Chapter 2 #3
“Anyway.” Why had she told him that, and with such sadness in her voice? “So, what’s going on?”
Finn turned to fully face her. “I have to go out of town for an emergency work thing.”
“Oh.” She blinked in surprise at the turn of events. “Perfect.” Turning away from him to hide her face, Julia looked toward the window. “I mean, you know how much I—”
“My replacement is on his way.”
Her shoulders fell at the news. Now she needed to ditch a new guy. Would that be harder or easier? “Is he a SEAL, too?”
“Yeah. Been out for three years now.”
She slowly faced him. “I thought you said last night you don’t walk away from anything.”
His gaze dipped for a brief moment, his eyes racing over the length of her fitted dress and down to her tan legs. “I don’t, but this job is important.”
She took one small step closer, her heels adding a few inches to her height, putting her at about five-nine now. “So, what you’re saying is that I’m not important?”
“I thought you were ready to let me go?” he asked, clearly confused and frustrated. “Isn’t that what you’ve been saying for two weeks?”
“I don’t approve of a replacement. Not going to happen. Call him and cancel.” She swatted a dismissive hand in the air. “It’s you or no one.”
With mere inches between them, Finn dipped his chin and narrowed his eyes at her.
What was that cologne he was wearing? He smelled incredible.
And why was she squeezing her thighs together again? Was she cured in the south-of-the-border region? Twice in one morning she’d been blindsided with sudden lust.
Finn angled his head, not backing down. “So, you do want me.” He shot her a cocky smile and winked before straightening to his full height.
“I don’t want to train someone new.”
He set a hand to his chest and frowned as if offended. “So, what you’re saying is you consider us like dogs to be house-trained?” He was teasing, but she deserved it. “Or like a pair of new high heels? Gotta break us in, huh?”
He pointed to her shoes, and she followed his line of sight, noticing how it lingered on her legs instead of her heels.
“If everything goes well, I’ll be back in three days,” he went on when she didn’t speak. “You can manage three days without me. Kevin’s a good guy. A bit flirty, so I apologize in advance.”
“What do you mean if everything goes well? What do you anticipate might happen?” Julia folded her arms, wondering why she felt a stab of worry about whatever the hell “emergency work thing” he was heading off to for three days.
Clearing his throat, Finn brought a fist to his mouth for a moment as if to buy himself time. She’d seen that look before. On her brother’s face back in the early days of the Iraq War, right before he deployed. A look that said he wasn’t quite sure how to say goodbye.
What was going on?
“I just meant the trip could get extended.” Finn casually shrugged.
“You’re lying,” she snapped out on impulse and tightened her arms across her chest.
“Am I?” Mimicking her posture, he crossed those bronzed, muscular arms over his chest, sending a whiff of that amazing cologne wafting her way. And with his forearms crossed, the veins popping—now she was the one fixating on his body. “I’m more than a bodyguard, by the way.”
“What do you do?” Look up. Stop staring at the arm porn. “What else do you do, I mean?”
“Security work. PMC. You know, like the stuff your brother’s friends do.”
“They aren’t private military contractors. They sort of bypass government regs.” When she met his eyes, he blinked a few times as if trying not to expose a secret or a bluff. “So, you’re working for the government on this three-day job?”
“Nah.” He lightly shook his head. “Something else. Just a quick assignment.”
“One that you believe is more important than me.” Why was she challenging him, keeping up the bitchy act?
After finally getting a lead, granted, it was a small one, but it was better than nothing, this was exactly what she wanted.
But Finn leaving her in the hands of this flirty Kevin guy, like she was just another job, hurt a little.
Besides, the last thing she needed was a new guy possibly botching shit up. She knew how to operate around Finn.
And time was running out with only three weeks remaining. If the lead on the doctor was a bust, she might be back to square one.
“I’m going out of town today. Overseas,” she blurted out like a So there, what’re you gonna do about it?
“What?” And there was that knee-jerk reaction she’d expected. “Why didn’t you give me a heads-up?”
“I didn’t know until five minutes before you showed up. I’m actually going to be heading to the airport now.” She swallowed and looked around her sparsely furnished condo for her laptop.
The framed photograph on the wall was the only decoration in the living room, and the furniture consisted of a white couch which was too uncomfortable to sit on, a glass coffee table in front of it, and a TV stand minus the TV.
She spied her laptop on the marble bar top separating the living room from the kitchen where she’d left it last night. “Once I get a ticket, that is.”
“Where are you going? Does your brother know?” Suspicion filled his tone.
“No, and you can’t tell him. Please.” Two quick steps and she was within kissing distance to the man. Of course, her heel chose that moment to go wonky. Her arms instinctively flew out, and her hands braced against the nearest object, which was Finn’s chest. “Client–bodyguard privilege.”
He lowered his gaze to peer at her hands on his chest. “I think you mean doctor–patient privilege. I’m no doctor.” He closed one eye briefly. “I was a medic in the Navy, though.”
“I didn’t know that.” For some odd reason, she couldn’t pry her hands away from the hard planes of his torso. At least she fought the urge to rub her palms over all those muscles.
He cocked his head slightly. “A lot you don’t know about me, princess.”
“I hate when you call me that.”
“And now you know how I feel when you call me commando. Makes me feel like I’m in some shitty eighties movie slashing my way through a jungle with a bandana wrapped around my head.”
In a jungle, huh? She almost laughed at the image he’d painted. She really did owe him a few apologies.
And then she remembered what was going on, and he’d be leaving her. “Choose me,” she whispered, then added in a stronger, almost surprising tone, “Pick me.”
He smiled. “Isn’t that a line from a movie? Not a SEAL movie, either. But I swear it sounds familiar.”
“You a movie guy?”
He shrugged.
Why am I still touching him? She stepped back and lifted her hands as if a police officer had asked to search her for a weapon. “Please. Choose me over this other job. I don’t want to go to Egypt with a stranger.”
His green eyes thinned in a hurry, and he was the one stepping back now, a stunned look on his face. “Egypt?”
“Why is that so hard to believe?”
His mouth became a hard, firm line. And his eyes cut to the Brazilian hardwoods beneath their feet as though he might be considering her request. “Where in Egypt?”
“Aswan. I assume I’ll need to fly to Cairo first and then get a connecting flight.”
Finn held a finger between them and lifted his eyes to hers. “Say that again.”
She repeated her words, still not following his odd reaction.
He dragged a hand over the light bit of growth covering his square jaw and bit out, “Why are you going there?”
“An investor’s traveling there, and I’ve been working hard to get a meeting with him.” She sucked at lying on the fly, damn it.
Finn’s attention went to the door, then back to her. “I need to step out and make a call. Just, um, wait here.”
“It is my place,” she reminded him, still perplexed as to why the hell he was acting so odd.
“Yeah, okay. Be right back.” He left the condo, and she took the chance to hurry to her phone to see if Mya had texted her the hotel details.
She breathed a sigh of relief at the text containing the address. Mya had followed it with a plea.
Mya: Do. Not. Go. Alone. I will call your brother. I can’t have you running around on your own chasing what could be the start of a big storm.
Shit. And Mya would call Michael if she knew it’d save her life.
She glanced at the door to the hall, then looked back at her phone.
Julia: Finn is going with me. You don’t need to tell my brother. I’ll text you later. Get some rest.
Mya: You promise?
Julia: Yes.
And hopefully, Finn would choose her over his other assignment, but after how horrible she’d been to him, she wasn’t so sure.
A knock at the front door a few minutes later had her pulse racing, and she hurried to let him back in.
He set his hand on the frame outside of the door as she held it open with her back, waiting for him to come in. But he remained in the hall, studying her.
Finn had once been part of an elite unit of operators. Of course, he’d be able to read her like a book. And from the look on his face, he knew something more than a business trip was taking her to Egypt.
“You’re coming out of town with me,” he announced firmly.
“Wait, what?” She expected him to explain further, but when he remained silently scrutinizing her, she asked, “Where are you going?”
“My assignment . . . it’s also in Aswan, Egypt.”
Now she understood his shocked expression a few moments ago. How could this possibly be a coincidence?
“There aren’t any commercial flights available today. We’re catching a free ride another way. A pit stop in Algiers first. We should be in Aswan tomorrow by four or five a.m. local time.”
She followed the line of muscle in his tense forearm with her eyes as his palm remained firm on the doorframe. “Who else is going?”
“My teammates. Harper, Roman, Wyatt, Chris, and A.J. We won’t be bringing Bear on this one.”
“Bear?”
“Our canine.”
Oh. Hm. Okay. Weird. “And you won’t tell me why you’re going there?
” Bad idea to ask because she knew he was about to follow up with the same question and probably push for a real answer this time.
An answer she knew if she provided, he’d take straight to her brother, and no one would let her on that plane.
“Only if you tell me why you’re going.” His lips twitched. Part smile. Or maybe worry.
“I need to pack,” she said quickly before he changed his mind.
“One condition,” he began, and she had a feeling he was about to lay down some ultimatums. “You stop being so damn mean.”