wearing.”
I sucked in my breath as I caught her meaning. Then her fingers brushed my thigh under the table. Fuck. My muscles tensed and jerked in response to that light touch.
“Bobby?” she said my name in a low voice.
She was going to be the death of me.
Instinctively, I tipped my head closer. She reached up and laid her hand on my cheek. Now my instincts were fighting a war. One part of me was telling me to put my mouth on hers. It was a damn nice mouth, wide and soft and lush, the kind of mouth a guy could spin entire fantasies around. And I’d already had a taste of it.
But the other part of me was saying all the things I already knew. She was out of my league. I didn’t deserve her.
Ryan and Jake would kill me.
Plus, we were in public.
But then she took the matter out of my hands, leaning and pressing her mouth to mine. I could’ve stopped her then, but I didn’t. I kissed her back. Her lips parted, and I traced the entrance with my tongue. She sighed and opened wider. When her tongue came out to tease mine, I closed one hand into a fist. My cock started to pulse, stirring to life. The scent of her, the taste, went straight to my head, and just as I was about ready to reach out, catch one of those curls she’d left trailing down her neck, Carly pulled back.
A flash of white out of the corner of my eye had me tensing. I’d forgotten we weren’t alone. She put a hand on my shoulder.
“It’s just the cameras.”
I didn’t quite realize what she meant until the flash came again. Before I had a chance to react, she leaned forward and pressed her lips to mine in a quick, chaste kiss. Another camera flash. I felt oddly frozen and then she pulled away. I stared at her, a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach.
She wiped at my mouth as she murmured, “Smudge proof, my ass.”
I caught her wrist. “What are you doing?” I could barely keep my voice under control.
“Do you really want to wear my lipstick? Harlot red isn’t your color, Bobby.” She gave me a sensual smile.
A low chuckle that was devoid of true humor had me looking up. I pushed my own feelings aside. I had a job to do, and it didn’t include anything about me.
“Well, I’ll admit, when I saw the news clips of the two of you, I had no idea things had become so...intimate.” Hank was staring at us with a greasy sort of smirk on his lips.
I gave him a hard glare and watched as that smug, sneering look on his face fal
tered, then faded away completely. Only after he was no longer looking at Carly, I allowed myself to look away.
A moment later, there was a faint noise from the podium. It was time for whatever in the hell it was to start.
* * *
It was boring, that’s what it was.
The problem with boring was that it left me with too much time to think, and almost every single thought centered around Carly and the sleek, silvery-blue dress she wore and how much fun I could have peeling it away.
It had been nearly twelve months since I’d had sex.
The first thing I’d done after I got out was sit through a full physical and health screening. Disease was rampant in prison, and I’d lived with that fear for pretty much my entire incarceration.
To my relief, I’d gotten back a clean bill of health just a few days later. The first chance I had after that, I’d found myself a bar, and when the opportunity had presented itself, I’d gotten laid. I didn’t remember her name, and I was pretty sure she didn’t remember mine either. We’d had a box of condoms and we’d used the entire damn supply in a single weekend.
That had been a little over eleven months ago.
Since then, the only relief I’d received came from my own fist.
But I was pretty certain that even if I’d had sex three times a week, and twice on Sundays, my body would still have been misbehaving around Carly Prince. She seemed to drag it out of me. The mischievous grin, the way she watched me, the way she moved...oh yeah. I’d want her no matter what.
Now, as the third speaker of the night was escorted onto the stage, I found my eyes studying the elegant lines of Carly’s profile, the pretty bow of her lips, the curve of her jaw down to her neck. The dress she wore had an odd sort of sparkle to it, as if the designer had crushed up jewels to make it.
It clung to her breasts, accentuating her curves while still looking elegant, demure, even. It slid down along her torso, along her waist and hips, ended a few inches above her knee. I could only imagine what she wore under it. That sparkly thing fit like a glove, and while I was positive she had on something underneath it, I preferred to pretend she was naked.