Songbird (Aster Springs #3)

Prologue Finn

ONE YEAR EARLIER

I stalk down the vacant hotel hallway toward the doors to the penthouse suite, parsing the commentary running through my earpiece and scanning an intersecting corridor for threats.

America’s reigning princess of pop, Rosalie Thorne, walks behind me while two other protection officers bring up the rear.

Our goal? To deliver the global superstar to her home for the night.

After a sweep of her suite to make sure it’s safe to enter, I return to the doors and let her slip inside. Her chin is dipped, her eyes on the carpeted floor, and her murmured thank you is barely audible under her breath.

“Stay alert,” I warn the team before they take up stations in the hallway, one by the door and the other by the elevator. “Shift’s not over for another six hours.”

They nod without hesitation, used to taking my orders even though I’ve only been on the job for two months, but the looks they give me barely hide their thoughts.

Linley is mildly curious, but as a skilled bodyguard with a long career behind her, she must have seen worse than a client favoring the new former SEAL over personnel with little personal protection experience.

Brewer, on the other hand, is a dick. He smirks like he knows something he shouldn’t, and if that something is the presumption that I’m doing more than guarding Rosalie’s bed at night, he’s smart enough to keep his mouth shut. Barely.

Whatever. I don’t give a shit about his opinion, and I don’t have the energy for workplace politics.

Rosalie Thorne is my client, and if she prefers me to shadow her over anyone else, then so be it.

I’m not here to launch a new career. I’m here as a favor to a friend and to keep a woman alive. That’s it and that’s all.

I double-check that the exit is secure and then take my place outside Rosalie’s en suite bathroom. The door is ajar and steam billows out into the bedroom. I lean into the opening so she can hear my voice, carefully averting my eyes from the shape of her petite silhouette behind the foggy glass.

“Everything all right in there, Miss Thorne?” I call out.

“I’m fine,” she responds in a dreamy tone that tells me she’s enjoying the hot water.

Satisfied she’s safe, I stand at ease and murmur into my earpiece. “Songbird has landed.”

And then I wait.

When the water cuts off, I step outside the bedroom to give Rosalie her privacy.

Ten minutes later, she reappears wrapped in one of those white terry-cloth robes she likes so much.

Her damp blonde waves hang down her back, her cheeks are pink from the steam, and her mouth is stained with the remnants of her trademark coral-pink lipstick.

I follow her to the kitchen, and when she orders room service—a pitcher of hot cocoa and two mugs, the same as always—I stand in the corner as she slides onto a high-backed chair at the oversized dining table.

And just as she’s done every night for the first eight weeks of her six-month world tour, Rosalie dips into the pocket of her robe and pulls out a ratty old deck of cards.

“Gin rummy?” she asks.

At the slight shake of my head, she drops hers to the side and pushes her lush lips into a pretty pout. “This will be the last time,” she promises. “If you can beat me. Best out of five.”

“Miss Thorne.” I keep my voice flat and professional. “I’m on duty. It wouldn’t be appropriate.”

“That’s not what you said last night.” Her baby blues sparkle with mischief. Her laugh is musical and light as she shuffles the cards like my surrender is inevitable, even when I give her nothing in return.

“Oh, come on,” she says with a sigh. “Just until I’m tired enough to sleep?” When I hesitate again, she rolls her eyes. “The suite is clear. Brewer and Linley are outside. I’m still coming down from the high of playing to a stadium with fifty thousand screaming fans. I need to unwind.”

“With gin rummy?” I deadpan.

“Yes. And warm almond milk.”

“Miss Thorne—”

“Don’t make me get bossy. You know how I hate throwing my weight around.” She smiles a little, like she’s trying to make a joke, but then her throat bobs in a nervous swallow. “And you also know I can’t sleep otherwise.”

Yeah. I do know that.

I calculated the risks the first time I gave in, but I still reevaluate the variables again now.

We’re in the penthouse in the best hotel with the highest security standards in New Orleans.

We’ve swept the floor as well as the suite, and any threat to Rosalie’s safety needs to get through Linley and Brewer before it reaches her door.

And in the unlikely event that happens, they’re never getting through me.

Judging that the risk of danger is low enough to play a game of cards with the client at her request, I lower myself into the chair opposite Rosalie and wait as she deals.

When I reach out to swipe up the hand that belongs to me, she stops me with a tentative brush of her fingers on mine.

Her skin is unnaturally warm from her shower, and my heart rate kicks up a little.

It shouldn’t matter that she’s beautiful.

Any other bodyguard probably wouldn’t notice it.

Another bodyguard wouldn’t let her touch him like this either.

Another bodyguard would remind himself that she has a boyfriend, and a public profile, and a life that’s really fucking complicated.

But I ignore all of that and keep my hand exactly where it is under hers.

“Thank you,” she says, but something about the way she says it makes me wonder what she’s thanking me for.

“You’re welcome,” I reply.

A knock sounds on the suite door, sharp and urgent, and I stand while speaking into my earpiece. “Is that room service?”

The lack of response from the team makes my hackles rise, and I drop into a mode of operation I’ve only ever used on duty. Focused. Lethal. “Brewer? Linley? What’s the situation?”

The extended silence is louder than any kind of alarm bell.

“Go to the bedroom,” I tell Rosalie. “Lock the door. Then go into the en suite bathroom and lock that door too. Don’t come out until I come back for you or someone else from your security team tells you it’s safe. Ask for the code word.”

Rosalie gets to her feet woodenly and pins me with terrified eyes. If adrenaline wasn’t flooding my veins, and if my head hadn’t already dipped to that place it goes to block out distractions and emotions, her fear might have broken me.

“Miss Thorne,” I say firmly. “What is the code word? Do you remember?”

She nods, too scared to speak, staring at my chest. And I’m an idiot, because of all the ways I might snap her out of her stupor, I lift a hand with the intention of cupping her cheek and tilting her face up to mine.

I remember my place at the last moment and instead wave it slowly in front of her blank gaze.

“I need to hear you say it,” I tell her.

The motion of my hand brings her around, and her eyes seek mine. Whatever she finds there puts a little steel into her back. “Songbird,” she whispers.

“Good.” The impatient rap of knuckles on the door sounds again, and I reluctantly remove my hand to point at Rosalie’s bedroom. “Go. Now.”

I follow her, wait for the click of the turning lock, then race to the front door. More thumping greets me, and I check the peephole to see who’s there, but it’s covered by a hand on the outside.

Fuck.

I pull my gun from its holster, holding it low as I call out, “Who is it?”

“Room service!” calls an unfamiliar voice.

It’s male and edgy and wrong. Room service shouldn’t have made it past Brewer at the elevator, let alone Linley at the suite door.

“Leave it outside,” I shout. “And back away.”

Silence, and then…

The light on the electronic lock beeps and flashes green, the door swings open, and a wiry man barely more than half my size throws himself through it, screaming and slashing at the air with a bloodied kitchen knife.

He doesn’t get any farther.

It takes me a split second to note he’s wearing a hotel staff uniform, and I take a shallow slice to the forearm at the same time I spot Linley collapsed on the carpet outside and the hallway otherwise empty. Thank Christ this guy is alone—but where the fuck is Brewer?

Head clear and heart pounding, I use the butt of my gun to stun the intruder, grunting as I twist him into a fucking pretzel and disarming him before slamming him to the ground and planting a violent knee between his shoulder blades.

“You psychotic motherfucker,” I growl as he fights the way I twist his arm almost out of its socket. His hair is lank and dull, and he stinks like stale sweat and bourbon. I hold my breath as I press my body weight into him.

I lean in close enough to whisper beside his ear. “Keep fighting and I’ll end you now. You won’t be the first man I’ve killed.”

He sinks into stillness for a minute, then jerks into life when a gentle gasp alerts us to the fact that we’re not alone.

I look up to see Rosalie hovering barely twenty paces away, one hand over her mouth and the color draining from her too-pale cheeks. In her other hand, she grips a brass candelabra tight enough that her knuckles are white. The candelabra is shaking. She’s shaking.

“I was scared,” Rosalie whispers. “I heard shouting. What if he hurt you? What if…”

She trails off as the guy beneath me snarls, spittle flying, and writhes to get free.

“I’m okay,” I reassure her. “You’re okay,” I add to reassure myself. “We’re both going to be okay.”

Shared fear and relief pass between us before Brewer bursts down the hotel corridor, gun held low as he registers the situation with one sweeping glance.

“Was he alone?” my partner demands.

Rosalie’s attacker giggles, a chilling sound that makes my stomach turn. “Yes, I’m alone,” he says. “I’m not sharing my beautiful angel with anyone. Those pretty lips belong to me.”

Rosalie wretches, and I throw my knee into the guy’s back. “Shut—the fuck—up,” I bark before turning to Brewer. “It looks that way,” I say between clenched teeth, “but I haven’t had a chance to search the floor outside the suite. Where the hell were you?”

“Taking a fucking leak—”

He glances at Rosalie and then cuts off without finishing his sentence. Instead, he kneels just outside the open doorway, presses his fingers to Linley’s throat, and then runs a qualified hand over her still form.

“She’s breathing,” he reports before speaking into his earpiece. “Linley’s down. Wound to the lower left flank. Head contusion. Blood loss. Suspect apprehended. We need backup and paramedics.”

Rosalie’s attacker lurches again, throwing himself against me and smashing his head into the floor hard enough to break a fucking tooth. Brewer produces a set of handcuffs, and I shift my position to give him room to snap them around the guy’s wrists.

The knife lies discarded on the white carpet, staining the pristine wool with bright red blood.

I glance at Rosalie. Her breathing is shallow and her gaze is glassy. She opens and closes her free hand like she’s trying to work feeling back into her fingers.

When I’m confident that Brewer has the guy in hand, I let my teammate drag him into the hall and cross the room to Rosalie.

The candelabra falls from her hand as I reach her, and though my heart is racing, it manages to speed up again with worry at how hard she’s trembling.

I pick up her hands, knowing and not caring that I’m not supposed to touch her unless it’s to protect her, but at the clammy chill of her skin, I decide touch is a kind of protection, and one I’m only too happy to provide.

She grips me like she’s afraid to let go.

“I can’t feel my lips,” she tells me as her attention drifts toward the open doorway, then the bloody weapon, and back to her hands engulfed between mine. “They’re… cold? I can’t feel them. I can’t feel my lips.”

My gaze drops to her mouth, pale and almost purple at the tips of her plump cupid’s bow, and Rosalie’s lashes flutter as her tongue sweeps out a little.

I lean into her, wishing I could hold her and warm her with my body, but I can’t.

I’m her bodyguard. She has a boyfriend. There are a hundred reasons this is wrong, including the way Rosalie leans into me too.

In the end, it doesn’t matter that I do the right thing. That I put duty and honor before temptation and resist the way Rosalie’s very being dismantles all my carefully constructed defenses. It doesn’t matter that I’m always the good guy, because the next day, I get fired.