by Ivy Layne
Aiden absorbed my words in silence, words I hadn't been aware I was going to say. Aiden might be here to warn me off his sister, but since he'd led with Evers and Brennan, I was thinking he was also here to find out how Charlie was really doing.
I wasn't going to let him in until I understood his relationship to Charlie better. He took a breath and seemed to come to a decision.
"It's a little early for beer," he said. "Do you have any coffee?"
"Follow me," I said, leading Aiden through the front rooms of my house into the kitchen at the back. My house was smaller than Charlie's overall, but the lower level was about the same size and laid out in a similar way—living room and dining room off the front hall, kitchen in the back.
Where she had the office and bathroom, I had a family room with a flat screen open to the kitchen. And unlike Charlie's mess of construction, my house was mostly finished.
The front rooms didn't have furniture yet. I hadn't had time to deal with them. But the kitchen was done and it was just about perfect. Dark cabinets, a custom poured concrete counter and matching island, high-end appliances, a wine fridge, two farmhouse sinks, and a wet bar in the butler's pantry beside the family room.
It was good-looking enough to make a decorator happy and functional enough for a guy, whether he liked to cook or just liked having cold beer close to his TV. It suited me, and I knew if I ended up flipping it, buyers would love it.
I had the same style single-cup coffeemaker Charlie did, and I had Aiden's coffee brewed a few minutes after we hit the kitchen.
He took it and said, "You redid this place?"
"You don't already know?" I challenged. I was curious to see if Aiden Winters could cut through the bullshit. It turned out, he could.
"I was going for polite, but if you'd rather do it this way, I'm good with that too."
"I don't like to waste time either," I said.
"Fine. I know you redid this place practically from the studs. Nice job, by the way."
I acknowledged his complement with a nod but didn't interrupt.
"You paid for the house, and all the work, in cash. You have zero debt. According to your tax return, you made well over a million dollars last year. It would've been a lot more if you hadn't gotten sidetracked avenging your brother, for which you took no money at all.
"You're former Army, and even Cooper couldn't find out what you were doing for them after you transitioned out of the Rangers, but whatever it was, they didn't want to let you go. You're trained in security and protection, but as you've built your business, you've left that behind in favor of hacking jobs that are mostly white hat. What I don't know is why a guy like you is rehabbing a house in the Highlands."
"I thought you were going to ask what a guy like me is doing with your sister," I said.
I wasn't thrown by his recitation of my history. Aiden Winters was tight with the Sinclairs, tightest with Cooper. I knew Cooper Sinclair, knew all of them. Cooper could find out anything. He was almost as good with the keyboard as I was.
I was surprised that Aiden appeared to be dodging the issue of my fucking Charlie. If she were my sister, I would've started with that. I probably would've started with a punch to the jaw.
"I don't have to ask what you're doing with Charlie," Aiden said, shaking his head. "Charlie is a beautiful woman. She's smart, and funny, and any man would be lucky to have her attention. When I heard about this, I didn't wonder what you were doing with Charlie. I wondered what it was about you that made Charlie stop and look.
"She has men after her all the time. If she were ugly and dull, she'd still have men after her all the time because she's a Winters, which makes her a target. But she's not ugly and dull. She's Charlie. She can fend off attention from men in her sleep, and most of them, she ignores. So what's she doing with you?"
Annoyed at his tone and the question, I shrugged. "Maybe she's just slumming," I said.
Aiden laughed, amusement bringing his austere features to life.
"Don't ever make the mistake of underestimating Charlie," he said. "She's not slumming."
"How do you know?" I challenged. "You're not going to tell me I'm her type."
"I don't know if Charlie has a type. God knows, the men she's dated haven't worked out. I think she's still trying to figure that part out. But I know she's not slumming because no one she'd bother to spend this much time with would be a step down. Do you get me?"
I wasn't sure I did. Not that I considered myself beneath Charlie. All of that was bullshit. But I knew most people looking at us would see it that way. William Davis certainly had. Charlie didn't, but I'd assumed her brother would.
Apparently, I'd been wrong.
"If you respect her judgment that much," I asked, "then why did you fire her from a job she loved?"
"Because she was miserable. She was fucking miserable. And she didn't love that job. I know, because I do love it. I work long hours, but I do it because I love it. I love the company. I love that I'm able to continue my family's legacy, to grow it.
"Charlie never felt that way. It was killing her. She was always stressed, headaches, not sleeping. I stopped hearing her laugh, and then I stopped seeing her smile. I love my sister, and the only reason she started working at Winters Incorporated in the first place was because she thought it would make me happy. Everyone else took off to do their own thing, and she wanted to support me so she decided she was going to take Gage's place and help me run the company."
"And you let her?" I asked. His answer wasn't what I'd expected. I thought he'd blow me off again or lie.
"At the time, I didn't really think it through. At first, she just wanted to intern, and she was a teenager. Then, she was there more and more and I was distracted with changes in the company and my marriage—"
He cut off and shook his head, his eyes tired. He pressed his lips together, digging grooves into the skin of his cheeks and around his mouth. Aiden might love his job, but he looked like he could use a day off.
"I should have done a better job raising her after our parents died. I left her with Elizabeth too much, and Elizabeth wasn't the maternal type. I didn't do right by Charlie. I let her think the company was where she belonged. I liked having her around, and she was damn good at her job, so I let things slide.
"When I finally saw how unhappy she was, I knew I had to do something about it. Believe me, I tried talking to her. I told her she had to slow down, that she needed a life outside of work. But I'm a shit example because I'm even more of a workaholic than she was. She ignored me and kept working herself harder until she was utterly miserable. So I fired her. Yes, I get that she's pissed, and yes, it was a dick move. I know that. I can own it."
Aiden's glare was defiant, but he'd answered my question. He might have gone about it the wrong way, but Aiden Winters adored his sister. More than that, he respected her. Good enough for me.
"She got her revenge with your Macallan," I said, not hiding my grin when his glare turned into a scowl. "That was the best whiskey I've ever had. If you want to buy another bottle and then piss her off again, let me know so I can make sure I'm around."
"God damn, Charlie knows how to twist the knife. That was a fifteen thousand-dollar bottle of whiskey." Aiden saluted me with his half-full coffee cup. "Pay attention, Jackson, so you know what you've got coming when you eventually piss her off. You'll have to stay on your toes with Charlie."
Shit.
I thought he was coming over here to warn me off, and instead he was giving me his blessing. A problem because Charlie and I weren't dating. We weren’t together. She wasn't my girlfriend.
Shit.
"I don't think you understand," I tried. "Charlie and I aren't . . . we're not . . . she doesn't—" I shut my mouth. There's no good way to tell a man that you're just fucking his sister.
"I really don't need to know the details," Aiden said with a grimace. "Charlie is a grown woman. She can figure this shit out on her own. If she needs advice, she's got Maggie. If
you fuck her over and she wants your ass kicked, that's a different story."
He eyed me, tracking me from my toes to the top of my head before he grinned into his coffee cup.
"You've got a good four inches on me, so I might have to call for backup."
"I'll keep that in mind," I said, amused.
Aiden looked like he was in good shape, and he was no lightweight, but I'd been trained by the best. He'd need a lot of backup if he thought he was going to take me down.
I wasn't worried about it. By the time things ended with Charlie, she'd probably be happy to see me go.
"Cooper says you don't take jobs like this very often anymore, but I want to hire you."
"Jobs like what?" I asked, pretty sure I knew what was coming.
"Security. Bodyguard. I want to hire you to guard Charlie."
I didn't bother to cover my laugh. "No fucking way," I said once I had myself under control. "Don't get me wrong. I'm not scared of your sister, but I'm not going out of my way to give her an excuse to put my balls in a vise. Jesus."
"I know you can keep your mouth shut. And I know you have other work on your plate, but I want you to watch over Charlie full-time and I'm willing to make it worth your while."
"Why me? Why not get someone from the Sinclair team? They have a whole division trained for exactly this kind of thing."
"You're already with her most of the time, anyway. And if I try to put a bodyguard on her, she'll go ballistic. Anyway, do you really want one of the Sinclair guys on her twenty-four seven? Sleeping in her house? Driving her around?"
Fuck, he had a point. I most definitely did not want one of the Sinclair team attached to Charlie at the hip twenty-four seven. That would put a serious crimp in my plans.
Goddammit.
An unwelcome thought occurred to me. Charlie had invited me into her bed, so I knew she liked my type. Big, rough, dangerous. Sinclair had a diverse team, but I could guess that the guy he'd put on Charlie would be muscle. Meaning, a lot like me.
Charlie was mine. This wasn't long-term, but for now, she was mine, and I wasn't sharing her with some fucking meathead, with a gun, that Sinclair thought was good enough to keep her safe.
Fuck that.
Making a decision, I said, "I have a job running that I can finish today if I put in a few more hours. Everything else is flexible for the next two weeks. I'll be on her around-the-clock as soon as I get this job wrapped up."
"That works," Aiden said. "Just send me an invoice when it's done, and I'll take care of it."
I resisted the urge to chuck my coffee cup at his head. "I'm not sending you a fucking invoice. You're not paying me to watch Charlie. I'm watching Charlie to keep her safe from the psycho after her."
"I'd rather you didn't tell Charlie about this conversation," Aiden said.
This guy just kept getting funnier and funnier. I shook my head.
"No fucking way. I'm not setting myself up for that. And tell your friend William Davis to get off her case."
Aiden took the last sip of his coffee and crossed the room to put the mug in my sink. "I already did," he said. "I told him to back off of Charlie—and you—if he comes by again. I'm sorry about that. We all love William, but he's a relic. He wants the girls married and having babies while they do what their menfolk tell them. He can't quite absorb that the world has moved on. He’s so obsessed with telling us what he thinks our parents would say that I think he forgets he used to argue with them all the time about this stuff. He means well."
"He might mean well, but he's a jackass," I said. I was beginning to understand William Davis's role in all of their lives, but that didn't mean I was gonna let him upset Charlie. Aiden nodded.
"If he comes by again, let me know. I'll see what I can do, though he doesn't listen to me any more than he used to listen to my dad. Just nods his head and then goes on giving me the same speech he always does."
"Yeah?" I asked, suddenly curious. "What does he give you shit about? I thought you were the king of the family."
"I am," Aiden agreed with a glint of laughter in his eyes. "But apparently, I never should've divorced my first wife—who was a raging bitch, as Charlie will be happy to tell you—and it's high time I found a new wife and started breeding the next generation of the Winters family. He recommended I find someone who will do what she's told and represent the family appropriately. He threatened to bring me a list of candidates."
"Jesus, that's sucks," I said, openly laughing at him.
"Believe me, I know. It's only gotten worse since Vance and Maggie got engaged. Maggie is old Atlanta and William is over the moon that Vance—whom he's given lecture upon lecture about the art, the tattoos, and the long hair—managed to snag Magnolia Henry. He thinks she's redeeming him. Yet I'm still single. And after all his resistance to Abigail, he's throwing her in my face, too."
Imitating William's patrician voice, Aiden said, "I fail to understand how Jacob and Vance have managed to find appropriate women and you are still single. You're letting down the Winters family name, Aiden."
"I'm seeing that Charlie might have it easy," I admitted. Aiden's expression turned serious in a flash.
"Regardless, I don't want him bothering her. If he does, I'll have another word with him. She's got enough going on right now. She doesn't need extra stress from William over things that don't matter anyway."
I followed him to the door. "We'll keep you posted if anything changes."
"I'd sleep better if I knew I was in the loop," Aiden said.
I nodded. I didn't have a baby sister, but I'd had a younger brother and I got what he was saying.
"I'll talk to Charlie about it," I said. "I don't like that note. And I don't want her scared. If anything else happens, we'll let you know."
I watched him jog down the steps and get in his Aston Martin. That visit hadn't gone the way I'd expected. Understatement. I hadn't expected to feel a kinship with Aiden Winters, of all people. It was there all the same. I knew where his head was. I'd been the older brother trying to keep his family together.
I didn't have generations of tradition weighing me down, but I'd felt the same love, love weighted with responsibility. The same need to protect. I'd mostly failed my own family, while Aiden was still trying to save his.
It didn't hurt that he wasn't an asshole. It was hard to dislike a man who loved his baby sister the way Aiden loved Charlie.
I wasn't looking forward to telling Charlie about his visit. She wouldn't like that Aiden had come by behind her back, and she definitely wouldn't like having a bodyguard. She was going to have to deal with it. I locked the door and went back to my laptop. If I was going to clear my schedule for Charlie, I had to get this job done.
While my laptop woke up, I sent her a quick text to check in. I'd feel better if I had confirmation that she was still safely behind the gates and the security. I'd given Aiden a hard time, but we were on the same page.
I didn't like her out there on her own, and I wouldn’t, until we caught whoever was after her and put him behind bars.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHARLIE
Lucas was driving my car when he pulled into the circular drive at Winters House. My sedan wasn't small, but Lucas's tall frame filled the driver's seat so thoroughly I was certain he had to be uncomfortable.
I thought about offering to drive back, then changed my mind. I didn't have to ask to know that Lucas was one of those men who didn't like anyone else to drive the vehicle he was in.
I hadn't spent my life surrounded by overbearing men without learning to pick my battles. I didn't wait for him to knock before opening the front door.
"Hey," I said. "Thanks for coming to get me. Sorry I took so long."
Lucas bent his head, his lips gliding across mine in a kiss that held more affection than passion. "No problem," he said. "I had a job I was trying to wrap up, anyway."
"Did you get it done?" I asked, linking my arm through his as he led me down the steps. Looking back ove
r my shoulder at the door I'd left half open, I said, "Oh, wait. I have some stuff for the house in the front hall. I should grab it."
"You can get in the car. I'll get your stuff."
Lucas opened the passenger door and stood over me as I sat and fastened my seatbelt. It's not that I didn't appreciate his protectiveness, but he seemed edgier than usual, his eyes scanning the courtyard and the closed gate, alert for any threat.
Assured that I was safely strapped into the car, he went back in the house for my loot. I'd raided the attics for some extra things no one needed.
Not much. Furniture would only get in the way of the renovations. Just a card table and three folding chairs, plus a few camp chairs—the kind that folded out into a lounger with a footrest.
Not having anywhere to sit except the futon was getting on my nerves. Lucas loaded the trunk and joined me in the car, starting the engine and pulling out of the courtyard.
"Did you get your job finished?" I asked, feeling oddly domestic. Lucas looked over at me and grinned, his green eyes lighting up even as shadows lurked in his face.
"I did," he said. "Closed it out with the client right before you called."
"Good timing," I commented.
"Yeah," he said. He fell silent, drawing in a half-breath like he was going to speak, then letting it out in a whoosh.
"What?" I asked. Something was bothering him.
"Your brother came to see me," he said finally, shooting me a quick, worried glance before focusing again on the winding road through Buckhead.
"Which one?" I asked, torn between dread and exasperation.
"Aiden."
"Was he awful?" I asked, bracing for the worst.
Lucas surprised me. "No, he was cool. He tried to hire me to be your bodyguard."
"Okaaay." I drew out the word, inviting an explanation. None was forthcoming. Finally, I asked, "What did you tell him?"
