Chapter 9
The four of us are in the den, our makeshift command center.
We are huddled around monitors, tablets, and the endless paperwork that accompanies legitimate security concerns.
Hawk is reviewing implementation timelines, his finger tracing across the entire property’s digital security feed, marking blind spots and vulnerabilities that still need to be addressed.
Damon is taking notes with silent efficiency.
I am trying to focus on the iPad in front of me, on the rotating schedules and emergency contact lists and the thousand details that demand attention, when Jagger’s voice cuts through the professional drone.
“Um…” His tone arrests me immediately. Jagger is many things—irritating, immature, a menace to anything resembling professionalism, and a perpetual adolescent trapped in the body of a grown man with serious skills. But uncertainty is not among them. Uncertainty from Jagger is ominous.
I look up from the tablet. “What?”
He’s staring at one of the tracking monitors, his gaze fixated on the display of GPS signatures for each of the tagged vehicles.
His face has gone still in a way that makes my stomach clench.
He turns the monitor toward us, the screen pivoting agonizingly slowly on its articulated arm.
“Did anyone clear one of the vehicles leaving the property?”
I feel the blood drain from my face, my stomach performing a slow, nauseating roll toward my feet. “No.”
I should have known.
In retrospect, the warning signs weren’t merely present.
They were glaring, neon-bright, and impossible to miss unless you were willfully blind.
Which, apparently, I have been. The eye-rolling has been theatrical, performed with the kind of dramatic flair usually reserved for soap-opera actresses.
The sarcasm cut sharper than any blade, each word dripping with contempt for the very protocols designed to keep her breathing.
My denial of her last-minute dinner plans this evening was received with the subtlety of a declaration of war on her civil liberties.
Jagger’s expression answers before his mouth moves. I see it in the set of his jaw, in the way his eyes won’t quite meet mine. “Why?”
He swallows. “Because the Aston Martin just pulled up on Sunset Boulevard.”
The Aston Martin. The vehicle I specifically designated as restricted.
The one that Devyn Martin should not, under any circumstances, be driving.
I close my eyes, slowly and carefully, as though by controlling the speed of my eyelids descending, I might somehow control the chaos unfolding around me.
“For fuck’s sake.” The words tear out of me before I can catch them, scraping up my throat on their way into the world.
Damon and Hawk both look deeply unsurprised, while Jagger looks absolutely delighted.
His eyes are bright with the particular joy of someone who loves chaos, feeds on disruption, and finds entertainment in the exact situations that make my life a living hell.
“See?” he says, gesturing broadly as though presenting evidence in a criminal trial. “I told you she was going to be fun.”
“Fun isn’t the word I’d use.”
“Spirited?”
I shake my head.
“Independent?”
“No.”
“Difficult?”
I point my finger at him, stabbing the air like a blade. “That one. That is the word. That is the only word.”
Hawk sighs. It is not a small sigh or casual exhalation, but the deep, weary release of a man whose coworkers are actively shortening his lifespan. Without a word, he reaches into his pocket, pulls out a set of keys, then tosses them across the table in a gentle arc. “Go get her.”
Damon catches them one-handed, already rising from his chair, already moving toward the door.
Jagger has slumped in his chair. “Come on. He gets to have all the fun.”
“This isn’t fun.” I stand, my chair scraping against the floor.
“It absolutely is. You’re old and wouldn’t know fun if it slapped you in the face.”
I shoot him a look, and he throws his hands up in surrender, but I can see the smile playing at the corners of his mouth, the barely suppressed laughter. “Fine… But if she throws a drink at you, I want pictures.”
I seriously consider strangling him. I map out the steps in my mind—the distance between us, the angle of approach, the pressure points that would render him unconscious before he could make a sound.
Behind me, I hear Hawk, his voice carrying a note of exhausted authority. “Bring her back.”
“No promises,” I grumble, and Jagger immediately begins snickering, the sound following me down the hallway as I chase after Damon.
The entire drive is torture. Not because of traffic, though it is the terrible gridlocked, bumper-to-bumper nightmare that makes Los Angeles famous for all the wrong reasons.
The torture comes from the forty minutes of thinking.
Of being trapped in a moving vehicle with nothing but my own thoughts for company.
And those thoughts have fixed themselves on a single target with the relentless focus of a missile locking onto coordinates.
Devyn Martin.
Thinking about her is dangerous. I know this.
I have known it since the moment she opened the front door with her chin lifted and her eyes sparkling with defiance.
Thinking about Devyn Martin is like handling broken glass—necessary but dangerous.
Every scenario I play out in my mind makes me more irritated, frustrated, and acutely more aware of the impossible situation I now inhabit.
She knows there’s a threat. It is not a speculation but a fact.
And yet, she slipped out like an escaping prisoner who viewed the very people trying to protect her as the enemy to be evaded.
The image rises in my mind unbidden: Devyn Martin—beautiful and furious—sliding behind the wheel of that Aston Martin, checking her mirrors and pulling out of the garage with the confidence of someone who has never understood what it means to be hunted.
The image alone raises my blood pressure. I can feel it in my temples, a steady drumbeat of frustration.
Beside me, Damon drives with the patience of a saint.
Or maybe a hostage negotiator. He calmly navigates the clogged arteries of LA, his hands loose on the wheel and eyes scanning the road with the detached alertness of a professional.
He doesn’t try to make conversation; he knows better.
He can probably feel the waves of irritation radiating from my side of the vehicle and knows I am one wrong word away from exploding.
Jagger remains on speakerphone, his deep tone filling the cabin with updates from the house. “She’s still downtown. The car hasn’t moved.”
“Great.” The word comes out clipped.
“Actually, she’s been stationary for twenty-three minutes.”
“Even better.” I can hear the sarcasm in my own voice.
“Looks like she’s at a restaurant.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose, squeezing my eyes shut against the pressure building there. “Which restaurant?”
Keyboard clicking filters through the speaker, rapid and erratic. “Oh.”
“What?”
Then Jagger whistles, low and impressed. “Fancy. You are very underdressed.”
“Dammit, Jagger.”
“It’s one of those places where they charge fifty dollars for a cocktail because they serve it with glacier ice or something.”
Damon snorts, a burst of sound that he quickly suppresses. I stare out the windshield at the endless river of brake lights stretching into the distance, and all I can think about is how much I hate this city and this assignment. “Address.”
Jagger finally gives us the information, and Damon’s fingers dance across the touchscreen as he enters it into the navigation system. The route updates immediately, a blue line snaking through the red arteries of traffic.
Ten more minutes.
Ten more minutes until I will be having a conversation with a woman who is rapidly becoming the most frustrating client of my career—an impressive achievement, really, considering we’ve barely known each other for ten days.
At this rate, by the end of the week, I’ll either be arrested for strangling her or nominated for sainthood for not having done so already.
“You like her.” Jagger’s teasing comes through the speaker, cutting through my dark reverie. I freeze, my entire body going rigid, and my hands clenching into fists on my thighs.
Damon immediately starts coughing. It’s a terrible performance, transparent and theatrical, the kind of feigned choking that comes from trying not to laugh and failing completely.
“What?” The lone word doesn’t even sound like me as it cracks into the air.
“You like her.” Jagger sounds entirely too pleased with himself, his voice dripping with satisfaction.
“No.”
“Definitely yes.”
“No.” But even I can hear the lack of conviction in my denial.
“Fine.” He sighs, feigning his defeat. “But I don’t believe you.”
I reach out and disconnect the call with a jab of my finger, severing the connection with finality. Beside me, Damon loses the fight against laughter entirely, a low chuckle escaping him before he can swallow it down.
The restaurant somehow manages to be exactly what I expected, as though my worst assumptions about Los Angeles’ wealth and pretension have been manifested in the middle of Sunset Boulevard.
It’s expensive, that much is obvious from the curb and the line of luxury vehicles waiting for valet service.
It’s the kind of place that doesn’t need to advertise its prices because if you have to ask, you can’t afford to eat here.
This is a place for people who own yachts, who summer in places I’ve never been to, who view security concerns as abstract concepts rather than daily realities.
Designer clothing fills the entrance, fabrics that shimmer with understated wealth, jewelry that catches the fading light and throws it back transformed.
People stand around pretending not to notice one another while absolutely noticing every detail, cataloging status, calculating worth.