Chapter 25
CHAPTER 25
CALLUM
Because Parker had texted that she was hanging out with the girls tonight, I headed straight home after my guided hike. I could clean my gear just as well there as the office. For months, this had been my standard operating procedure, retreating to my cave where no one had any expectations of me. Alone was how I liked it.
But tonight my house felt emptier than usual. Suddenly I noticed how bare everything looked. How little of me there really was scattered around. I could blame that on my years of military service, on having been trained to travel light and not acquire much in the way of things. But it was more a reflection of the fact that I had so little in my life beyond my career and closest mates. And I’d deliberately held them at arm’s length because it had felt safer than letting them in.
I hadn’t wanted to let Parker in. But she’d worked her way past my defenses in that sweet, relentless way she had, saving me from so much more than just the bloody phone. She made me want things. Things I’d told myself weren’t for a man like me. Things I still wasn’t altogether sure I deserved.
She’d spent less than twenty-four hours under my roof, yet she’d managed to leave her stamp on the place, at least in my mind. I kept picturing her curled up on the sofa, her behemoth of a dog stretched out on the rug beside her. She took up so much space for such a wee thing, and damn it, I missed her.
I didn’t know what Jade’s continued presence meant for us. Or for Parker herself. I doubted she knew, either. Not that we’d had a chance to talk about it. But we would. We’d make it work. Parker Lawrence wasn’t a weak-willed woman who’d let other well-meaning people dictate her life. Not after all the trouble she’d gone to in order to come here. I just had to be patient.
Not exactly my strong suit these days.
Wandering into my kitchen, I opened the fridge for a beer and pondered what the hell I’d eat for dinner.
The sound of tires on gravel pulled my attention to the front window. Parker had no car, so who the hell had come to interrupt my solitude?
I should’ve expected Finn and Alex. They’d been remarkably chill about the past few weeks, but clearly their patience was at an end.
I met the pair of them at the door, taking in the bag in Finn’s hand. “Is that takeaway from Taste of Mumbai?”
“We all had clients today, so I didn’t think any of us would want to cook.”
“And we figured you’d be more inclined to answer questions if we fed you,” Alex added.
“Fair enough. I’ve got beer.”
They trailed me inside. Finn unloaded containers on the kitchen table, while I retrieved two more bottles, and Alex opened the cabinets, looking for plates. The scent of warm, exotic spices filled the space, making my mouth water and my stomach growl. “Please tell me you got samosas and garlic naan.”
“I got enough food for a small army. I’m starving.”
We settled in, filling our plates with fragrant biryani and at least three types of curry. I ripped a piece of buttery naan in half and dipped it into the lamb rogan josh.
“So, are you going to tell us what the hell is going on with Parker?” Finn asked cheerfully. “And I dinna mean between the two of you.”
I’d held my tongue all these weeks, wanting to respect her privacy and give her the opportunity to tell them her story in her own time. But I no longer felt I had that option. My partners had a right to know about things that might well impact our business.
“Jade is Parker’s bodyguard.”
The piece of beef Finn had speared fell right off the tip of his fork as he stared at me. “I’m sorry. Bodyguard? What?”
“Why does Parker need a bodyguard?” Alex asked. “Who is she?”
I went brows up. “You haven’t looked?”
“No, I respected her privacy. Even after setting up that whole untraceable communication system for her. Do I need to look?”
Did he? None of us were accustomed to functioning without full intel.
“I’m no’ entirely sure. She hasn’t said a whole lot about it, even to me. But the long and the short of it is that she has fibromyalgia, and her parents are very controlling. She insists not in an abusive sort of way, but out of a well-intentioned, overbearing concern. She wanted to throw off the yolk of their control, so she and Jade planned this six-month tour of Europe. Except unbeknownst to anyone else, Parker set up a whole second set of plans, with burner phones and new bank accounts, and she gave her bodyguard the slip and set out on her own.”
“Jade is who she needed to contact without being traceable?” Alex asked.
“Aye. It took her this long to track Parker down.”
Finn looked impressed. “I knew she had skills, but I didn’t expect anything like this.”
I broke open a samosa, allowing the steam to escape before I bit in. “Aye, well, Jade’s been covering for Parker with her parents all this time, but that finally ran out, so Parker notified her family yesterday that she’s gotten a job and started a whole new life here.”
“So, now what?” Alex asked.
“Well, they both assume that her parents are going to show up, because they willnae be happy about any of this. I’d expect, based on the things Parker has alluded to, that they’ll try to force her to go home.”
Finn snorted. “Good luck with that. They have no idea they’re about to encounter the Wall of Quinn.”
“None of that tells me anything about who she or her family is,” Alex insisted. “Whatever chronic illness she’s got isn’t a reason for any normal person to have a bodyguard. Do you want me to look into her family and see what we may be getting into?”
I scrubbed a hand down my face. We’d never run any kind of mission without proper intel, and I desperately wished we were better prepared. And yet… “Hold off for now. It probably will come to that, but I’d rather give her the chance to tell me—us—herself without violating her trust.”
“Fair enough,” he conceded. “That still leaves us with her bodyguard. It was one thing for her to show up the past couple of days and help around the office, but where does this go? Are we looking at hiring someone else? I don’t know that we have that in the budget.”
“I don’t know. We havenae had a chance to really talk about what any of this means since Jade got here. I’m no’ sure Parker knows any more than we do.” And I definitely felt weird and twitchy because so many things had simply been left hanging, without being fully defined.
“Seems like that’s that, for now,” Finn observed.
We lapsed into quiet for a bit, as we all dug into our food.
Alex was the one who broke the silence. “So Parker spent the night over here the other night.”
I arched a brow and shoveled in some biryani. “It’s no’ what you think.”
When he just stared at me, I shrugged. “It could have been, but it wasn’t. We’re… easing into things.”
Finn narrowed his eyes. “You’re different with her. Better. Less angry.”
“It’s pretty fucking hard to hang on to all that around her,” I admitted.
“Not that I necessarily think this will happen, but just to play devil’s advocate… what happens if she decides to go back?” Alex asked. “What if they pressure her into it?”
I had to fight down my body’s instant demand for action. Because the idea that Parker would up and vanish as quickly as she’d come into my world left me shaken in a way I didn’t expect.
“I dinna think she will. She’s built a life across a bloody ocean because she doesn’t want to deal with this. With them. She wants to stay for the job. For this life.”
For me.
I didn’t say it, but I had to believe that we were building something. I didn’t entirely know what yet, but we’d just found each other. I couldn’t just let her go.
Clearing my throat, I tore another piece of naan. “I willnae allow her to be forced into anything she doesn’t want to do. Can I count on the two of you for the same?”
They offered sober nods.
“We’ve got your back, brother,” Alex said.
“Always.”
Knowing that was a comfort, even if I didn’t always know what that looked like in civilian life.
But after we’d wiped out the mountain of food and the pair of them had left, the niggle that we were going into this prospective ambush blind wouldn’t leave me alone. It drove me to my computer to do a little digging. I wasn’t Alex. I didn’t have his hacking skills, but I wasn’t without some ability to research myself. I wanted to know who I was prospectively facing off with.
Even with the limited information Parker had shared with me about her family, it took me less than five minutes to track down her father’s company. She hadn’t been kidding. Meridian Global had interests in all sorts of businesses all over the world, with satellite offices on four continents. Anderson Lawrence ran a hell of an operation. A quick image search turned up photos of him with business leaders and government officials from all over. I pegged him in his late fifties, with graying dark hair, and a general aura of I expect the world to behave in a certain way, so it does . I knew the type. I’d come from exactly that kind of world before I’d walked away to pursue my own path and thoroughly ruined my grandfather’s impeccable record for getting his way.
When Anderson Lawrence showed up to retrieve his daughter, he wouldn’t be prepared to take no for an answer. We could run a tight literal defense, but somehow I didn’t think that would do anything but antagonize the man. If Parker was going to be allowed to simply live her own life, we needed to get her parents’ trust and support. And that meant playing by a different set of rules. Rules I’d done everything in my power to escape.
I had another prospective source of information on the likes of Anderson Lawrence. One that could probably tell me a lot more valuable information than whatever Alex might dig up. It just meant I had to sell a little piece of my soul to get it.
Was Parker worth opening that door?
I thought of the dozens of moments of joy I’d been witness to since she walked into my life—all her quiet triumphs—everything she stood to lose, and I reached for the phone.
He answered on the second ring. “Hello?”
“Grandda, it’s Callum. I need your help.”