Chapter Seven #2
“I don’t mind,” she said, meeting Ford’s gaze, “but how long are you thinking? We can’t hide out here forever.”
“A few days. Maybe a week. I need time to come up with the next step.” He gave her a conciliatory look. “Preferably with your help.” Smart man.
“What about your job?” Didn’t he have a business to run?
He absently stroked the fur on Blitz’s back. She should’ve expected that any dog of his would be remarkably well behaved. Much better than the yellow lab she’d grown up with.
“My sister will handle any emergencies from San Francisco.” He downed half his glass of tea. “Day-to-day, the office pretty much runs itself. Sabine, my assistant, has been there longer than me, and she’s the real brains there. I trust her one hundred percent.” Apparently, he was also humble.
If he wanted to be truly kind, he could reveal a horrible flaw that would quell her minor obsession with him. But then doing so would probably just make her like the damn man even more.
“Where will you sleep?” Henri asked the question she hadn’t wanted to put voice to. “There are only two bedrooms.”
“Couch. Floor. I don’t really care.” He dragged a hand down his face. “I could probably fall asleep in this chair right now.”
Natalie’s heart softened. Outside of when he’d been injured, she’d never seen him so vulnerable. It stirred some protective instinct inside of her that she didn’t want to examine, and the heavy mood started to drag her down. “I don’t mind having a hot guy share my bed,” she said, with a saucy wink.
“I’m not sharing your bed,” Ford said, color rising in his cheeks. “You’re injured.” Sure, that was why.
“So if I wasn’t, you’d be fine with it.”
He made a frustrated noise in his throat.
With a glance at Henri, the little devil inside made her say, “I am cleared for moderate activity, but I was simply offering a place to sleep.”
He spluttered. “I wasn’t insinuating—”
“Oh, trust me. I know.” She gave him an innocent smile and he glared back. Sometimes pushing his buttons was too easy. And, if she wasn’t mistaken, Henri’s eyes twinkled at seeing Ford so out of sorts. Bonus point.
“Let him sleep on the couch,” the older man said, rising from his seat. “He made this mess.”
“No problem,” Ford said. “Thank you.”
Looking placated, Henri stood. “I will make dinner.”
“How can I help?” she asked. Normally she and Henri worked side by side, chatting, but with Ford here, the dynamic had changed.
Henri waved off her offer and strode around the couch to the kitchen. “Be ready to eat in forty-five minutes.” He flipped on an old CD player, and the bouncy rhythms of a man singing while strumming an acoustic guitar filled the air.
“What the hell is that?” Ford asked in a low voice, his eyebrows rising.
She laughed lightly. “Georges Brassens.” Hopefully she hadn’t butchered the name. “Henri said he was popular in the 50s and 60s.”
“He sounds like a campy, easy-listening version of Johnny Cash.”
“Same era, right?” She shrugged, feeling a little defensive on her host’s behalf.
“It’s growing on me. Apparently, a lot of his songs are anti-establishment, but I have to rely on Henri to translate.
Wait till you hear the one about the well-endowed gorilla who breaks out of a zoo and attacks a judge. ”
Ford’s eyes widened, and she laughed. For a brief moment, she could almost forget that her world had gone to hell.
Ford woke at four a.m. to the high-frequency buzzing of cicadas competing with birdsong and the occasional lowing of distant cattle. Moonlight peeked around the edges of thick curtains, illuminating Blitz in her spot on the floor, up against his makeshift bed.
He sat up and stifled a groan, his back protesting a night on too-soft cushions. Maybe next time, he’d set up on the floor with his dog.
She lifted her head and rested her chin on the sofa with a faint whine. “Go back to sleep, Beeze. I’m fine.” He scratched her between the ears until she dropped her head with an exaggerated sigh.
After using the toilet in the oddly shaped half-bath where he’d stashed his toothbrush, Ford couldn’t stop himself from walking the perimeter of the main floor, checking that the doors and windows were still locked, and peering out into the night.
The motion-triggered spotlights he’d installed last month in the front and back yards were currently off, but the softer lights that provided illumination around the property showed nothing amiss.
Over the background chorus of night sounds, the rhythmic, almost beep-like call of an owl stood out.
It reminded him of a heart rate monitor in both sound and spacing.
Or maybe a garbage truck backing up very slowly.
The first night he’d stayed here a few weeks ago, the odd call had woken him from sleep, and he’d looked it up.
Now, it comforted him. The owl probably wouldn’t stick around if anyone were prowling the area.
Saving Natalie’s bedroom for last, he shuffled quietly toward her door, which she’d left open a few inches.
He listened to the faint sound of her breathing, and let his eyes trace the shape of her body on the left side of the double bed.
A shell-shaped nightlight plugged into the wall reflected off her golden hair.
The sunny color wasn’t her natural shade, but it suited her.
And he noticed because he was fucking pathetic. How annoying that confirming she was okay made it a little easier to draw breath. None of the clients he’d been hired to protect over the years had affected him the way she did. And he’d sure as hell never kissed any of them.
But even four years ago, he’d wanted to, God help him. He could finally admit that. He’d somehow managed to take out Marinelli before the man could hurt Natalie, but now Ford only remembered her leaning over him, cupping his head, her gorgeous face white with shock, tears streaming down her cheeks.
His scar twinged at the memory, but he shook it off. He couldn’t afford to fall under her spell again. He had to be on his A game in order to keep her safe.
He backed away from the door, determined to get a couple more hours of sleep before Henri came down to make coffee.
A soft cry, followed by a string of curses, came from inside the bedroom.
“Natalie?” He pushed through the doorway and stopped at the sight of her sitting up in bed, wearing a pale, loose T-shirt that hung off one shoulder. “What’s wrong?”
“Ford?” Her voice was soft and a little scratchy. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“It’s fine. I was up.” He moved closer. “Are you okay?”
She laughed lightly. “It was nothing. Sometimes I forget I haven’t healed yet and move too fast, or the wrong way. I’m fine.”
His heart banged inside his chest as he looked at her.
“Why are you awake?” she asked. “Is the couch too uncomfortable?”
“It’s fine. I just needed the bathroom.”
“You’re a bad liar.”
He shook his head. How did she undo him so easily? “Usually, I’m pretty good at it.”
She gifted him with a small smile. “I spent a lot of time watching you. I’ve learned your tells.”
Was it dark enough to hide the heat that flooded his cheeks? Damned fair skin. “I have tells?” His stomach dipped at the thought of her watching him that closely.
One shoulder lifted. “Everyone does if you pay attention. They’re not the same though. You need a baseline of behavior to spot the difference.”
He knew this, of course. Knew it wasn’t like the movies where they made it seem like there were standard signs of evasion.
Sure, there were some commonalities, but also many other reasons for people to make certain expressions, avoid eye contact, or have other reactions when questioned.
Culture, past trauma, personality, upbringing, illness or physical conditions…
“I suppose that’s a good skill for an investigative journalist to have.” If that’s what she really was. He’d begun to have doubts.
“It definitely comes in handy.” She yawned and covered her mouth.
“Go back to sleep.”
She rubbed her eyes and dropped her bare legs over the side of the bed, facing his direction now. God, was she trying to tempt him? “Not sure I’ll be able to now. I can’t stop worrying about Emma or my family.”
He sighed. “I agree you should find a way to warn them. Preferably without confirming your…aliveness to the rest of the world. Just because you left the hospital with a heartbeat doesn’t mean you survived.”
“A lovely thought.”
“Sorry. I just meant that it’s safer for everyone if whoever’s after you still has doubts.
” God, why was he so bad at this? “We’ll figure out how to get in touch with your team without giving away your location.
Today, okay?” He wasn’t a total asshole.
It was just that Natalie and Henri’s safety was his top priority.
“Other than that though, I’d like to keep your status under wraps until we have a better idea who we’re up against. Better to keep them guessing. ”
She rolled her lips between her teeth and nodded. “Emma might have some idea who it is. That’s another reason I want to talk to her.”
“I also have an investigator of my own working on it.” He could protect Natalie better if he identified her enemy.
“Ford, without access to my bank accounts, I can’t pay you for any of this. If you let me contact Gretchen—”
“Gretchen? Why her?” Was there a connection to Natalie’s work and the woman who’d helped take down Remy Blaze?
Natalie blinked, and then her expression smoothed. “She’s a good friend. I trust her to keep a secret, she can watch out for herself better than my family can, and she’s very generous.”
He mostly believed her, but she’d gone very still.
She wasn’t the only one who knew how to catalog someone’s tells.
There was definitely more to the story. He’d let it go for now, but they were going to revisit her relationship to Gretchen soon.
“Don’t worry about the money. I’ve got it covered.
We can work out the details when the danger has passed and you reclaim your life. ”
Her brow furrowed, making her look a little sinister in the dim light. “Promise?”
“Absolutely.”
“Okay.” She glanced at the window as the raptor outside resumed its pulsing call. “What is that? I’ve heard it before but never remember to ask about it the next day.”
“A Eurasian scops owl.”
“Weird. It sounds manmade.” She squinted at him. “Did Henri teach you that? I think he has a secret plan to turn me into a birder.”
Ford laughed lightly. Seems she’d worked her magic on the old man too. “I looked it up the first time I heard it. There’s an app that can identify a bird by its sounds.”
“Oh, no.” She put a hand on her brow and shook her head dramatically. “I’m surrounded by bird nerds.”
He couldn’t suppress his grin. “I swear I’m not. Just curious by nature.”
“More like cautious,” she shot back.
His smile dropped. She wasn’t wrong. His focus on creating the safest environment for everyone in his care had been the death knell for more than one relationship, and it was a good reminder why he shouldn’t be here right now, chatting intimately in the dark with this woman.
If he let her distract him, he couldn’t protect her.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I was kidding.”
“I don’t see being cautious as an insult.
It’s who I am, and it generally makes me good at my job.
” He straightened and took a step back. “It’s letting down my guard that causes problems.” And he damned well better not forget it.
Tapping the door jamb, he turned away. “It’s still early.
Let’s get back to sleep. We both need it. ”
“Ford.” She sighed. “I’m not worried about my shoulder. If that couch is too uncomfortable, you really could share the bed with me.”
God, she had no fucking idea. He paused in the doorway, but didn’t look back. “No. I don’t think I could.”