Bulletproof (A Matter of Time #2)

One

In my life, I had been kidnapped twice, shot at, hit, chased down in a car, and yanked off the street. It sort of numbed you to surreal experiences. Because of all that, my brother, Dane, was certain that my gauge that sensed weirdness was way out of whack. It was possible.

Things that other people—normal people—thought were insane or horrifying didn’t normally faze me, so from time to time, I’d have a hard time differentiating run-of-the-mill crazy from severe psychosis.

This capacity for trust drove my partner, my husband, Sam Kage—we had gotten married in Ontario last year—crazy.

Now, being as we lived in Chicago and not Canada, our marriage wasn’t legal, but we did have a domestic partnership that we had registered with the great state of Illinois.

I loved that he’d wanted a ceremony, and standing in front of the judge—even though it wasn’t our country—made me deliriously happy.

He had been the same, and I missed seeing all that love in his eyes on a daily basis.

I had been working off my sexual energy at the gym, and I had been running like a man training for a marathon.

I even beat my brother at racquetball, which, normally, the stars had to be aligned for me to do.

When Dane stared at me with wonder all over his face, I told him I needed Sam to come home so I could get laid.

As always, when I overshared, I got the look of disgust that he could do better than anybody.

I needed to keep busy, so working on the weekend seemed like a good idea.

That was why I volunteered for a Saturday with Michelle Cooper instead of lying comatose around my loft for two days.

Normally, when Sam was home, Saturdays were for sleeping in, hours of sex, and a late breakfast/early lunch.

Sam in the morning—with his gravel-filled voice, soft eyes, tousled hair, and stubbly beard—could stop my heart.

His smile when he first opened his slate-blue eyes, the way they crinkled in half, the curve of his mouth …

I couldn’t help it; I suddenly had to shift where I was standing on the train because my jeans were tight across the front. I needed to stop thinking about my man.

Fiddling with the platinum band on the ring finger of my left hand, I got off at the Oak Park platform and descended the stairs to the street.

I loved it there—even used to live there—and adored all the little shops, the great restaurants, and the jewelry store that sold the Baltic Sea amber that my best friend, Dylan Greer, collected.

It had stopped pouring, but it was dark and overcast, the street squishy and wet with puddles, the air still smelling like rain.

As I passed a restaurant, the aroma of syrup hit me, and I had a sudden craving for French toast. I made a mental note to stop for brunch at a restaurant I liked after my walk-through/meeting/consultation.

A year ago, Aubrey Jenner—then Aubrey Flanagan—Dylan Greer, and I had had our own business.

But Harvest Design folded in the withering economy, and we were forced to sell and find new jobs.

I could not find one in my field of graphic design and refused to go back to working for my brother, so I ended up at Synergy.

What I had thought would be an okay job at the time—when I needed something, anything, and I was desperate—I now realized was slowly rotting away my soul.

“Dramatic much?” Dylan asked me over the phone.

She was not enjoying her job as an entry-level graphic designer at Tateman Limited either—because she was so much more than entry-level anything—but at least she was using her skill set.

“Oh, Jory, you are so using the gifts God gave you,” she snapped at me. “You talk to people better than anyone I know.”

I groaned.

“Then quit bitching about it and find a new goddamn job!”

And I needed to, but I could admit to being lazy because the job was effortless and I got paid pretty well.

“Call me later. I wanna go to that store that sells those weird spices, but that guy—”

“Charles.”

“Yeah, Charles. He hates me, so you hafta talk to him.”

“He likes you; don’t be stupid.”

“He likes you, Jory,” she assured me. “He wants to put his hands all over you. I can see it in that predatory way he looks at you.”

“Whatever,” I said, patronizing her.

“He does; you just don’t see it. You never see it until it’s too late.”

Whatever that meant.

“Fine, I’ll call you later.”

“Good. Go to work.”

So, I did, and when I called her when I was done, we went shopping together.

The spice store was our third stop in Chinatown, and Charles was his normal, helpful self.

I was pretty sure that Dylan was delusional.

She always saw more interest in the men around me than I caught myself. I suspected she was stroking my ego.

But I really did need a new job because working at Synergy—being an assistant to a counselor who assisted a matchmaker—was so not my idea of fun.

At Synergy, we did life makeovers, which was their upbeat, cue the band, way of describing their “process.” Ugh.

We came in, gutted your house, cleaned you up, and found you a partner.

It was like Queer Eye for the Straight Guy meets The Dating Game, except there were no cameras, and it took about a month from start to finish and had what they called check-ins or follow-ups afterward.

I went first with a counselor, as part of the team, and we met the client and documented the horror of his or her life.

Together, we created a file and reported back to our matchmaker.

There were five teams at Synergy, each headed by a matchmaker.

I worked for Michelle Cooper, who reported to Becker Rowe, our matchmaker, and finally to Blake Southerlyn, our managing director.

Reaching the house after eleven, I looked toward the front door and immediately saw Michelle and the rest of the team.

Even if I had not been looking for her, there was no way to miss her.

She was a knockout with her short, cropped blonde curls and green eyes, which were looking at me like I was the Second Coming.

She was crisp and polished in her Stella McCartney suit and gave the impression of cool poise, even as she crooked her finger at me.

My grin was wide as I walked toward her, my courier bag bumping against my hip as I moved fast to reach her.

“I could pass out right now with you being on time and all,” she said, laughing at me as I closed in on her.

“For you, I’ll be on time,” I said, returning her smile. “For Keith, I dunno.”

She nodded. “He does not like to work with you.”

“He’s a nozzle,” I told her, looking around at the others. “Am I right?”

“He’s right,” Lily Chow stated loudly while others grunted their agreement.

“See?”

“Jory!” Michelle tried not to laugh. “He and I are peers.”

“Like I care. He doesn’t want to work with me anymore anyway.”

“Yes, I know. Only Gina and I like you.”

I opened my mouth to tell her that I didn’t give a crap—again—but she silenced me with her hand.

“Fine,” I said. “But how come your husband’s lettin’ you work on the weekend? I thought you guys had a rule or something?”

“He has a big court case and something with the filing.” She made a face of disgust. “He can’t even take a break today and have dinner with me, so I’m flying solo anyway.”

“Oh good. Then you can eat with me after,” I said, joining her and the others on the porch.

“I would love to do that,” she said sincerely, smiling at me.

“Good. It’s a date,” I said, reaching out to fix her folded collar, probably messed up by her seat belt, smoothing it back into place before smiling at the other four members of her team.

“Hey.”

I looked back at her.

“What’s wrong?”

I shrugged.

“Jory?”

“Nothing,” I lied.

She took hold of my arm and led me a couple of feet away. “You hate this.”

“I don’t hate it,” I said as I fiddled with the silver chain around my neck.

Sam had given me a Saint Jude medallion a while back, and since he was the patron saint of the Chicago Police Department, I wore it to make sure he—the saint—knew I was paying attention. I wanted him looking after my man.

“Yeah, you do.”

“It’s fine, I promise,” I said, leading her back to the front door.

“J, event coordinating is not my favorite part of the gig either, but it’s a job, right? I mean, I don’t know about you, but I need the money.”

But she didn’t, not really. Her husband was a way scary attorney who made, like, five hundred dollars an hour or something. I was the one who needed the job.

“Okay?”

“Okay,” I assured her. “Now, c’mon. Let’s go in and see the travesty that is the man and the house.”

“Oh, I know,” she said, awe infusing her voice. “I can’t wait to get in there.”

“Really?”

“Jory, are you kidding? Are you seeing this house? It must be amazing inside.”

I thought the outside looked a little run-down and crappy.

“Look at the stained glass and all the natural woodwork and—”

But she had to stop when the door opened and we were faced with a blond-haired, blue-eyed man looking at us quizzically, if not downright annoyed.

He was taller than me, but most men were.

At five-nine, I was nowhere near big. But the stranger at the door was lean and muscular—not big muscular like Sam was, but few men were.

The stranger’s frame was carved and strong, obvious since the T-shirt he was wearing was hugging his toned chest and torso like a second skin.

It occurred to me that he looked like he belonged on skis in the Alps, wearing a parka, his first name Siegfried.

I had the urge to yodel, but stifled it, instead turning my head to Michelle, always deferring to the counselor, as well as the woman, in our midst.

“Good morning.” Michelle smiled huge, giving the man the benefit of gleaming eyes, rows of perfect and even white teeth, and lips that curved in the corner into a gorgeous smile. She was adorable.

“Good morning.” He smiled back, taking hold of the hand she offered him.