Chapter Four
RHYS
I BARELY slept after I finally got home in the middle of the night, and now the mountain of paperwork sitting in front of me on my desk is pissing me off. Everything is pissing me off today.
Fucking sub-par, my ass.
The impish sparkle in her hazel eyes as she said it has played on repeat in my head since she pivoted on her pretty little, pink-painted toes and walked out of the room.
An agent has been sitting outside her house since I left last night, and after she practically fucking dared me to get an agent assigned to her, it’s been my personal mission today to get that done. The request is on a judge’s desk waiting for a signature.
I don’t know what I’m doing? Fuck that.
I know when a woman likes to be kissed. Women love when I kiss them. Although I’ve been so busy with work for the past eight or nine months that I haven’t even given women a second thought.
Why do I even fucking care?
I pinch the bridge of my nose with my thumb and finger and squeeze my eyes closed to try to reset my thinking, but for some reason those plump lips and the cocky way she crossed her arms over her chest are the first thing I see when I close my eyes.
Damn it, I don’t have the time or inclination for this.
Sanders leans his ass on the edge of my desk while I’m typing up a report. “So, what’s the deal with the blond last night?”
Of course he wants to know about the blond. Nothing is off-limits according to him, as long as you don’t get caught, it didn’t happen. I don’t even know how he’s kept his job.
Not looking up at him, I try not to show my irritation and keep typing. “No deal.”
I decided last night I will not think about the relief I felt when she said she wasn’t married with a ten-foot pole. It’s none of my business whether she’s married or not, all I care about is that she’s a witness. That’s all I need to care about.
“Is she single? Do you have dibs already? What’s her story?” He has a sucker in his mouth, and the slurping sound of him pulling it between his lips sets my teeth on edge.
If you look up douchebag in the dictionary, Sanders’ picture will be stamped on the page. I’m pretty sure he owns one style of shirt in ten different colors, every day he’s in a long sleeve henley with too many buttons undone over his chest.
Then there’s the giant watch on his wrist and gold ring on his finger that looks like a college class ring. I don’t think I bothered with a class ring in college. Not even when I was in the Army Rangers. Who does?
Sanders is a player who promises women anything they want until they sleep with him and then he moves on. His type gives men a bad name. He’s a fucking asshole.
My mom taught me everything she wanted me to know about women, all of which included respect and patience. Something about ‘the blond’ last night pushes every bit of patience I’ve been taught to the limit.
But at the same time, the thought of him even touching her makes me want to rip his jugular out with my bare hands.
All focus on what I was typing goes out the window, and I take a deep breath as I sit back in my squeaky desk chair and lift a brow. “She’s not available to you.”
He sticks his sucker back in his mouth and pushes it into his cheek with a big smile. It grossly scrapes over his teeth as he does. “You gonna make a move?”
Linking my fingers in front of me, I tap the pads of my thumbs together as I stare at him. “She’s a witness, Sanders, that would go against protocol.”
His smile gets even bigger, the purposeful day-old stubble not hiding the laugh lines on his cheeks, and he pulls the sucker from his mouth after it taps annoyingly against his teeth again. “She shot you down, didn’t she? Ha! I knew it. Swan and I had a bet.”
I lift my eyebrows and shake my head. Just as I’m about to tell him what a dick he is, I hear my name from across the room.
“Abbot!” Assistant Director Dunn bellows and closes his office door after we make eye contact.
Fuck.
“You’re in deep shit. We had a bet on that, too.” He pops his sucker back in his mouth as he slinks away like the fucking snake he is.
I lock my computer and cross the island of cubicles and computer monitors to knock on Dunn’s door.
“Come in. Close the door behind you.” He doesn’t lift his head from the paperwork on his desk and just points at the chair across from him with his pen.
The shine on top of his head through thinning hair reflects the light from the overhead fluorescents. His tie is askew around his neck, and his bifocals are perched on his nose like a librarian.
He’s been in this office since the 80s, and the crappy furniture proves it. Even the cubicles out in the fishbowl don’t have the type of fake wood veneer on them he has on this desk.
Grinding my teeth, I sit in the chair and watch the asshole look between his screen and the paperwork on his desk. The silence in the room is pulling the muscles across my shoulders tighter with each passing second.
Setting his pen down, he links his fingers together on his desk. “You want to explain why these guys ran right past you and flushed weeks of planning and money down the toilet?”
Leaning my elbows on the arms of the old, stained chair, I pivot forward. “Sir, a civilian walked onto the scene, and when they saw her, I tried to protect her identity by hiding her.”
His jaw ticks. “Except that while you were hiding her, they picked up her ID off the sidewalk.”
“I, and she herself, were unaware she had dropped her ID until after they were gone and she was looking for it.”
“Where was your fucking head, Abbot? Or should I ask which head were you thinking with?”
Keeping calm, I clear my throat. “I assure you, sir, it was a tactical error on my part. I did not see her drop her clutch.”
“Is that what I tell my boss? That my agent in charge had his eyes on a tight little ass instead of the job?” His head is getting redder as he speaks.
Somehow, his calling Ms. Harlow a tight little ass doesn’t sit well with me, and I grind my teeth together to stop myself from saying something I shouldn’t. If this little screw-up isn’t enough to fuck up my chances of promotion, telling my boss to go fuck himself surely will.
“With all due respect, sir, ensuring the safety of the public should come first in situations like these. I was watching the altercation between the subjects, and when Ms. Harlow stepped around the corner, I acted in her best interest.”
The vein next to his eye pulses under the skin as he stares at me. “You want to explain the request for an agent to be placed in her home? Expedited?”
“I thought it would be obvious, sir, if they have her ID, they know where she lives.” I’m dangerously close to being insubordinate, and I need to rein it in.
His breath through his nose comes faster. “Drive-bys sporadically throughout the day should be sufficient. Using money from an already tight budget is not easily justified.
“Nor is asking special favors from judges.”
Apparently, he knows I called in a favor to get an order for security on Ms. Harlow expedited.
“I respectfully disagree, sir. If her life is in danger, or even worse, if something happens to her between drive-bys, the family will be justified in suing. I’m not sure what budget that money will come from.”
I’ll never tell him that Ms. Harlow ensured I attempt to disrupt her life as much as possible on a matter of principle with her snarky little attitude.
However, I will keep ignoring the need to see her again that keeps swirling in my head.
He stares at me again, a battle of wills ensues as I let what I said sink in. He knows I’m right.
Leaning back in his chair, he sighs. “Fine. Congratulations, Special Agent Abbot, until further notice you are Ms. Harlow’s protection detail.”
You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.
All the wind in my revenge sails dies, and I feel like I’m bobbing on a churning sea that’s about to pull me under. Talk about backfiring. I stare at him. Any argument I might use is already dead in the pipe based on my aforementioned argument for Ms. Harlow needing protection.
Lifting my index finger to point at my chest, I jerk my head back. “I can’t be her detail. I’m in the middle of a case, stepping away right now would prove detrimental.”
Shit!
Fuck!
He tosses a piece of paper across his desk, it lands right on the edge, and I see the judge signed off on the protection detail below my signature as the requester. “Seeing as how it is so important for an agent to monitor Ms. Harlow twenty-four-seven, maybe you can find a way to do both.”
“There has to be another agent who can be her detail.”
“From whose budget, Abbot? You want to put Sanders on her?”
The double interpretation of that question has me fisting my hands on my legs. I don’t want Sanders anywhere near her, that fucker would land us with a sexual harassment suit so fast it would make our heads spin.
After last night, there is no way in hell that I could ever see Ms. Harlow putting up with, much less falling for Sanders’ advances; she would eat him for breakfast. But fuck, just the thought of him being anywhere near her sends my irritation through the roof.
Grabbing the order from his desk, I stand and walk out without another word. The door is not all the way closed before I hear him typing again, like the conversation didn’t happen.
That evening, I’m standing in the foyer of the Harlow house, after dismissing the unit sitting at the end of the driveway. A young girl who looks to be about twelve years old asks me to stay put while she goes to get ‘Aunt Kinley’.
The house is vast. From what I was able to research on the ranch, it’s twelve hundred acres and used to be a cattle ranch, but changed to a horse ranch, training, and boarding setup a couple of generations ago.
It’s been in the family for over one hundred and fifty years, and I think each generation adds on to the house to make it bigger.
The current owner, Clive Harlow, has six children, and his wife died after the birth of their youngest child. The oldest, Grayson Harlow, has never left the ranch and stands to inherit. He also lost his wife in a car accident almost eight years ago and has a daughter from that marriage.
The other two sons enlisted when they were eighteen, one forcefully after getting in trouble with the law into the Army, and the other went into the Air Force. Because they both moved into higher, elite levels of the military, information on them is sparse.
I met Mason when I was here last night, he looks and behaves like military, and from what I gathered, his wife and toddler son live on the property.
The guy, Jax, who was next to him in the hall, is also military, but I know nothing about him except that he is married to Mason’s sister, and they have infant twins.
Aside from Kinley Harlow, who makes a decent living as an artist, and Mason’s sister, Marley, there is the youngest sister, who is a veterinarian who just opened her own practice in Owasso.
As I’m looking around the foyer and the stairs that lead up to the second floor, I’m impressed by the simple grandeur of the home. Everything is wood and it’s bright, warm, and comfortable.
“I want to say it’s good to see you again so soon, Special Agent, but I don’t like to lie.” The deceptively pretty voice that has been in my head since last night has me turning toward a large doorway that opens to a dining room with a table that seats at least twenty.
Ms. Harlow is leaning against the frame in a pair of linen shorts that look like a very short skirt and a flowy tie-dyed tank top that has a pot leaf in sequins on the front and only comes to the top of the waistband of her shorts.
The smallest sliver of a tan stomach is peeking out at me.
There’s a little diamond stud hooked into her belly button.
Her blond hair, which was in a ponytail last night, is hanging in big waves around her arms to her waist, and she’s barefoot.
She’s crossed her arms over her chest, and one foot is propped on her tan inner thigh like some yoga move or something.
Her toenails are just as pink and pretty as they were last night.
My cock jumps in my pants.
I don’t have time for this shit.
Ignoring the blood rushing south, I pull the copy of the signed order from the judge out of my breast pocket and unfold it. Holding it up in front of me, she pushes off the frame and takes a step toward me to tug it from my fingers.
She takes less than a minute to read it, and her eyes narrow as she gets to the bottom. Her pretty, plump lips press together in a tight line, and in one calm blink, those hazel-green orbs slide up to look at me without lifting her head.
Somewhere in the distance, a group of cicadas start to trill together, the rising crescendo a perfect representation of the stifling hot middle of fucking summer, or as some of us like to say, hell.
Sliding my hands into the pockets of my slacks, I cock an eyebrow and smile. “You wanted an order signed by the judge? Your wish is my command, baby.”