Never the Same (Delta Shield Security #3)

Prologue Hollis

Prologue

Hollis

“I could’ve been naked. What the hell are you doing in here?” Reed lingered in the bathroom doorway, a towel slung low around his hips, water still beading along his collarbone. I’d been waiting a good ten minutes for him to find me on his bed, petting his dog.

“And what would be so bad about that?”

His jaw flexed. “You’re just lucky I didn’t pull a gun on you like the last time you broke in.”

“From where, beneath your towel?” I asked with a laugh. “Besides, that home invasion ended just fine, didn’t it? I walked away without a single bullet hole.”

“Traitor,” he said to Ranger instead of acknowledging me, then motioned for him to get off the bed. I followed the order and stood as well.

Ranger sat protectively at my feet, as if worried his dad might bite me.

I mean . . .

Wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world to happen.

“Not his fault he didn’t give you a heads-up I was here. He loves me.”

“No clue why,” he grunted.

I ignored him, opting to take a moment to not-so guiltily check out his physique, because a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do.

Reed tore his hands through his dark hair, trying to tame the wild, wet strands with only his fingers. All he managed to do was free more water droplets, and they cascaded down to his broad chest.

I zeroed in on the tattoo scrolled across his rib in fancy black script and blurted out, “What’s that about?”

“You’ve known me for months, which means you’re well aware of the fact I don’t talk about myself.” He shoved away from the doorframe, and Ranger howled a little warning at him to behave. “Why would I start now?”

I continued to key in on what was written across the one rib, ideas percolating as to what it meant. “As someone who keeps their walls so high they might touch the stars . . .” I forced my eyes back up to his. “. . . I can respect your unwillingness to share.”

For whatever reason, my answer only seemed to annoy him more. He stopped before me, close enough that our Belgian Malinois barrier began whacking his tail against his daddy’s shins.

I did something both bold and stupid. I let my hand act on its own accord. Instead of tracing the tattoo, I went for his hair.

Reed immediately snatched my wrist, as if I’d left behind a trail of insults with that quick touch.

His jaw muscles stopped working themselves to death, and his gaze softened. “What happened to you? Why is there blood on your ear?”

Shit, is there? I jerked my hand back to deal with flyaways from my French braid, a lame attempt to hide what had happened at zero five hundred.

“Where were you before you came here?” He nudged his chin in the direction of his bed, now spotting the package I’d left.

I twisted to the side. “That’s a baby shower gift for Audrey. I was hoping to stash it here until her party.”

“Which isn’t anytime soon.”

“I know, but I had it with me, and I don’t want her finding it in my rental when I pick her and Chase up. We’re going for brunch in the city.”

Audrey was my best friend, and she had a nine-year-old son, Chase, who was my godson. Audrey had recently remarried, and her husband, Alejandro “Alex” Rodriguez, worked at Delta Shield Security with Audrey’s brother, along with Reed.

“What is it?” He stepped around me, picked up the package, and opened the lid. “A baby rattle. Is this thing made of real gold?”

“Of course.” I grabbed the blue box, closed the lid, and went into his walk-in closet, taking it upon myself to hide it. I bent over and set it on a shoebox. When I stood and whipped around, he was now bracing each side of the doorframe, trapping me in there.

“Tell me about the blood.” The demand slipped narrowly between his lips, the words painted in a cool, dark tone. If a voice could be described as a color, his was blue. He had a way of mellowing me out while also making me feel lost at sea with the waters rough and wild.

I kept quiet, trying to ignore my body’s response to his carved and cut one.

“Hollis,” he said like a protest.

“Jason.” I hit him back with the same moody tone, locking my arms over my chest.

“Reed,” he corrected, detesting whenever I used his first name. “The blood. How? Why?”

I closed the gap between us. “I get blood on myself all the time. It’s rarely mine.

Why is it a big deal? You know what I do.

” I freed my arms from across my chest and poked his pectoral muscle.

“I also know you were in Papua New Guinea three days ago getting blood on yourself, too. Tell me about your mission, and I’ll tell you about mine. Fair is fair.”

“My op was classified.” He walked into his room, nearly colliding with Ranger right at his heels. “Was your op local?”

“Close enough, yeah,” I admitted, joining him back in the bedroom.

“Why didn’t you ask for an assist?”

I arched my brow. “What makes you think I needed one?” I knelt alongside Ranger, who rolled over so I could rub his belly.

“Fine, fine,” I relented. “It was an easy op. You know, girl meets rich guy who promises her the world. She gets swept off her feet, marries him, only to find out he’s a corrupt and dangerous asshole who makes his fortune smuggling antiquities.

Enter me: saves her from the jerk and highly encourages the dick husband to rewrite his will before the Feds show up. ”

“Let me guess, he stole one of your family’s rare artifacts?”

I laughed. “You really think someone could ever get into one of our vaults and steal something?” I patted Ranger’s belly twice, then stood. “Anyway, that basically sums up the plot to a romance novel, yeah? So, there you go. Easy in and out.”

He shot me a funny look. “More like a thriller.”

“What do I know?” I shrugged. “I usually don’t have time to read for fun these days. But you like to read, right?”

“How would you know that?” The man nearly brooded me into tomorrow with that tight-eyed look of his.

“What, you don’t think I know about the books you’re hoarding?”

“I’d hardly call keeping a nice collection of hardbacks ‘hoarding.’” He squinted, then tore his hand through his hair. “Wait, they’re all in cabinets, behind closed doors. How do you know they’re in there?”

“You know what they say about doors?” I smirked. “Made to be opened.”

“And breached without an invite, apparently.” He gestured toward the hallway.

Remembering I had blood on me and needed to rinse it off, I walked around his muscular body to get to the sink. The blood may have belonged to that woman’s husband. In my defense, he should have known better than to try to kill me. It didn’t end so well for him.

“I wasn’t done in there, but sure, go ahead . . . help yourself.”

Faucet on, I caught his eyes in the mirror. “I’ll be out of your hair soon so you can get dressed. Well, unless you plan to lounge around naked all day. I’ve been known to do that on occasion at my place in the South of France.”

“Remind me never to barge in on you if I’m ever hanging out on a yacht I’ll never be able to afford in the French Riviera.”

“Mm-hmm.” I splashed some water on the side of my neck and ear and scrubbed the evidence clean. “You and I both know you wouldn’t mind walking in on me.” I turned off the water and dried my hands.

“In . . . your . . . dreams.” He slow-rolled those words before I faced him. “And are you taking your time here because driving me crazy is your favorite pastime, second only to saving strangers in distress?”

“Not trying to get a rise out of you, promise.” I lowered my gaze to his towel, praying for a slight twitch. Something to indicate he didn’t really hate me. At the least, wanted to have sex with me. Not that we’d be doing that, but still.

“No risk of that, don’t worry,” he said in a low, husky voice that was quite the contradiction to his words, right along with his biceps straining as he braced against yet another doorframe like he was trying to will himself not to set me on the counter and have his way with me.

We shouldn’t. The rational side of my brain knew that. My body? Not so much.

“Just keep the gift for me until it’s time for her baby shower, ’K?

” I waited for the muscular obstruction to budge.

When he didn’t, it took me staring at his tattoo for him to stop playing chicken and move.

“I have ten more minutes to spare before I’m due at Audrey’s.

” And she only lives down the street, so.

“I’ll hang out in your living room until then. ”

He turned toward me while readjusting his towel. “You asking for permission or . . . ?”

“That doesn’t sound very much like something I’d do, now, does it?” I took a moment to commit to memory this man’s glorious body, then left with Ranger before he could respond. “Maybe I’ll take a closer look at your daddy’s books and see what he likes to read, what do you think?”

In the hallway, Ranger went up on his back legs and pawed the air.

“I’ll take that as a yes.” I wandered into the living room, stopping at the built-ins flanking his flat-screen TV. Each had closed-door cabinets below, the kind of neat symmetry that was very Reed.

I went to my knees, sitting back on my heels as I opened the first door.

Rows of hardbacks greeted me. Mostly science fiction (no surprise there), but there was also a solid lineup of nonfiction, too.

I reached for one, curious, but froze when a sheet of paper slipped loose and fluttered to the floor.

Shit. I didn’t want to look. I really didn’t. It was one thing to break into his house and poke around. It was another to read something he’d clearly hidden.

But I’d already seen the letterhead, which had my pulse stuttering. The logo at the top was one I recognized, and dread prickled the back of my neck. A low hum filled my ears, and I could practically hear Reed’s voice telling me to leave it alone.

Ranger pawed my arm like he agreed, but it was too late. The guilt was already coiling in my gut as I read the first line. I now knew something Reed wouldn’t want me to—and no way could I unknow it.