Chapter 5
CHAPTER FIVE
F ine. Maybe Doc had a point. Bean’s low, throbbing headache had been steadily growing over the last half hour. From the second she’d stepped out of her office, her bossy-ass boss had been peppering her with questions. How was her vision? Did she need ice for her face? Was she sure there weren’t other parts of her that she’d hurt?
Not that she could blame Gavin or anything. She handled almost all the company’s technology. There were three others who’d been trained to monitor the cybersecurity systems of their clients, but if any alarms or alerts were triggered, she was the one they notified to handle it. Bean was also the only one who had clearance to do the deeper research into and for their clients. Yes, she’d handed some things off to Tiny, but nothing that was highly sensitive, which encompassed the majority of her work.
So she understood Gavin’s concern. He had a company to run, after all. With her temporarily out of commission, a lot of Hudson Security’s research work would be at a standstill. Still, she ignored his questions. Not that she wanted to be rude. However, the mere thought of speaking had her head throbbing even harder.
As he followed her out to the parking lot, he took the keys to her white Audi out of her hand and grabbed something from her trunk before steering her toward his Hudson Security-issued armored SUV. She didn’t bother questioning him or protesting. She’d recognized that look on his face. The lips pressed together in a tight line, the granite set of his scruffy jaw, the light-gray eyes that challenged her to argue with him.
This wasn’t her first rodeo. She knew when to pick her battles with the man. If he wanted to drive her, then fine. They were heading in the same direction—they were neighbors, after all—so what did it matter?
However, getting into Gavin’s SUV for the short ride home turned out to be a horrible idea. The moment he started driving, everything tilted to the side. A tidal wave of nausea washed over her. Keeping her eyes slammed shut was the only thing that kept her from puking all over his leather upholstery. That and very slow, very steady, and very shallow breaths.
Gavin was talking, and even though his deep rumble was somewhat soothing, she’d stopped listening the second the vehicle was in motion. To be fair though, her growing headache had probably less to do with her fall and the man’s uncharacteristic chatter, and more to do with the budding panic that was building in her chest. The thought of not working for the next day or two? At all? Yeah...
Her lungs squeezed tightly, and unease swirled in her gut.
It was no secret that her life revolved around her work. She hadn’t been lying to Doc earlier when she said she didn’t people well. She didn’t. On top of that, she sure as hell wasn’t the outdoorsy sort. Living in a small, tight-knit, nature-loving island community meant she mostly kept to herself .
Aside from reading, which she didn’t do nearly enough of, Bean didn’t have many hobbies that didn’t involve some sort of screen. When she wasn’t on her computer working, she gamed or decompressed with some mindless coloring or puzzle apps on her tablet.
Super boring? Maybe.
But after digging around people’s pasts and online histories, which tended to be bleak, sordid, or vile—often a combination of all three—she wanted to shut her mind off. Coloring a paint-by-number mandala or immersing herself in a matching-tile game often did the trick.
“B, did you hear me?” Gavin asked as the car slowed.
“Maybe,” she murmured, peeking an eye open. Instead of feeling the relief of finally getting home and being able to get out of the dizzying car, her eyes widened, and she frowned. Gavin had pulled into a driveway. His driveway, not hers. “Why are we at your place?”
“So you didn’t hear me,” he said with a sigh, placing the car in park. “I’ll have one of the guys drop your car off later tonight.”
“Fine. But that doesn’t answer my question.”
His chuckle was low as he shook his head. “You didn’t listen to a single thing I said on the way here, did you?”
She opened her mouth but then snapped it shut. Nope. She hadn’t heard a damn thing. “Refresh my memory.”
Instead of answering, he pushed open his door with a muttered, “Sit tight.” Before she could question him, Gavin rounded the front of the SUV and opened her door.
She sucked in a breath as he quickly leaned over her to undo her seat belt. Big mistake. She caught a hint of cedar and pine, and her stomach pitched. Her frown deepened when she realized the stomach flip was way different than the earlier nausea-induced ones. Quickly dismissing the thought, she rubbed her aching temples. She must have hit her head harder than she’d thought.
“Come on,” he said, gently gripping her elbow to assist her out of her seat.
She wanted to protest his help on principle, but the second she stood up, everything swayed. His arm was immediately around her waist, and once again, that cedar and pine scent she’d never noticed before filled her nose. Taking her weight, he walked her toward his house. It was a home she was familiar with seeing as they’d been friends and neighbors for years.
The Hudson Security property took up a large portion of the northeast corner of Hudson Island, which Gavin leased from the De La Rosa family. The acreage housed not only their office, but also the facilities and training grounds of Hudson Tactical, a new joint venture between Hudson Security and De La Rosa Gym that utilized employees from both companies—security specialists from Hudson Security and martial arts coaches from De La Rosa Gym—to provide hand-to-hand combat and tactical training to law enforcement types.
Gavin had also purchased an eight-acre lot adjacent to the Hudson Security property from the family and built five houses. His was a four-bedroom, three-bathroom, log-style cabin. The other four were various smaller versions of his home that were for employees. She lived in the one closest to him, Xander was in the one farthest away, and the two cabins in the middle were currently unoccupied and generally used as short-term housing for the handful of employees who were based off island.
A ring sounded as he opened the front door, and she winced at the high-pitched noise. Gavin muttered a curse, leaned her against the wall, and rushed to disarm the alarm. He was back beside her within seconds. With his arm once again locked around her waist, he led her into the living room and eased her down onto the couch. “Be right back. Do not move.”
She wanted to make some sort of smart-ass remark about his bossiness, but her brain was fried. All she could do was sink into the plush leather couch and cringe as her head pounded in time to each of her heartbeats.
After a moment, the cushion beside her sank. “Here, B, take these. If your headache doesn’t get a little better in the next half hour, I’m calling Doc.”
It was a chore to pry her eyes open, but when she did, concerned gray eyes stared back at her. Gavin held out a glass of water and a couple of pain pills. The cool water was soothing as she swallowed them down.
“Thanks, boss man. I’ll be good as new and out of your hair before you know it.”
He shook his head. “You’re staying here tonight.”
She pursed her lips. There was no way she’d heard that correctly. “Sorry. What was that?”
“On the way over here, we talked?—”
“ You talked,” she interrupted. “I ignored you.” His eyebrow arched, and she rolled her eyes. “In a very polite and respectable way, of course.”
“Of course.” The edges of his lips twitched. “Well, since you didn’t protest what I was saying, I assumed we were in agreement.”
She racked her brain for any hints of their conversation in the car and came up blank. “You’re going to have to refresh my memory again.”
His eyes narrowed as he stared across the room, as if pondering the meaning of life. “Is it really refreshing your memory if you never bothered to hear what I said in the first place? I suppose a bit of what I said must have seeped into your subconscious, right? ”
Good. Freaking. God. “Gavin Frazier,” she said, putting as much annoyance as she could muster into the two words.
He chuckled. “Damn. Full name. You mean business.”
The man wasn’t wrong. She rarely called him by his given name. It was always boss man, boss, or Frazier. “That’s right, Gavin .”
He smirked. “Well, Sabrina , you’re here because I don’t trust you. At all.”
In the span of a heartbeat, the blood drained from her face. All humor vanished, and her gaze dropped to her lap. Ouch.
“Holy shit, B. I didn’t mean it like that ,” he said in a rush, grabbing her hands.
She stilled. Completely. For the life of her, she couldn’t take a breath, and her chest squeezed painfully tight. It was as if he’d punched her in the gut.
“Bean, look at me.”
She shook her head, gaze fixed on her knees, still unable to breathe. Then his hands were framing her face, and he tilted her head up. Her heart knocked hard in her chest. Physical touch wasn’t something she was accustomed to. Especially not from her boss.
“Breathe, B, or you’re going to pass out.”
Meeting his gaze, she sucked in a breath. Shaking her head, she tried to pull away, but his hands held firm. His gray eyes were intent and imploring. “I trust you with my life, B. I trust you with the lives of every member of our team.”
Confusion swirled in her brain. Then what did he mean?
He ran a thumb gently over the edge of her bruised eye before pulling away and raking his hands through his already disheveled hair. “What I meant to say and completely fucked up is that I don’t trust that you’ll follow Doc’s orders. Your place has all your computers. Hell, your home workstation is identical to your office setup. ”
She shook her head— Holy. Moly. Overreact much, B? —and tried to inject some levity into their conversation. “I have one less monitor at home.” His eyebrow arched, and that I’m-not-impressed look crossed his face. She cleared her throat. Right. Hello, awkward. “You were saying?”
“If you’re at your place, I don’t think you’ll be able to not work. You have a concussion?—”
“A slight possible concussion,” she clarified.
He scrubbed his hands over his face as he muttered something she couldn’t decipher. Most likely a curse given the frustrated glare he was now shooting at her. “I don’t care how slight or possible it is. You have a concussion. You need to rest. And I know you won’t do that at your place.” He waved a hand at his living room. “Here, I have a laptop. That’s it. And you’re not getting on it.”
There was no use arguing with him. “Fine, but I need to swing by my place to pick up some stuff.”
“Like what?” he asked, rising from the couch.
It took everything she had to not roll her eyes. She knew he was trying to help—and, yes, he did have a point since she’d planned to hop on her computer the minute he drove away—but he was being a bit over the top. “Clothes, contact lenses, tampons... You know, those kinds of things?”
He crossed the room and picked up a bag. Her eyes narrowed once she recognized it was the emergency bag she kept in the trunk of her car. “I assume this has all the stuff you need for one night?”
This time, her rolling eyes won the battle. Of course he had an answer for everything. “I knew you were bossy,” she muttered, “but you have to admit that this is a lot. Even for you.”
“Deal with it.” He shot her a smile that was more smirk than grin. “Honestly though, I wasn’t lying earlier.”
Her mind drew yet another blank. “You said a lot of stuff earlier. Care to be a little more specific?” She could hear the snark in her tone and winced. “Sorry.”
“You’re fine, B,” he said, seemingly paying her attitude no mind.
The thought gave her pause. She wasn’t quite sure if that was a good thing or bad.
“When we were talking with Doc in your office earlier today,” Gavin continued, “about you being the most important part of Hudson Security.”
“Right.” She snorted. “Pretty sure that would be you and MacKay. Esme even.”
Gavin shook his head. “It’s you. And right now, you’re injured. So you’re going to rest up, because you being hurt is unacceptable.”
She studied him. His expression was so serious and intense. Yes, she was used to that, but there was something else she couldn’t read. Something that had her wanting to give the guy a hug. Which, holy shit, was not something she did. With anyone. Ever. “We’re a team, boss man,” she said, needing to lighten... whatever it was that had settled over them. “We’re all equally important. All cogs in an interconnected machine. I may have more tricks up my sleeve than others, but we all have important roles.”
Whatever had settled over Gavin lifted, and the corners of his lips tilted up. “Sure, B. If that makes you feel better.”
She pursed her lips. “I can’t tell if you’re being serious or making fun of me.”
He shrugged. “I’m going to make us dinner. You can rest here on the couch or in the guest room. Where would you rather be?”
Of course he’d give her an evasive nonanswer.
“Home.” She gave him a smile that was all teeth.
“Not happening,” he said, snagging a blanket off an accent chair and tossing it to her. It landed perfectly on her lap. Because of course it did.
Shaking her head, she groaned and swung her legs up onto the couch. “The couch is fine. By any chance, Gavin, do you have some energy drinks?”
“Not a chance in hell, Sabrina,” he called over his shoulder as he left the room.
Fighting a smile, she snuggled into the couch cushions. She didn’t want to think too hard about why the thought of him not trusting her had hurt so much. Had down right gutted her. Instead, she closed her eyes, let the Tylenol do its magic, and focused on how annoying the man could be.
Well, maybe not annoying per se. But irritating.
Yes, she tossed a ton of snark his way on a daily basis, but she’d never really had him toss it right back. Until today. And it was kind of surprising and... fun.