Protected by a Hero

by Susan Stoker, Cristin Harber, Cora Seton, Lynn Raye Harris, Kaylea Cross, Katie Reus, Tessa Layne

  “I saw him choke you before. He played it down, and you”—Parker’s brow furrowed—“went back.”

  “Like I said, that was a mistake. I had a bagbiting plan to save Bacon, but—”

  “Bagbiting?”

  “Oh.” Her eyes went wide that he picked that up. “It means—”

  “I know what it means. Your plan didn’t fail; you just didn’t keep yourself safe.”

  Wariness ran over her. He even thought in the same terms she did. “Right. So faulty strategy. I was stupid.”

  His head shook slightly. “Nope. I don’t buy stupid.” Parker grabbed his beer and drained half of it. “If you need to go to the cops or whatever for—” He cleared his throat uncomfortably. “For anything he might’ve done, I’ll be your ride. I’ll… be whatever you need.”

  “Oh …” She had fanatical notes. Everything was written in code, so only she could understand it, but it was there. She had saved a couple of selfies that showed bruises, blood. But showing those humiliating pictures to anyone… she just couldn’t process that. “I don’t want to. I’m not ready for everything that comes with that.”

  His jaw flexed as if he wanted to disagree. “You change your mind, you let me know.”

  “Alright.” Because what was she going to say? She’d stayed with a man who hurt her. The floor was suddenly the most interesting thing in the room. She couldn’t tear her stinging eyes away as a knot tied in her throat. The hopelessness and loneliness that had strangled her before seemed ridiculous, especially when there were people in the world like Parker, but… she squeezed her eyes shut. Slowly, she pushed through the bevy of emotions choking her and locked her gaze on Parker.

  “What do you do again?” he asked, completely off topic.

  “Website testing.” Her standard answer.

  “What else?”

  More than he could comprehend. Her standard thought. Yet maybe not. But she didn’t trust him enough to even start an explanation. “That’s about it.”

  “You won’t leave an abusive home without your computer—”

  “It’s my livelihood.”

  “Your dog’s name is Bacon Byte.”

  “She’s tiny as a postage stamp, fat as a hog. We both love bacon.”

  He smirked. “I saw her collar. Byte. With a y. You’re not making a play off an appetizer there.”

  Defensive, she pushed her shoulders back. “What’s your point?”

  “You speak hack and text inarticulations, you recognized bells and whistles in my office, you almost died for a computer. You do more than web security.”

  Even as he called her on things that most never noticed, she couldn’t say the words. She wasn’t confident enough in herself to share her true colors with an outsider. Matt had broken her down to this point. Instead of agreeing, she shrugged. “I like the idea of hacker culture. That’s it.”

  And that was true.

  Parker mulled her words over and nodded. “I get that.”

  They sipped their beers, her dancing around sharing too much and him likely trying to figure out all of the pieces that put her together. Though why he pushed, she didn’t understand.

  He ran a hand over his face. “I’ve never been able to get you out of my head. Before today. Before all this.”

  Her head pulled back, shocked, on its own accord because she was too busy trying not to pass out. “What?”

  Parker’s tongue ran over his top lip. “What I don’t know is—you.” His forehead furrowed. “And why you’re hiding that from me.”

  “I don’t mean to.” She sucked down a breath as though it might fortify her soul. “And I’ve thought about you—”

  As if Matt had ears in the room, the lights went black. The quiet hum of appliances slowed and silenced. Fear bled into her veins. Matt wasn’t leaving Parker’s house without her.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  “Nope, screw this.” Parker shot up from his chair. The chair clattered on the floor, and he grasped Lexi’s arm, pulling her close. The top of her head came to his chest, and when he bent his chin to touch it, the scent of his shampoo in her hair teased him mercilessly while he listened for incoming danger. “Nothing’s going to hurt you. God, that fuckin’ drunk-ass dick.”

  But just because Parker wouldn’t let Matt hurt her didn’t mean the guy wouldn’t try. When Parker got his hands on Matt, there’d be no question about where the line was and how far Matt was to stay away from it.

  “Parker,” she whispered, her voice tinged with fear.

  “Give me a second.” His ears ached as he listened to the point he could hear his heartbeat. Maybe hers. “One more second.”

  No sounds.

  But this wasn’t a regular power outage. The timing was too perfect. This was a drunk dude ripping wires out of his breaker box, though even the act of doing that would trigger an alarm to Titan. What gnawed at Parker’s chest was that the backup generator hadn’t kicked on. The breaker box and generator weren’t together, which meant Matt had to have been hunting around his property. Dude was further gone than Parker initially realized.

  As his eyes grew accustomed to the dark, he walked with Lexi to a wall, then carefully, he peeked outside. His gaze ran up and down his neighborhood. The street lights were on, and a few houses had porch lights on or windows lit. Confirmation that this wasn’t a power outage.

  He needed to assess if there was an immediate incoming assault. Was Matt gonna firebomb his window with a Molotov cocktail? Was he going to shoot at the bedroom windows? What was that asshole going to do?

  “Stay put a sec.” Parker swiveled to a nearby bookshelf and ran his hand under it, removing a Glock.

  “Why do you have a gun in your bookshelf?” she whispered.

  He held the weapon down, his finger itching to feel the Ghost trigger, and he moved back to the petite woman shaking in the dark. “Occasional hazards of my job.”

  “Are you kidding me?” But she clung to him. “Parker—”

  “Sweetheart, I need you to give me a quiet second. Okay?”

  With no immediate offensive to prepare against, he changed tactics and headed to stash Lexi in the safe room. Then he could pull up the video feedback and disengage the alarm system. Whatever was about to happen didn’t need to involve the cops, and he could explain the alerts to Boss Man later. This was between him and Matt.

  Click.

  Parker pivoted toward the breath-of-a-noise at back of the house. Was Matt picking his lock? If so, then awesome. The doors had a built-in security feature that handled petty moves like that. If any door was forcibly breached, the security protocols snapped into effect. The first of which would happen any second.

  “Let’s go,” he said.

  They bounded up the stairs and crested the top one when Parker heard a cry of male pain. Matt had disabled the last tumbler in the back door, which meant volts of electricity had shocked him.

  “What was that?” she asked.

  “The door’s wired to give an electrical shock under breach protocol.”

  “Why does your house—”

  He tucked the 9mm into the back of his waistband and snagged a flashlight from the hall closet. “In you go.” He scooted her into the reinforced space masquerading as a guest room and turned on the flashlight. “You’ll be fine, but I’m locking you in.”

  “What?” She shook her head. “I don’t want—”

  “Safest place.”

  He pressed a kiss to her lips that slowed the spinning world. The seconds his lips seared hers, her fingers dug into his shirt, and he went from shoving her into the safe room to backing her against the wall, kissing to their tactical, strategic detriment.

  He broke away—surprised that his body had taken over when his mind would never have allowed a slip like that—and every fiber of his being rioted at their distance. He cupped her face and spent a tick of a second longer than he should have sliding his fingers over her skin and down her neck. “Damn, Lex. You’re dangerous.”

&nbs
p; Then he hurried away before he shut them both in the safe room and kissed every inch of her, from behind her ears to the tips of her toes.

  “Focus,” he growled. As he hurried toward his office, he couldn’t get the taste of her off his tongue. Clearly his self-lecture hadn’t worked.

  Parker booted up the monitoring system that ran off a centralized battery, cancelled the alerts, and quickly moved through the feedback. A figure who had hidden his face—clearly Matt knew where the cameras were, so the asshole wasn’t that drunk—headed to the breaker box, then disconnected the generator, and finally headed for the back door. Asshole. The footage showed Matt falling backward then crawling away from the door and running off into the dark.

  Pussy. Still, he wanted to check the exterior and reconnect the generator while Lexi was safe. Parker stormed across his bedroom—stopping for a nanosecond to take in his mussed sheets where Lexi had been in his bed—then snagged a backup weapon, just in case. If Matt was still there, Parker would make it clear he wasn’t playing games.

  He moved through the house to the back door and disarmed the lock. The night was silent as he stepped outside and waited for Matt to bum-rush him from the shadows. “Show your face, asshole.”

  Silence.

  Parker pulled the door shut, engaging the lock from the exterior side, and slid around his home. His body anticipated sucker punches and attacks. He listened for the swish of clothing or a step in the grass. Still, he didn’t hear anything other than expected neighborhood noises. He moved past the bushes to the electrical box. The small metal door had been left open.

  He glanced in, expecting to see cut wires, but they were intact. Squinting in the dark, Parker angled to keep an eye on his surroundings and still study the box. His wires weren’t cut, switches weren’t thrown. A tingle of uncertainty fell over him. How had the system gone down? He used the flashlight app on his phone to study the breaker box. Nothing abnormal caught his eye—except. He peered closer. What the—?

  A tiny electro-jammer was secured to the back interior wall. He ran his finger over it, confirming that it was exactly what it looked like. He scratched his thumb over it, popped it off the back of the metal box, and crushed the tiny device. The lights on his house blinked and illuminated.

  A strong current of apprehension ticked at his thoughts. What was Matt doing with technology like that? The guy was a blow-it-up-question-later kind of guy. Nothing like this. Confusion and concern at what he was missing racked Parker’s brain.

  He moved back inside, locked up tight, and re-engaged the security system. Then he hit the stairs, taking three steps at a time. After opening the panel hidden in the wall, Parker punched in the code, and Lexi’s steel-enforced door unlocked. He twisted the door knob and—ducked as a flash of motion came toward his head. When he looked up, Lexi, nightstand lamp in hand, jerked back, ready to smash it against him again.

  “Easy!” Parker stepped to the side, hands up. “Lex, sweetheart, it’s me.”

  She blinked, eyes peeled wide. “Tell me what happened.”

  “Your ex is an asshole.” He tugged her hand, dragging her downstairs behind him. “And we’re not staying here.”

  “Parker.”

  “Jamming my power and breaking in my goddamn door.”

  “Jamming?” she repeated, pulling up beside him.

  “Since when does that prick know shit about technology?” Parker mumbled, more pissed than making conversation.

  Her face fell, all the color fading. “What? Why?”

  “There was a—” Fuming and confused at the attempted breach, he shook his head. “Never mind.”

  “No, tell me.”

  Then his eyes narrowed on her. He thought about her vague familiarity with technology. “Do you know what an electromagnetic jammer does?”

  She nodded, her face saying she was absolutely familiar with the term. “Maybe.”

  “Well, Matt apparently does too.”

  Lexi slowly shook her head. “There’s no way.”

  “It didn’t get in my breaker box on its own, Lex.”

  Her face darkened, lines pinching her sweet face. “I’ve caused enough of a headache here. Can you drop me at my sister’s house?”

  “Are you kidding me?”

  “No. I should go.”

  “So wait, a sister? Thought you said you bounced around foster homes.”

  A brief flash of acknowledgment crossed her face. “I just need to go.”

  “Lex—”

  “Will you take me? If not, I think you know I’ll brave the elements.”

  “What the hell is going on with you?” Because if it didn’t sound like an idea worthy of a caveman or jail time, he’d tie her sweet ass to a chair and keep her safe.

  “I have to get out of here.”

  His mind turned over everything he knew, and none of it made sense. There were secrets all over her face. His anger and alarm blurred together. He wanted to shake some common sense into her. Wanted to lay down some kind of law that if she was hiding anything from him, she should stop and rely on him instead.

  “Haven’t I done enough to earn your trust yet?” he asked.

  She dropped her head. “Don’t be like Matt, questioning what I want to do, when I want to do it. I’m asking you to take me to my sister’s. I’ve caused enough trouble and need to go.”

  The comparison was like a wave of ice-cold water. He stepped back and hated their distance, but worse, he hated wanting to protect her while she wanted to leave. “Whatever you say, Lex.”

  But his mind shocked him as he held back the words, “Please don’t go.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  It was well after the middle of the night. Lexi was back in her clothes, and Parker was pissed at her as he drove her to her sister’s. Her mind crunched every possible piece of data she had, which only confirmed that she had a problem and needed to go dark after talking to Shadow.

  Lexi buried herself in Parker’s sweatshirt. She said she’d give it back but planned to steal it. Like it or not, no matter their connection, there was the chance they’d never see each other again, especially given how the night was ending and his understandably frustrated response.

  “You sure about this? Did you talk to her?” His knuckles were pinched tight on his steering wheel.

  She had already sworn up and down that Meredith was expecting her and that Matt wouldn’t think to go over there because of how much her sister traveled. Mere wasn’t expecting her, and lying to Parker wasn’t the greatest thing to do, but it was the right course of action. “Yes. She left the door unlocked, told me to go in when I got here.”

  “Okay,” he said in a voice so low she wanted to lean toward him. “I’ll walk you in.”

  “No, you don’t have to.” But if he did come up with her, then she could drag him back into the dark. He could press against her as he’d done when the power was out; he could take her mouth as though neither of them cared who else was in the dark. A shiver ran up her spine as she thought about the power in that kiss.

  “You don’t have to be so secretive with me, Lex. You get that?”

  She tilted her head. “Why do you have guns hidden in your bookshelf? Why is your door electrified?”

  He grumbled. “Touché.”

  They arrived at Meredith’s swanky apartment building, and Lexi wished the drive had taken a hundred miles longer. Parker shifted his SUV to park and turned his smoldering gaze, so hot that the seat warmer had nothing on him, toward her. With just the strength of his look, he held her stationary.

  “Look, Lex, you need to get something.”

  God, he made her feel fuzzy from the inside out. “What’s that?”

  “I’m not him, and whatever you’re holding so close to the vest? You don’t have to.”

  “I do.” She nodded, looking at Bacon, who was asleep on the floorboard.

  “So at least you admit that there is something.”

  “Maybe.”

  He grabbed her hand, whi
ch she hadn’t realized was fidgeting. “You disappear, I will find you.”

  Her blood jumped a few degrees hotter because he’d smiled and said nice things. How messed up did she have to be to simply get aroused from kindness? From the growly quiet and protective manner with which he cared for her?

  “I won’t disappear for long.” She unbuckled and jumped out, grabbing her laptop bag and a still-sleeping, snoring Bacon. As she slammed her door, she heard a second door open and shut. Oh, God. Lexi kept her head down and powered toward the apartment’s front door.

  His shoes slapped the ground behind her. Her stomach somersaulted. Parker was running after her. Like running after her, and she couldn’t breathe.

  “Hey.” He stopped in front of her so abruptly that she almost ran into his brick wall of a chest.

  Bacon let out a loud snore but didn’t wake, and Lexi guessed that the poor dog was sleeping so soundly because it was the first time in weeks that she hadn’t felt the need to remain on constant safety patrol. Parker’s hands steadied Lexi, then he pulled himself away as though he’d grabbed her too hard. But with him, it was never possessive enough. Crap, she didn’t want to leave him. Not yet.

  “Wait a sec. Okay?” His breath came out as a cloud in the cold.

  “I should go inside.”

  “I need you to stop.” Hesitation was written all over him, as though he had no idea what he was doing, and that confusion in and of itself was baffling.

  “What are you doing?” she whispered.

  His palms went to his face, running his fingers into his hair, where they knotted. “I want to—I don’t want to hurt you. I need to grab you. Hold you. I want to feel you. But damn it…” Uncertainty danced on his face. “I’m not the guy who knows how to help with whatever you’ve been through. I don’t regret much, but I already regret ruining the chance.”

  His words made her boneless. Standing was a challenge she didn’t think she could meet for much longer. “The chance at what?”

  “At you, sweetheart.”

  Oh God…

  As though he were inching through a minefield, he closed what remained of the distance between them. “I work with numbers. With code. You know I went to MIT but then I became a Marine. Now I’m Titan. I call what I see. It’s either black or white. One way. One order. One goal. So that look on your bruised face, coupled with trying to make sense of today? I want to drag you back to my car. I want what you do not need. And if I let you go, I’m sure of it, you’ll be gone. It’s that simple.”