Chapter 12
CHAPTER 12
N o, don’t be ridiculous. She’s my bodyguard.
The words stung, even though she knew they were true. That’s all she was to him—a protector. So why did hearing them leave such a sour taste in her mouth?
She had no claim to him, even if their kiss had been… What? Explosive? Enlightening? Earth-shattering?
Goddamn it. She shook her head, wishing she hadn’t heard that.
And now Damian’s arms were wrapped around Christine, in the same way he’d held her not so long ago.
It just kept getting worse.
Hawk, who’d stepped in with her, assessed the situation. “We can’t let her go now. She’s a liability.”
“What?” Christine looked up, panic in her eyes.
“I’ve called the FBI. They’re going to take you to a safehouse.”
“A safehouse?” Christine’s voice trembled. “But I want to go home.”
“You should have thought about that before you broke into a guarded property and jumped a personal protection officer,” Thorn retorted, her tone crisp—because of him.
Christine blinked, looking every bit the damsel in distress. “But I didn’t know. I thought… I don’t know what I thought, but I had to come here and see for myself if it was true.”
Thorn did feel a twinge of sympathy. Christine had been Damian’s plaything, then discarded—but not entirely—and now she’d found out he’d married someone else.
To be fair, that would irk anyone. She’d want to know what the hell was going on too.
But to find out it was a ruse? The poor girl’s head must be spinning. It was enough to confuse anyone.
“You’ll be taken to a secure safehouse where you’ll be guarded until this is over,” Hawk continued, turning to Damian. “We might also need to discuss moving you to a different location.”
Damian scowled. “Why? I thought you said it was safer to stay here.”
Thorn glanced at Christine. “Hawk’s right. If she can get to you, others can too. This place is too big for one team to protect, even with the electric fence and additional patrols. Now that we know they’re using IEDs carried by drones…” She shrugged, letting the implication hang in the air.
“We underestimated their skill,” Hawk said. “But let’s get her someplace safe, and then we’ll talk about you.”
Christine’s lip quivered on cue, and she clutched at Damian.
Give me a freakin’ break.
Damian held her at arm’s length. “It’s only until the conference.”
“What about my things?” Christine asked, her voice trembling.
“We’ll send someone to your apartment to get them,” Hawk added.
Damian let her go. “I’m sorry, but it’s for the best, Christine.”
Thorn watched her face crumple. They couldn’t risk Christine talking to the media—or anyone else—about his fake marriage. Not only would it put her in the firing line, but it would compromise Damian too. He had to be kept safe at all costs. The FBI was counting on them to deliver him in Miami, next Tuesday. A week to go, then this would all be over.
“Let’s get her out of here,” Thorn said, when Christine looked like she might dissolve into tears again. “We can’t afford any more distractions.”
Even now, Hawk was away from his post, and the two men patrolling the perimeter had split up, one covering the front gate, the other watching the security cameras positioned around the property.
Hawk took a frightened Christine by the arm.
“I’m sorry,” she whimpered, turning her doe-eyes toward Damian.
He gave a tight nod. “I know. Take care, Christine.”
Thorn watched as Damian’s assistant was led from the house. Once she was gone, Thorn closed and locked the patio doors, before resetting the alarm.
“Are you okay?” Damian asked, his gaze dropping to her neck.
“Yeah, why wouldn’t I be?”
“She scratched you pretty bad.”
Shit, she’d forgotten about that. “I’ll go and see to it,” she said, turning to walk out of the room.
“This is my fault.” Damian’s low growl caused her to pause. “If I hadn’t led her on?—”
Thorn didn’t turn around. “Yeah, well, it’s done now. Nothing we can do about it. At least we got her before she jeopardized the entire operation.”
He didn’t respond, so she kept going toward the guest bathroom.
What a mess.
Thorn inspected the nail marks on her neck and flinched. The stupid woman had drawn blood. Hopefully, it wouldn’t scar. She cleaned the wounds thoroughly, then applied some disinfectant spray she’d brought with her, just in case.
Damian was right. This was his fault—but it was also theirs.
Christine had been impulsive and acted irrationally, but Thorn totally understood why. The poor woman had been left in the dark, not knowing how Damian felt about her. Then, when he’d suddenly gotten married, she’d fallen apart. Under the circumstances, Thorn could sympathize with her desire to find out the truth.
When she’d asked Damian if he had a significant other, he’d said nobody serious. Well, he’d forgotten to mention that “nobody” didn’t view their relationship quite the same way he did.
For Christine, it had been serious.
She’d developed feelings for Damian, and even though Thorn had suspected as much, she hadn’t realized how deep those feelings ran.
Bat-shit crazy deep.
Thorn glanced at her reflection in the mirror, feeling a pang of guilt. Her lips could still taste him; her skin felt scorched where he’d touched her.
Another line she’d crossed.
That kiss—oh my God, that kiss—had been a mistake. A ginormous lapse in judgment.
Why? What was it about him that made her react so irrationally? She thought about Christine. Maybe that was just the effect he had on women. He was the spikey, dangerous rock that they smashed themselves against, driven to a frenzy by his stormy gaze and lethal charm.
She gritted her teeth. That meant she was no different than his assistant. No more immune than Christine was.
Thorn inhaled deeply, then blew out the air, forcing herself to relax.
One week, then they’d fly to Miami, and she could put this behind them. She removed a blade of grass from her hair. All she had to do was keep Damian alive long enough to install his crypto update. A task that was getting increasingly more difficult with each passing day.
Damian was waiting for her when she came out. “Thorn, can we talk?”
“About what?”
He hesitated. “About what happened earlier, in the bedroom.”
“Oh, you mean that kiss? I thought that meant nothing.”
His eyes narrowed. “You overheard?”
She shrugged. “Forget it. It’s not important.”
His voice was a low rumble. “You know I had to say that. It didn’t feel like nothing to me.”
She sighed, feeling the sense of responsibility press down on her. “Look, it was a moment of weakness on my part. I should never have allowed that to happen. It’s against all the rules.”
“Bullshit. I?—”
“Forget about it, Damian,” she said softly, cutting him off. “It should never have happened. I could get fired if the others find out. Thank God you managed to shut her up in time.”
“They won’t find out,” he said quietly. “Not from me, anyway.”
Christine might still mention it, but an FBI agent was unlikely to care. “My only focus now is to get you somewhere safe so I can keep you alive until you get to Miami.”
He glared at her for a long moment. “Why are you being like this?”
“Like what? This is who I am. My job is to protect you, and that’s what I’m going to do.”
He hissed out a breath. “Was it Christine? Are you worried I’ve still got feelings for her?”
She scoffed, masking the ache in her chest. “No, of course not. I know she meant nothing to you.”
He frowned. “I wouldn’t go so far as to say she meant nothing.”
“Well, I know it obviously wasn’t as serious for you as it was for her.”
He stood very still, his eyes darkening to a gunmetal gray. “If you know it wasn’t serious, why are you pulling away from me?”
She took a deep breath, trying to steady herself.
Pulling away from me.
Why did he have to make it sound so… intimate?
“Like I said, Damian, it should never have happened. There’s nothing to pull away from. I’m sorry about that, but can we please just move on?”
His eyes probed her face, then finding nothing, he gave a tight nod. “If that’s the way you want it, sure. No problem.”
“Good.”
“Fine.”
She stood in the corridor and watched him march past her to his bedroom. A moment later, the door shut, and she heard him lock it from the inside. The sound of the key turning felt as final as a pin being pulled from a grenade.
An icy chill clutched at her heart.
Why’d she feel so… bereft?
She let out a long, slow breath, then turned to check the alarm system.
Focus. She had work to do.
No more distractions.