by Anya Breton
Guarded Heart
Anya Breton
Someone is trying to kill high priest Morgan Seaton, but the last person he wants protecting him is people-hater Brook Calder—a fellow Water witch from his youth. He values the witches of his coven too much to put them in danger from her shoot-first-ask-questions-later methods. But the head of Neptune’s Rangers assures Morgan that Brook is the best of the best, so Morgan has no choice but to accept help from the one witch he’s never been able to entice.
If they can stop giving into their scorching desire everywhere—including the back of a limo or the bathroom floor—he might survive long enough to find out who wants him dead.
A Romantica® paranormal erotic romance from Ellora’s Cave
Guarded Heart
Anya Breton
Chapter One
After several hours locked in a floating tin can with screeching kids, falsely smiling flight attendants and braggarts with Oompa-Loompa tans, Brook should have been happier to be on land. Maybe it was a good thing airlines didn’t allow stun guns in carryons. She’d come a long way since her youth, but sometimes it was hard to rein in her aggressive urges. Long flights certainly put her to the test.
Brook tugged her duffel bag onto her shoulder and started for the guys in black waiting at the door to the baggage claim. The chauffeur holding the sign printed with her surname cleared his throat when she pointed at it. The inward jerking she sensed over her empathy net was the marker of both his surprise and confusion.
“B. Calder?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry.” He rubbed a hand through his hair. “It’s just that I was told to pick up a Mister Calder.”
Brook stared until he relented and showed her to the appropriate door. A white limousine idled at the curb, a second driver waiting inside. The original chauffeur opened the door with little fanfare. She shot a cursory glance within the luxurious space as she did a scan of the males’ intentions on the empathy net.
All clear.
She got inside, attention splitting. The males in the front seat could attack at any moment. As could those in the cars around them on the two-lane road. But her phone messages were also important.
During the final flight, her boss Kyle had sent a note with the tracking numbers for the overnight delivery of her weapons. She wouldn’t feel comfortable again until her stun gun and handguns were safely affixed to her body. They protected more than her clients. They protected her peace of mind, even if she rarely had reason to use them.
Though Lake Michigan’s calming water was to her right, the trip along the interstate emphasized her bleak mood. In her opinion Gary, Indiana, was a dump. What might have been a bustling metropolis decades ago in the booming age of steel now looked like something out of the zombie apocalypse. It could have been worse. She could have been sent to Detroit.
Twenty minutes of travel time was enough to file her messages into the appropriate folders. The car pulled to a stop in front of a beige two-story beach house with a conspicuous burgundy door. Filmy blue curtains that were too delicate to be considered masculine covered the windows. That had better not be a hint of what she’d find inside.
Brook had been sent to protect the newly ascended high priest of the Great Lakes Region from an unknown assailant. Her boss hadn’t given her a name. In the mad rush to get a Ranger to the area, Kyle hadn’t explained anything about the Water witch client apart from the knowledge someone had attempted to kill him in a very public way. If this was the priest’s house—with its banks of easily broken windows—then Brook had her work cut out for her. But challenges made a Ranger’s job interesting.
A lovely woman with long mahogany hair greeted Brook at the front door. The female’s flushed pink lips, soft cheeks and straight nose made her the spitting image of Cameron Diaz. Dark hair featuring salon-bought cherry highlights as well as the strange celadon color of her irises proved she was someone unique rather than the actress.
Those eyes scanned critically over Brook before flicking up to her face. Brook drew in the scent of fresh water off the woman while simultaneously measuring the press of her power.
Not a woman at all. Like Brook, the female scrutinizing her on the porch was a Water witch. Similarly, like Brook, the female wasn’t priestess material but she was definitely an Adept.
Given the confusion at the airport, Brook felt the need to introduce herself properly. “I’m Brook Calder.”
“There must be some mistake,” the female said in a pitch that made Brook’s voice sound masculine. She lifted her nose, looking down on Brook. “We called for the best Ranger available.”
Brook stared rather than point out that not only was she the best Ranger available or unavailable, but she’d also been pulled off an assignment in the Sierra Nevadas to come here. Their dueling empathic links would do all the communicating for her.
The female took a step back from the door and surveyed Brook’s scuffed boots. “Come inside until we can get this sorted.”
There was nothing to sort. Brook was the best of Neptune’s Rangers. Period.
Nevertheless, the Cameron Diaz look-alike produced a slim smartphone from her pocket and searched through her list of contacts. Framed in the living room that was a curious hodgepodge of updated stone floors and undulating retro glass block walls, the female appeared at home in her smart skirt suit and prim ponytail.
Brook tossed her bag to her feet, leaning her T-shirt-covered back against the now closed front door. She dropped her arms to her sides where she could easily get to her weapons…despite their conspicuous absence. Hopefully they would arrive before the day was out.
“This is Mira Fontaine from the Great Lakes Region office,” the woman said to whomever was on the other end of the call. “I need to speak to Master Destan right away.”
Brook got comfortable. Kyle’s assistant Judy would probably have to fetch him from the bathroom or perhaps a meeting. Mira shifted her weight onto her narrow right hip. Then onto her left. And then back again by the time Kyle reached the phone.
“Master Destan,” the snooty female said with a measure of impatience Kyle hadn’t earned. “There seems to have been some confusion. We requested your best Ranger to assist us with the matter of the regional high priest’s safety but a female has just arrived.”
Brook lifted her head until she stared at the blemishes in the otherwise pristine white plaster ceiling. No doubt Kyle relayed tales of her skill and numerous successes to the snob. The female’s frustration lifted with each second that passed—an emotion Brook clearly felt without need of an empathic link. It nearly made her smile.
“But…t-the Ranger you s-sent…is a female.”
Brook’s eyebrows lifted at that. Generally it was the priests who complained about a Ranger’s gender, not their female assistants.
No doubt Kyle reminded Mira females were once the majority in their faction—that only the last century had seen a leveling out in the birth rates between males and females. It was Witch History 101 no one should have had to explain to Ms. Mira Fontaine.
“You have no males,” Mira said with increasing anxiety.
Kyle had males. But Brook was the best.
Mira gave a suffering sigh. Subsequent words of false gratitude preceded her ending the call.
Brook continued her perusal of the ceiling until she was given an apology.
“This way,” Mira said.
The female’s rude behavior was filed away in Brook’s memory bank.
Brook hauled her bag up again and followed Mira through the twenties-era beach house. They walked past a renovated modern kitchen, a formal breakfast room and a small guest room. Their destination was a closed white-painted door with a heavy brass knob.
Mira knocked t
wice on the thick wood. The entrance of what was surely a home office opened, revealing a gentleman sporting khaki slacks and a blue polo shirt stretched over his slim frame. Silver and white threaded his nearly black hair, giving him a dignified air. His cool gray eyes measured Brook much as Mira’s had. They returned to her face.
A small smile formed on his thin lips. “You must be Ranger Calder. Please, come in.”
His neutral tone and the steady emotions on her empathy net told Brook nothing. Though a more powerful magical signature emanating from the office was from someone hidden around the corner, Brook assumed this male in his middle age was the regional high priest she’d been called to protect. He carried himself like a man with power—like a man who was used to getting his way.
Brook stretched out her hand in a professional gesture. He grasped her palm in his as soon as she was near enough to touch. His squeeze was just on the edge of painful as if an attempt to prove his might. The empathic link he tried to engage while he had her skin against his told her even more about him.
This one likes control.
Brook stepped into the sunlit office, tossing off his magical link as she moved. A bank of broad windows opened to the lake view. The vista was vast and blue—a truly beautiful sight but foolishly unsafe given their recent attack.
She tore her gaze away from the windows, focusing on the furniture in front of her. A person’s working environment said a lot about him.
This one was messy with haphazard stacks of papers and books scattered along the white furniture. Countless little colored flags stuck out from between the pages of tomes large and small. Sticky notes hung at irregular intervals on every flat surface and some that weren’t. But the space had a homey, lived-in feel thanks to a half-opened box of donuts on a side table, an open sketchpad on the desk and fresh flowers springing from sedate vases.
It wasn’t any of these things that snared Brook’s attention repeatedly. The male seated at a small round table in the far left corner had that honor.
He was clad in a button-down white shirt with blue, green and gray plaid, his sky-blue irises popping against the dull colors. Defined cheeks framed a straight nose and cleanly shaved masculine jaw. Though his brows were brown, his hair was anything but. The golden locks were styled in messy waves over his forehead then shorn close to his head on the sides and back…a lot like Brook’s own hairstyle. But it was those eyes that caught her notice more than once.
There was something almost familiar about them.
The blue eyes swept up and down Brook three times before widening and then ultimately narrowing. A smooth baritone voice burst from his peach-hued lips. “Brook Lochlan?”
Brook swallowed down a quick shot of unease. She hadn’t been Brook Lochlan for six years. When her absent father had died, she’d waited the necessary year of mourning and then she’d filed for a legal change of name.
How did this male know her?
“Brook Calder,” she said with a chilly delivery.
“By Neptune!” He smashed a hand through his unruly locks and then dismissed her, focusing on the older male waiting by the door. “No. This will not do at all. If we must have someone, then find someone else.”
Brook’s jeans, pixie-cut hair and masculine mannerisms meant she was rarely treated like a lady. Instead, she was often treated like one of the boys. Her possession of respectable B-cup breasts and lips that were a little too plump to be male meant she also didn’t trip a male’s need to challenge a rival.
What did this male find wrong with her?
Brook cast a look over her shoulder at the older male. “Shouldn’t the priest make his own decision?”
“The priest has,” the younger individual said.
Her gaze snapped forward. This male—this blond who couldn’t have been older than thirty-two—was the Great Lakes Region high priest?
“I asked for the best to be sent,” the older male said.
The blond jabbed a long finger toward Brook. “This female would sooner punch an innocent for looking at her wrong than wait for their intentions to become clear.”
Brook fought a visible reaction. She was perhaps the most cynical Ranger in Neptune’s Fellowship but she didn’t act violently without cause. And those few times she hadn’t had enough evidence to prove someone’s guilt, Neptune had seen fit to provide it soon after she’d acted against them.
So just who was this priest who thought he knew her?
She examined the male’s face, noting the planes and ridges of his features once more. He was handsome, as most witches were. His compact build and honey skin weren’t anything special in their race. But those eyes…those eyes were familiar.
“I can’t work with her,” the blond said. “I won’t be responsible for the damage she causes in the name of protecting me. And I don’t need a blasted bodyguard.”
The pieces of the strange puzzle finally fell into place. “By the great blue sea.” She took a step forward. “Morgan Seaton.”
He lifted his chin and sniffed once. It was all the answer she needed.
This was surely some manner of karmic torture, having to help Morgan Seaton—a male she’d saved from his own his foolish ingenuousness nearly every vacation she’d spent at her mother’s beach house.
“No. I won’t work for him.” She readjusted the duffel bag strap over her shoulder as she twisted toward the door. “Find someone else.”
“Ranger Calder,” the older man called after her. “They said you were the best.”
“I am the best.” She continued past Mira, who was smirking in the corridor. “But some people are unprotectable.”
Soles tapping on the floor implied the older male followed.
“Please come back, Ranger Calder,” he said. “We need to call the Rangers’ office together to sort out this misunderstanding.”
Her boss would be miffed if she took off without giving word. She’d stay for as long as it would take Morgan Seaton to formally fire her. Then she’d get her itinerary for the return trip. Perhaps this time she could get a layover someplace with a nice pool.
Just a few minutes pain longer before she’d be on her way out of this little dump with lake access.
Morgan would recognize those plump lips and that disaffected glare anywhere. Though Brook had filled out her lanky body in the eight years since he’d last seen her, she was still the curmudgeon he’d known since he was six. Marriage certainly hadn’t softened her prickly demeanor.
Her five-foot eight-inch frame was coated in a pair of low-rise jeans that looked painted over her toned body. Several times he caught his gaze dropping from her dark scowl to the peaks that pushed at her gray T-shirt. Brook had clearly eaten a few sweets since he’d last seen her, because she’d filled out more than just her lanky frame. Too bad it wasn’t the bad sort of filling out. No, the stomach visible beneath her top was tighter than his.
“A Ranger,” he said while Irvin searched for the direct number to the Rangers’ office. “I’m stunned you passed boot camp without killing anyone.”
“Who said I didn’t kill anyone?” She hadn’t missed a beat. Her ice-blue eyes glittered with anger she did little to hide.
Should he chuckle or glare? With Brook it was always hard to decide. She might well have killed someone for what she’d deemed a perfectly logical reason and somehow managed to move up in the ranks despite it.
The female was a menace with her pessimistic views on humanity and the factions at large. She truly believed people were guilty until proven innocent. And she thought he was naïve for believing in their inherent good.
Fortunately Irvin dialed the correct number. An aging woman answered with a formal greeting and then set them on hold so she could fetch her boss. The music they were obliged to listen to was soft adult rock that grated on his nerves.
Kyle Destan was the head of Neptune’s Rangers. He’d come highly recommended by all involved, not that they had many options if they wanted to keep this issue quiet. Unless they wan
ted a Fire witch Ranger to stand sentinel for the area’s Water witches, they had to go through Kyle.
“Destan,” the male said briskly from the home office in California.
“Master Destan, this is Morgan Seaton…in the Great Lakes Region.”
Morgan hadn’t quite gotten used to the idea he was now high priest over a seven-state region. The job was still new—he’d had it a mere five months.
“Priest Seaton, what can I do for you?”
“I’m afraid there has been a misunderstanding,” Morgan said. “I’m not sure the Ranger you sent will be a good fit for our situation.”
“Ranger Calder is the best. She is a good fit for any situation.”
The female herself spoke up. “Not this one. Sorry, Master Destan, but this guy is hopeless.”
He was hopeless? Brook was the only hopeless individual in the room. She wouldn’t know what happiness was if she’d landed on an island made of fluffy cotton candy and ice cream peaks that was home to an indigenous population of fuzzy kittens. She was incapable of tender emotion. He couldn’t work with someone like her.
“Calder—”
“No,” Morgan said, interrupting Master Destan’s long-distance reproach. “She’s correct. I’m hopeless because I’m unwilling to work with her particular brand of act-first-and-question-later operation. If we must have a Ranger, I want one who will protect me without collateral damage.”
There wasn’t an immediate response. The lack of one made Morgan uneasy. His fear was partially realized when the man spoke next.
“The Rangers weigh every situation for the best possible outcome,” Master Destan said.
“I’m sure that they do—”
“If I may interject,” Irvin said from his position at the desk in the middle of the room. The older man—his trusted advisor and uncle on his father’s side—focused his full attention on Morgan. “You need protection. That man pulling a gun on you in Macy’s was a close call. The Great Lakes Region needs her priest alive. If this Ranger Calder is their best Ranger, then I think we owe it to the covens to set aside our differences and work with her.”
