Chapter Six #2
He lounged there with effortless stillness, long legs stretched out, hands easy on the armrests, as if gravity worked differently for him. Meanwhile, Chloe kept rearranging her mouse pad with the focus of a diplomat brokering peace between hostile nations.
“This is your command center?” he asked, amusement crinkling the corners of those soulful green eyes.
“For the time being.” She swept an exaggerated hand across the cramped space. “World domination, one glute workout at a time.”
He huffed a soft laugh. It reached his eyes. She pretended that didn’t affect her physiology.
“So,” she said, tucking a strand of hair that had come loose from her ponytail behind her ear and hoping her fingers didn’t look as trembly as they felt.
“Since we’re working together, I figured it’d help if we got to know each other.
You know, so I don’t keep calling you ‘hey, you with the muscles.’”
“Cher, I’d answer to that.” His smirk was lazy. Dangerous. “But sure. Ask away.”
She cleared her throat. “Okay. Um. Where are you from?”
“Cajun country. Little town named Breaux Bridge.”
“I hear it in your voice.”
“Yeah, the Cajun, she slips out sometimes,” he agreed, accent dipping just enough to prove the point. “You can take the boy outta Louisiana—”
“But you can’t take the Louisiana out of the boy,” she finished.
Their smiles met in the tiny space between them. It felt like a collision.
He rested his forearm casually on his thigh. “Grew up with my mawmaw. She raised me. Tough, tough woman. Loved hard, worried quiet.”
Something softened in his voice, barely there, but unmistakable.
Chloe tried to picture him younger. Tall, maybe lanky. Green-eyed and stubborn, navigating childhood in a place that smelled like gumbo and river water. “Was it just you and her?”
“Pretty much.” No elaboration. No defensiveness. Just a door gently closed. He tilted his head. “What about you?”
“Oh. Well.” She gave a crooked smile. “My family is complicated, like one of those genealogy charts that looks normal until you peer closer and realize each branch is hiding a landmine.”
He lifted a brow. “That bad?”
“Not bad. Just messy.” She tapped her pen, a steady rhythm betraying her nerves. “Mom died when I was six. Dad married the woman he’d been cheating with. Surprise half-sister. Surprise abandonment. Bonus therapy sessions.”
His eyes warmed, deepening into understanding. “That’s a lot for a kid.”
“It was,” she admitted quietly. “But my aunt and uncle saved me. Leo too. They gave me a family when I thought I’d lost mine.”
“Good people,” Kayne murmured.
“The best.” Her throat tightened a fraction before she nudged herself forward. “Okay, next question. How’d you go from Louisiana to becoming a . . . whatever you are now?”
He chuckled. “Security specialist.” A pause. “I enlisted young after my mawmaw passed away. Had a lot of anger and energy to unload somewhere. Military gave me a place to put all the things I didn’t know what to do with. I became a SEAL. Then, eventually, CObrA Securities.”
“SEAL?” Chloe blinked at him. “As in the dangerous kind? Underwater demolitions and jumping from airplanes? National heroes?”
“That’s the one.”
“Oh.” She swallowed. Well. That escalated. “So you’re . . . very good at this.”
“Protecting people?” His gaze locked onto hers, steady and unflinching. “Yeah, cher. I’m real good at this.”
The way he said it made something deep inside her go warm and unsteady.
“Okay,” she said quickly, needing a subject change before she melted into her ergonomic chair. “Favorite food?”
“Crawfish étouffée,” he answered instantly. “C’est bon.” Then, a beat later, “Or anything my mawmaw cooked in a cast-iron pot older than Louisiana itself.”
She laughed. “That tracks. I’m more of a protein shake and sweet potato fries girl.”
“Sweet potato fries are holy,” he said with solemn conviction.
“I knew you were trustworthy,” she deadpanned.
He grinned slowly, devastating in ways she didn’t have the emotional bandwidth to unpack.
“Your turn,” Chloe rushed out, redirecting her brain before it wandered into romance-novel fantasy territory. “Ask me something.”
He studied her, focused and genuinely interested. Not dissecting. Discovering.
“What made you start all this?” he asked, nodding at the planners and color-coded filming schedules.
“My videos?” She laughed softly. “A client moved away and begged me to post workouts online so she could follow along. I didn’t think anyone would watch. Maybe my aunt.”
“And now you’ve got ten million people hanging on your every squat rep.”
She groaned, cheeks heating. “It sounds creepy when you say it like that.”
“It’s true, though.” He leaned in just a fraction. “You built something big, Chloe. An empire. On your own.”
The compliment hit harder than she expected, as if someone had engulfed her in an enthusiastic, affectionate bear hug. It was nice, dangerously nice, being seen that way.
“I guess I did,” she murmured. “But sometimes I feel like I’m standing on the edge of a cliff hoping the wind doesn’t shift.”
His expression softened around the edges. “I’m here now. Ain’t no wind knockin’ you over on my watch.”
The words slid into her like low heat.
She cleared her throat. “We should get back to work.”
Neither of them moved.
Eventually, Kayne pushed up from the chair, his voice threaded with something she absolutely shouldn’t want. “Anytime you want to tell me more, cher, I’m right here.”
And as he stepped toward the door, Chloe had the very unsettling realization that she wanted to tell him more. Possibly too much, in ways that were entirely, catastrophically unsafe.
#
Kayne stepped into the hallway before he did something really stupid. Like walk right back in there, haul her out of that chair, and kiss her until both of them forgot why he was in St. Louis at all.
He exhaled slowly.
Lord have mercy. He’d been around beautiful women.
Plenty of them. The CObrA Securities compound practically ran on them.
But Chloe Giordano had a way of looking at a man that made his ribcage feel one size too small.
She had soft eyes and an open heart. All her energy was wrapped in muscle and stubbornness.
Chloe was the type of woman who didn’t just slip under your defenses, she pitched a damn tent and ordered room service.
He braced his hands on the wall and let his head drop forward, breathing in, then out to clear the energy buzzing through him. He tried to remember how long it had been since someone had looked at him as if he mattered.
Professional. That’s what he was supposed to be. Not some fool losing IQ points every time she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, pretending to be shy when he knew damn well she wasn’t.
“Get a grip, Serruto,” he muttered.
But the second he closed his eyes, her voice slid back through his head:
“I guess I did . . . but sometimes I feel like I’m standing on the edge of a cliff hoping the wind doesn’t shift.”
Something in him had gone rigid at that, as if old instincts were waking up, older wounds stirring. He knew what it felt like to pray the ground stayed steady beneath your feet.
And he’d meant every word he told her: “I’m here now. Ain’t no wind knockin’ you over on my watch.”
And that was the problem. The more he learned about her—the loss, the grit, the hope—the blurrier the line became between “job” and “I’d burn the world down before I let anything touch her.”
Kayne pushed off the wall and paced the length of the hallway, needing motion before he crawled out of his own skin.
The hallway smelled faintly of lemon cleaner and a trace of Chloe’s perfume drifting out under the door.
It was sweet and delicate. It in no way matched the steel in her spine, but somehow fit her perfectly anyway.
He should walk it off. Go check the perimeter. Call the office. Do literally anything except think about the way she’d smiled when he’d told her about Cajun country, as if she’d tucked the image somewhere special, and wanted to know the boy he used to be, not just the man he’d become.
Kayne scrubbed a hand over his jaw.
“Damn it, cher,” he muttered. “You gonna be the death of me.”
His phone buzzed. Good. He needed a distraction to tether him back to a world that made sense. It was a text from Logan Bradley: Status check. How’s the client?
Kayne huffed a humorless laugh. Complicated didn’t cover it.
He typed back: Client’s fine. Cooperative. Situational awareness improving. No breaches so far. Translation: Her smile could melt Kevlar, and I’m in serious trouble.
Another buzz.
Stay sharp, Serruto. Stalkers escalate fast.
Roger that. He slid the phone into his pocket. The job. The threat. The whole reason he was here. He wasn’t some kid with a crush. He was the barricade between Chloe and whatever darkness was trying to take aim at her.
And barriers didn’t get distracted. They didn’t crack.
Kayne drew another slow breath, forcing the heat, the ache, the want into a locked mental drawer he intended to revisit never.
He straightened, shoulders rolling back, posture resetting to full operational readiness.
Then Chloe’s laugh floated down the hall. It was light and airy. His pulse leaped before he could stop it.
He closed his eyes. “God help me.”
Then he walked back toward her office, every instinct at war: Protect her. Don’t touch her. Protect her anyway.
Don’t you dare touch her.
But as he neared her door, one truth anchored itself deep in his gut. He was already in deeper than he should be.
And falling fast.
#
Kayne was about to enter Chloe’s office when a voice chirped down the hall.
“Ohhh, my God, there you are! I was about to call Search and Rescue!”
He closed his eyes. Counted to three. Nope. Still her voice. He should’ve known peace was too much to hope for.
Danica swept around the corner, the human equivalent of a glitter bomb, hair bouncing and sunglasses perched on top of her head despite being indoors. She skidded to a halt when she saw him.
Then came the grin. Slow. Wicked. Criminal in at least seven jurisdictions.
“Well, hello again, Tall, Dark, and Cajun.” She planted a hand on her hip. “Did you miss me?”
Kayne blinked. “We met twenty minutes ago.”
“Yes, and those were the best twenty minutes of my week.” She sighed dreamily. “Possibly my life. Hard to say yet.” She snapped upright. “But! I need you.” She lifted one finger. “Specifically, your brutally honest male perspective.”
He stared. “On what?”
“This.”
And without even pretending to ease him into it, Danica whipped out her phone and held up a mirror selfie of herself in what could generously be called a dress but more accurately resembled a legit cry for help.
Kayne made a strangled sound somewhere between a cough and a choke. “You askin’ me if that’s appropriate attire for what? Church? A funeral? Ice-fishing?”
“Ha!” She waved him off. “Hilarious. It’s for a date tonight. Potential soulmate. Or potential terrible kisser. Time will tell.” She frowned. “Chloe claims it’s too much.”
Kayne considered the fabric, or lack thereof, with the weary calm of a man navigating a minefield. He replied diplomatically, “Depends on what you want the poor man to focus on. Conversation or other priorities.”
Danica gasped, delighted. “So you do think I look hot.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose. “I did not say that.”
“You implied!” Lash flutter. “And I trust your judgment. You look like a man who’s broken hearts in multiple states.”
Kayne prayed for an extraction team. Tactical smoke grenades. A rappel line through the ceiling. Divine intervention. Anything.
“Oh!” She clasped her hands, eyes flashing. “I know why you’re here.”
He froze. “Do you?”
“Obviously.” She leaned in as if she was about to leak classified intel. “Chloe has . . . issues.”
His brows slammed together. “Issues.”
“Romantic issues,” she clarified, sweeping her hand dramatically. “She shuts down. Panics. She hasn’t dated in forever. So you,” she waved her arms in an up and down gesture usually reserved for models unveiling luxury vehicles, “are exactly the man she needs to break the curse.”
Kayne opened his mouth. Nothing came out.
Danica plowed ahead, unstoppable. “You’re broody. Buff. Drop-dead gorge. You smolder.” She squinted at his arms. “I mean, look at those. Those aren’t ‘help-me-move-a-couch’ arms. Those are ‘carry-me-over-a-threshold-and-regret-nothing’ arms.”
Kayne considered self-defenestration. Headfirst.
“Danica,” he said tightly, “Chloe and I—”
Chloe stepped into the doorway, eyes ricocheting between them, already bracing for impact.
Danica beamed. “Perfect timing! I was just telling Kayne that he should absolutely sweep you off your feet, figuratively or literally. I’m flexible.”
Chloe’s face went scarlet. “Dani!”
“What?” Danica blinked innocently. “He’s beautiful. You’re beautiful. The world deserves this.”
Kayne cleared his throat. “Not sure that’s how any of this works.”
“Oh, hush.” Danica poked his pectoralis—poked him—as if he wasn’t a trained operative who could disassemble someone twice her size in under eight seconds. “You’re clearly into her.”
Kayne inhaled sharply.
Chloe squeaked, “He is not!”
“Mm-hmm,” Danica hummed. “Funny how that was her denial and not yours.”
Kayne opened his mouth and, for the first time in his adult life, had no earthly idea what to say. Brutal combat? Easy. Armed stalkers? Routine. A meddling half-sister with zero filter and unlimited confidence?
May God have mercy.
Danica clapped once, triumphant. “Anyway! I need you both to look at Option B.” She whipped out another selfie featuring even less dress. “Too much? Or just right?”
Chloe groaned into her hands.
Kayne looked heavenward. Why me?
Danica winked and said to Chloe, “You can text me your thoughts later.”
“I will not.”
“You will,” she singsonged, already strutting away. “Love you! Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do, which, honestly, leaves the field wide open!”
Silence dropped like a curtain.
Chloe finally lifted her head. “I’m so sorry.”
Kayne let out a low exhale that was one-third laugh, one-third disbelief, one-third spiritual surrender. “If she weren’t family, cher, I’d say we need to call in a specialist.”
Chloe groaned again. “She’s not always this bad.”
He gave her a look.
“Okay,” she conceded. “She’s always exactly this bad.”
His lips twitched. “One thing’s for sure.”
“What?”
“She’s gonna make this assignment a whole lot more interestin’.”
Chloe shook her head, embarrassed, apologetic, but smiling despite herself.
Lord help him, Kayne felt that smile land square in the center of his chest.