The Alpha Bodyguards Books #1-3

Chapter Seventeen

I jerked awake and reached for a rifle that wasn’t there. Shaking my head, disoriented for a split second, I heard the shower and it all came rushing back.

A smile spread across my face.

Then I noticed the predawn light coming through the blinds and my gaze cut to the bedroom clock.

Four hours.

I’d been out for four hours and she was still in the shower?

Alarm hit my gut and I was on my feet, pulling on jeans in half a second.

Water running. Empty bathroom.

Fuck.

Fuck.

I knew what’d happened before I turned the water off, but I still couldn’t fucking believe it. I strode into the living room, looking for her bike anyway.

Right where I left it, the rusted piece of shit leaned against the wall in the front hall.

Idiotic hope surged. “Brookelyn?”

Silence.

I glanced out at the empty balcony, then my gaze cut back to the floor by her bike.

No backpack.

I checked the two other bedrooms just in case, but she wasn’t there. Standing in the entryway, my hands went to my hips, and that’s when I noticed it.

My keys weren’t on the entryway table next to my cell where I’d left them.

My hands automatically patted my pockets.

Mother fucking fucker.

Striding back to my bedroom, I threw on a T-shirt and stepped into my boots before walking back to the front hall and grabbing my cell. The whole fucking time I told myself I was overreacting, that she’d run out to grab coffee or some shit. That she was downstairs at the restaurant getting an early breakfast.

Leaving my front door unlocked, I hit the elevator call button and made up about a hundred other fucking excuses, but I knew.

I fucking knew.

The elevator opened on the parking garage level and I saw it immediately. My spot was empty.

God-fucking-damn it .

I called Luna.

He answered on the fourth ring. “Little early, bro. What’s up?”

“The chick from Dax’s. Brookelyn.”

“You mean the fake-name chica. Why do I get the feeling this conversation isn’t gonna end well?”

Because it wasn’t. Not for me. “I brought her home last night, and—”

“ Jesucristo , Collins,” Luna swore. “The Marines don’t give you enough shit to fuck with?”

Apparently not. “Woke up this morning, and she and my truck are gone.”

Pause, then, “What do you mean, gone ?”

I rubbed a hand over my head. “I fell asleep, she was beside me. I woke up, she and my keys and truck are gone.”

“ Mierda , bro.” I heard some shuffling. “I’m calling the cops, and I’m on my way.”

“No,” I snapped, before reining it the fuck in. “No cops. Can you access the security feeds for my building? Maybe see which direction she went?” What time she left. What she looked like when she did? Was she running scared? Was she a fucking scam artist from the get-go? Fuck, I didn’t know what the hell I was looking for, but I just fucking wanted to see her face again.

Luna exhaled. “Seeing which direction she went isn’t gonna help find your ride, amigo.”

Fuck. “I know.” Fuck . “I just… I ship out in a couple hours. I don’t have time to deal with this fucking shit!”

Luna was silent a beat.

“You there?” I snapped.

“Brother,” he placated, “you only got three more months.”

“I know how much fucking time I have!”

Luna’s tone turned shrink calm. “You already got a life waiting for you. I’m waiting for you. Christensen and Talerco are out. You got a job lined up. I know what you’re thinking. We’ve all been there.” His voice quieted. “But you don’t need her, man. Call the cops, report the vehicle stolen, then let it go. You don’t need this clouding your head downrange.”

My chest tight, my fucking jaw clenched, I started to sink. “I never said I needed her. Jesus fucking Christ, I fucked her. I didn’t marry her.”

Luna ignored my clipped tone. “Nothing wrong with wanting a warm chica to come home to, mi amigo. I get it. Trust me, I get it. But it’s not gonna be this chica.”

I slammed my fist against the elevator call button. “There a point to your bullshit pep talk? Because I don’t fucking need it. I need to see what’s on the security feeds, I need my truck back, and I need my fucking locks rekeyed.”

“All right, all right,” he placated like I was some pussy. “I’m on my way. Give me ten.”

“Fine.” I hung up and got back in the elevator.

Every goddamn floor the elevator dinged as it ascended, I sank further. I didn’t bother looking in the restaurant because I knew I wouldn’t fucking find her. She wasn’t the type to spend ten bucks on a coffee, let alone step foot into a place like that. If she’d been hungry, she struck me as the cold pizza type. I’d bet her thrift store bike on it.

Which only pissed me off more as I passed the piece of shit when I walked back into my condo.

Goddamn it all to hell, I’d offered that woman my fucking world. I knew she didn’t have shit. I wasn’t rubbing it in her face or holding it against her. I’d meant exactly what I’d fucking said when I’d told her to stay here. Someone should enjoy it. She should’ve fucking enjoyed it. Three months rent free, with no expiration after that. Unless we weren’t compatible.

But fuck, I knew we were.

I’d fucking felt it.

Deep.

Not just her pussy, but her fucking presence. Her stillness. Shit, her eyes. I’d wanted to drown in them. I knew she was hiding something, but whatever it was, I’d stupidly been confident enough I could’ve handled it. Psycho ex, record, dirt poor, drifter, whatever the fuck she was hiding, nothing in life was insurmountable.

But she was fucking gone. My truck was gone. And I was sinking into a black hole of emotions I couldn’t fucking name faster than I could pull my trigger finger.

All I knew was the moment I laid eyes on her, shit changed, and whatever that was, it was fucking with me, hard.

So hard that I was standing in my bedroom staring blindly at my bed when Luna walked in.

“Collins!”

I walked out to meet him.

Haircut still regulation, freshly showered, wearing a black polo and black cargos, André Luna sized me up with a single, quick glance before he set a laptop and a toolbox on my kitchen table. “You know what your problem is? You think too much.” He smiled like life was a fucking bowl of cherries.

He always smiled like that. Downrange, days out, covered in shit and sand and sweat, he’d still find a reason to smile like that. Fucker was also the best sniper I’d ever met. He taught me everything I knew.

“I don’t think enough,” I countered. “You wouldn’t be here if I did.”

He chuckled and opened his laptop. “Point made. Let’s see if I can hack into the security here.”

“Hack?”

“Yeah.” He grinned. “How else did you think I was gonna get access?”

I didn’t fucking know. “You own a security firm.”

“Personal security, bro. As in close protection. But I’m adding monitoring, surveillance, home security, business—everything. It’ll be up and running by the time you get back.” He talked casually as his fingers flew across the keys, like he was as comfortable with a computer as he was with a long-range sniper rifle.

I tipped my chin at his computer. “When’d you learn this shit?”

“Still learning.” He concentrated on his screen a moment. “Self taught.”

Fuck . “You expecting me to sit at a desk and hack away at keys when I get back?” Because that sounded like a death sentence.

“Only if you want to. I need boots on the ground more though.” Luna looked up and winked at me. “And we’re in.”

Damn. “That fast?” Thank fuck I wouldn’t be behind a desk.

“Yeah.” He chuckled. “I need to sell your property management my new services. They have shit security.” He turned his laptop toward me. “Okay, what time did she leave?”

Three rows of four columns, a dozen different views populated his laptop screen. They showed the security camera feed for a few seconds. Then the dozen windows flipped to new windows with new security camera angles showing every fucking corner, angle and recess of the building I’d never wanted to see.

Until twenty minutes ago.

“Start about midnight,” I told Luna. “Can we find the camera from my floor? ”

“No problem.” Luna typed a few strokes and the twelve camera angles cut to two, one from each end of my floor.

“That’s it. Can you speed it up?”

“Yep.”

The images started to move faster until I saw someone getting off the elevator and walk at an exaggerated pace toward my door. “Stop.” I pointed to the camera angle that was closer to my end of the hall. “Right there. Slow it down.”

Luna backed the footage up a few seconds then we watched a guy in a dress shirt and pants, phone in hand, exit the elevator and walk directly toward my front door.

“What the fuck?” I muttered, as I watched him stop and lean on the wall right outside my place. “What time is that?”

“Almost oh-one-hundred.”

“Who the fuck is that?” Did she fucking tell someone where she was? “He’s not looking up from his phone.”

Luna studied the screen as we watched the fucker scroll through shit on his phone. “It’s on purpose.” He rewound the footage and pointed. “There, watch when he gets off the elevator.”

Sure enough, the fucking prick made a quick glance up and down the hall before dropping his head, pulling his phone out and holding it in front of him while he walked.

I watched as the fuck stood outside my door for a minute before Luna sped the tape up again.

Twenty-nine minutes later, Luna stopped the fast forward.

At one-twenty in the morning, my front door opened and Brookelyn froze.

Her face registered shock then she tried to shut the door, but the prick put his foot in the way.

“Dios mio,” Luna muttered.

I didn’t say anything. I was watching in a silent rage as he reached for a curl of hair and twisted it around his finger.

The same gesture I’d done .

But that was only the beginning.

The Gucci-dressed prick leaned down and kissed her cheek then whispered in her ear. He stood back up, pulled on the lock of her hair before releasing it, then said something else.

Brookelyn shook her head.

Out of nowhere, his hand shot out and he grabbed her breast. Hard and punishing, he twisted in a show of dominance and Brookelyn flinched.

“Luna,” I growled low.

“I know, I know, amigo. Hold on, we need a shot of his face.”

I didn’t want to hold the fuck on. I wanted to find the asshole and fucking crucify him. I didn’t know if she’d alerted him to her whereabouts or what, but she clearly didn’t want to see him, and she definitely didn’t want him touching her.

That’s what I fucking thought…

Until I watched him step up to her, grab her chin and put his motherfucking mouth on her.

My hands fisted and my adrenaline went into fucking orbit as I waited for her to push him away.

But she didn’t.

The woman I’d fucked all night, the woman I’d offered my home to, the woman I’d laid my shit wide open for and come inside—she didn’t push the man away who assaulted her breast.

No.

She fucking tilted her head and kissed him.

Passionately.