Chapter 1
Nash
Present day
I didn’t like when he got like this.
I mean, I didn’t like the guy, period, but I really didn’t like when he got like this.
He was quiet… too quiet. And not the kind of quiet that meant he was planning something, like trying to ditch me again.
No, it was the kind of quiet that he sometimes got when he was in the middle of doing something unimportant and his mind just wandered off.
Wandering wasn’t the right word, because that made it sound like he was just preoccupied. No, when he got like this it was so much… more.
What the fuck do you care, Nash? It’s not like this is a real gig.
I couldn’t deny the voice in my head was right. After all, babysitting a former president who lived in Bumfuck, Nowhereland, wasn’t exactly the highlight of my career.
The familiar bitterness that washed over me just served to piss me off.
In the first half-dozen foster homes I’d been placed in, I’d tried so many variations of being the perfect kid that I’d easily lost myself in the process.
By the time both my age and the count of foster homes hit double digits, I’d accepted that life wasn’t going to hand me a fucking break, and I’d reacted accordingly.
So, it wasn’t like I shouldn’t be used to being thrown a curveball every now and again. Or at just about every opportunity, since Fate seemed to enjoy fucking with me.
I forced the negativity away and focused on my charge.
Of course, all that did was piss me off again as I remembered the day before.
Babysitting Everett Shaw, former leader of the free world, had been meant to knock me down a couple of pegs, and hell if it hadn’t worked.
The man was a fucking pain in my ass – a fact that had been proven yet again the day before when he’d taken off on me after sending me on a fool’s errand to track down a magazine he’d supposedly left in the gazebo that he spent so much of his time in.
I’d returned with said magazine – which had turned out to be nothing more than a prop in a carefully planned act of rebellion – only to find the man had taken off in his 1941 Cadillac Series 61.
He’d gone so far as to employ his housekeeper and the groundskeeper to help him make his escape, but fortunately my predecessor had warned me that the man had a habit of ditching his Secret Service agents.
I’d gotten the impression that Shaw and Grady had formed some kind of friendship in the years they’d been together, but Grady had done his duty and shared the tidbit anyway.
A clear sign the agent had never forgotten he was honor bound to first and foremost protect the former president.
It was a fact I was grateful for, because if I hadn’t planted a tracking device on the man’s car, I never would have found him and I’d have paid for it with my superiors.
At this point, the assholes were looking for any excuse to can my ass, and losing track of my charge was sure to make that happen.
So I’d been in a carefully veiled rage by the time I’d tracked Shaw down at his friend Vincent’s house.
Grady had warned me all about Vincent St. James and his fanatical rules about not allowing armed agents onto his property, but I’d already made the decision that despite Grady’s loyalty to Shaw, he’d been too damn lenient with the man.
My intention had been to show Shaw and his friend that there was a new sheriff in town, but I’d let my irritation get the better of me and had made my decision based on emotion rather than reason.
Despite doing my homework on Vincent, I’d truly thought Grady was just over-exaggerating the mysterious man’s attitude and all it would take was a little bit of my own to show the former soldier who was really in charge.
I’d underestimated the man big time.
Big time.
Even when the tall asshole had come striding out of his garage, rifle in hand, I’d been slow to react.
Probably because I couldn’t have even imagined the balls it would take for someone to approach a federal officer so blatantly armed.
I’d told myself the weapon was just for show even as I’d scrambled to pull my own firearm from the holster, an awkward feat considering I’d still been sitting in my car at the time, which had been trapped between two gates leading onto the property.
But the weapon hadn’t been for show, and I’d barely gotten the first few words of warning out for Vincent to put the gun down when he’d shot out my tire.
Shaw had managed to diffuse the situation with his friend, but then he’d laid into me about not following Vincent’s ridiculous rules.
As someone who’d always prided himself on his ability to stay cool in any situation, something about having Everett Shaw talking down to me like I was nothing more than a misbehaving child had really done a number on me.
In that moment, I hadn’t given a shit that my words would likely end up costing me my job.
I’d gotten in Shaw’s face and practically told the man who’d once commanded the world’s most powerful army that he was acting like a spoiled brat.
Then I’d turned my fury on Vincent St. James, a man who’d already proven he wasn’t exactly the most reasonable of guys.
Fortunately, he’d surprised me again by seeing reason and had allowed me to inspect his property while he’d given me a rundown on the security measures he’d taken to secure the fortress-like home.
I hadn’t been allowed to go inside and I hadn’t asked to, since I’d garnered enough information from Grady to know that whoever the mysterious Vincent was, he cared a great deal about Shaw and wouldn’t let anything happen to him when he was in his presence.
Shaw and I hadn’t spoken again until several hours later when he’d been ready to go home.
Well, I’d spoken, he’d pretended to listen.
Vincent had helped me replace my tire with the spare, so I’d been ready to leave when Shaw had exited the house. I’d expected for him to try and rake me over the coals again, but he’d barely made eye contact with me.
A fact that should have been okay with me.
But it hadn’t been.
Just like it wasn’t sitting well with me now as I watched him stare off in the distance, a pair of gardening shears forgotten in his hand.
It was early in the morning and the sun was just starting to rise, but he’d been at work in his garden for more than an hour.
It wasn’t overly cold, but I still fought the urge to insist he come inside with me.
At fifty-eight, Everett Shaw was in good shape, but there was just something about him when he got like this.
He always looked so… frail.
Yeah, I didn’t like it.
I’d rather have him in my face acting like the confident leader I’d seen so many times on television when I’d been dreaming of the day when I’d protect his successor.
I refused to acknowledge the other reason that I couldn’t get that moment when he’d been standing so close to me as he’d berated me for breaking Vincent’s rule out of my head.
The early morning silence was broken by the muffled ringing of a phone.
I watched as it took Shaw several beats to even seem to acknowledge the sound.
His moves were slow as he searched the phone out and put it to his ear.
I couldn’t hear him talking, but it didn’t matter because a moment later, he was climbing to his feet.
When he turned, he actually seemed surprised to see me, though I had to wonder why, since I was practically glued to the man’s ass all day.
The only time we ever managed to get away from one another was at night and on my days off when another agent took over, though the lucky bastard rarely had to spend any time in Shaw’s company, since the older man was usually asleep by eleven each night.
Shaw studied me for a moment, his expression unreadable.
Then he was walking my way, his hands in his pockets.
The former president lived on a small estate just east of the Jefferson National Forest in Virginia.
The closest town was a good twenty minutes away and didn’t have much more than half a dozen shops and a single gas station.
Additionally, the surrounding land was sparsely populated, so when it came to threats against a man like Shaw, they were few and far between.
Yeah, there were always fanatics out there, but unlike many of his predecessors, Everett Shaw had kept a low profile since leaving office and that had served him well when it came to things like privacy.
Too well, it sometimes seemed.
Because besides Vincent and the married couple who served as his only staff and lived in a guest cottage on the property, there seemed to be no one in Shaw’s life.
No dog to greet him when he came home or a cat to curl up against at night.
It was just him and his roses and the television shows that kept him company night after night.
“I need to go to Vincent’s house,” Shaw murmured as he neared me.
“Of course, Mr. President,” I said as he passed me.
He paused briefly when I addressed him by his title, and I swore I saw him flinch, but then he was moving again.
It took him just a few minutes to get cleaned up and changed, and when we headed outside, he didn’t even argue about driving himself.
He simply walked to my agency-issued sedan and climbed into the back seat.
It was all so very perfectly routine.
And it irritated the fuck out of me.
God, what the hell was wrong with me? The man was behaving exactly as he should, especially considering the bullshit he’d put me through the day before.