Guardian For Hire: A For Hire Novel

by Christine Bell

  He worked her with his tongue until whimpering moans became muttered cries. Taking it as his cue, he slipped a finger inside her gripping channel and she screamed.

  “Sorry,” she rasped, clasping a delicate hand over her mouth.

  He pulled back and shook his head, running his tongue over his mouth. “There’s no neighbors to hear you, Doc. Only me. And trust me, I want to hear it all.”

  She gave a shaky nod and lay back down, and he returned to what was rapidly becoming his favorite pastime until he heard her soft cries begin anew. “That’s right. Let me hear you,” he ground out.

  “Yessss.” She screamed a hoarse, needy cry, and his cock throbbed, desperate to fill her. “I need you inside of me,” she chanted, her body bowing and quaking.

  It was too much for one man to endure. With one last lick, he rose and gazed down at her. She was gorgeous. Her bottom lip was red and swollen from her biting down on it, and it made the cherry red of her cheeks that much more seductive. Her hair was wild tangle around her, her lids heavy with want. Her rosy skin begging for his touch.

  He needed to deliver.

  He straightened and yanked his pants off.

  Her eyes were wide as she stared. “You weren’t kidding about that eight inches.”

  He barked a laugh and took her in his arms, nibbling on the hollow of her collarbone before responding, “You been thinking about that a lot, Doc?”

  He didn’t think her cheeks could have turned a deeper red, but he’d been wrong.

  “I think this conversation is distracting from the matter at hand—” She wrapped her fingers around his shaft, giving him a firm pull and licking her lips. “Don’t you think?”

  Damn, her touch was magic, sending bolts of desire coursing through him. His stomach tightened with every movement as she continued to work him up and down. The only thing that kept him from exploding was the memory of her wet, pink center. He needed to bury himself deep inside her and never, ever come out. But first he needed to get her onto a bed. No way their first time was going to be on the kitchen table.

  Now to hope there would be a second time…

  He pushed her hand away, ignoring her groan of disappointment.

  “Come on.” He scooped a forearm under her knees and hoisted her into a fireman’s lift before starting through the living room.

  “Where are we going?” she squealed, laughing. He wanted to answer, but the press of her supple breasts against his back was distracting as hell.

  He swatted her bottom gently, and she sucked in a breath.

  “That’s for asking questions,” he muttered.

  There was a tiny pause, then with the slightest hint of a smile in her voice, she asked, “What did you say?”

  He spanked her again, harder that time, and her body squirmed. So fucking hot. The woman was going to be the death of him.

  When he got to the top of the stairs, he pulled open his bedroom door and sprinted to the bed. He laid her in the middle of the sheets as he had in each of his nightly fantasies.

  This time, he didn’t need to spread her thighs apart. She opened them to him, the best invitation he’d ever received.

  “Jesus, you’re beautiful.”

  Her smile reached her eyes, and she hooked a come-hither finger toward him.

  One thing was for sure. There was no way in hell she’d have to ask him twice.

  She held her arms out, and he slid over her, leaning down to kiss the tips of her breasts reverently. It was impossible to decide which part of her to touch from one moment to the next, her pale skin was all so soft and inviting. As he went, the ruby blush in her cheeks traveled downward, tinting her breasts with a delicate pink that only made them that much more enticing.

  He thumbed her center, her wetness perfect and ready for him. He was harder than a hammer, and every second was more of a struggle to get through than the last.

  “Gavin, I need you,” she begged.

  He growled and lunged for the bedside table, fumbling until he’d yanked the drawer open and gotten what he needed. With a quick tear of foil and both of their desperate hands on the job, he was sheathed and ready for her. Without another word, he reared back and balanced himself on his elbows. Her face was a mask of need as he cupped his cock and pressed it into her, inch by straining inch. She was impossibly tight, almost to the point of pain, so wet and warm that her body seemed a perfectly molded paradise just for him.

  “You feel so fucking good,” he breathed. He watched as she shook beneath his every movement, her legs hooked around his back to pull him farther into her sweet core.

  Her hips rocked against him in mesmerizing circles. Every thrust was an invitation to finish it. Every flutter of her eyelashes, every soft moan, beckoned him to grip those toned thighs and pound, fast and hard, in and out of her until she was filled with him. His body demanded it, but he held back, waiting…waiting.

  “I want to watch you,” he murmured, pulling back to make space between them.

  She smiled and traced a finger slowly down her body, past her breasts, until she met her core. Her fingers moved as she rubbed her clit, soft moans escaping her lips with every delicate motion.

  She tightened around him, her movements becoming frantic, and the blood pounded in his ears as her body dragged him toward the precipice.

  “Come for me, love,” he commanded softly. “I want to see it.” Her cries were low at first but grew louder, and louder still as he flexed his hips faster and deeper with each thrust.

  Then her walls quaked around him, squeezing and pulling, sucking at him as tremors racked her body. Her legs wrapped around him. Her back arched, and he couldn’t hold back anymore. He gripped her thighs and ground into her in long, hard strokes. It was primal and savage, his need to fill her, but there was no controlling it. With a growl of his own, he collapsed onto her, his needy mouth closing on her neck as he came in hot, frantic spurts.

  Long moments passed before his pulse finally steadied and she stirred against him. With a sigh, he pulled away, rolling to his side. He didn’t look at her. It was an uncomfortable thing, but there was a decision that needed to be made, and he wouldn’t be the one to make it. Was this going to be something she regretted instantly or…

  “Well, that was…that was fun,” she breathed. He turned back to find her sitting with her legs slung over the side of the bed, smiling, her arms crossed over her still-rosy chest. She looked more relaxed than he’d ever seen her. Hope lodged in his heart, and he grinned back.

  “I agree.” He’d been through plenty of awkward afterglows, but he’d never had to deal with knowing the person would still be living with him afterward.

  “We’ll have to do it again sometime…soon?”

  At first he thought he hadn’t heard her, but she was looking him in the eye so intensely that there was no way it could have been a mistake. She bit her lip hard enough that the thing looked fit to bust, so he rushed to put her out of her misery.

  “Yes. As a matter of fact”—he leaned in and kissed her, pushing back the warning blaring in the back of his mind with a vicious shove—“why don’t you join me in the shower in five?”

  Chapter Twelve

  In the days since he and Sarabeth had first slept together, he’d made an effort to leave bed as little as possible, with the exception of working her case and getting her in shape for the basics of self-defense. Every time he thought he wouldn’t be able to muster the energy to pleasure her in every way he could imagine, she’d turn over in the sheets, and he’d catch a peek of those sweet pink nipples. Or she’d get out of bed to use the bathroom so that he could see the curve of her heart-shaped ass swaying as she walked away from him. By the time she was back in bed, his worries were always long forgotten.

  He still had to leave more often than he’d have liked, but every time he got to come back to bed and find her there was another reward for all his hard work.

  That morning, however, he slipped out while she slept, reluctantly leaving h
er in Maddy’s capable hands for an hour. He got to his office in record time, determined to get in and out so that he could get back in and out of Sarabeth as quickly as possible, but as he was about to enter the building, a motion from the corner of his eye caught his attention. He turned to get a better look and found a lanky man leaning against a limo parked near the wrought iron gates. A fedora masked the upper part of his face, but Gavin took in the spindly build and lightning-shaped mutton chops. A mug shot flashed through his mind, and he examined the Roman nose. There was no mistaking the pockmarked face of Sal “Lightning” Lighterton.

  The gangster stared back at him and made the slightest motion for him to approach, not raising his hand above his waist.

  Gavin strolled over, hand on the butt of his pistol, senses alert, saying as loudly as possible, “Let me guess, Jimmy Too Short? Joey Baggamuffins? Johnny on the Spot?” If he was going to get information, he’d have to play dumb. And if he wasn’t going to get information, then he was going to need backup. Keeping him talking might be the only way to get the private parking lot feeling more public. Until then, playing dumb was his only option.

  The thug laughed a wheezing, labored chuckle, then plucked the toothpick from between his ashy lips and pointed it at Gavin. “You’re real funny, huh? It’d be a shame if somebody slit that hysterical windpipe on you, so I’ma do you a favor. Listen closely—all’s we want is all the footage from The Healing Place so it can be destroyed. There are things my employer doesn’t want…seen.” His voice sounded as though there was a wasp perpetually lodged in the back of his throat.

  “What would make him think I know anything about that?” Gavin said. His mind whirred. What possible motive could a gangster have for wanting tapes, other than continuing the string of blackmail Nico had started? Unless… His chain of thought was broken by Sal’s reply.

  “That was a pretty young lady, that one that’s always on the news. You know her?”

  “What are you trying to say, buddy? Spit it out.” He wasn’t playing games any more. His brain flashed to an image of Sarabeth, dark hair spread on his pillow, and his stomach cramped. What if he wasn’t the only mobster in town?

  “We got some recent intel that could make getting rid of your young friend a moot point. Good information, you know, says that all the footage is hidden away in some evidence locker. You wouldn’t happen to know anybody with access to that locker?” Sal perched the toothpick back between his lips, a malicious smile curling his thin lips.

  He obviously already knew the answer to that question, but Gavin wasn’t about to give him any leeway. Not yet. “I couldn’t say, since I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  The smile on the thug’s face hardened into a solid line. “I don’t think you’re paying attention. Let me spell it out for you. We’re willing to forget about Sarabeth Lucking. Scout’s honor. And you know it’s hard for guys like us to forget about such pretty ladies. All you have to do is turn over those tapes. Easy as that. If not, well, things might not be so easy.” He spit the toothpick onto the ground in front of Gavin’s feet. “We’ll be in touch.”

  Sal slipped into the back of the limo, closing the door without a second glance at Gavin before the car sped away on the high street. It was only after he’d watched the vehicle disappear over a hill that he noticed the man had left a calling card. On the other side of the space where the car had been parked, there lay a dark-red brick with a note rubber-banded around it. The words were typed in newspaper font:

  Beachwood Street. 5 p.m. Pay phone.

  He read the words twice before stuffing the paper in his pocket and turning on his heel to stalk toward his office.

  There was no question that the only way to obtain the tapes was through illegal measures. He’d been on the wrong side of the law more than his fair share and for far less altruistic reasons. So what if he’d given up that life more than a decade ago? Sarabeth was special. And the thought of seeing even a single hair on her head harmed made his chest hurt. He wasn’t in a mental place to think too hard on the whys of that. If he wanted to ensure her safety, there was work to be done.

  His conscience kicked hard at the thought of doing any favors for the mob and the possible ramifications of those videos going missing, but the more he knocked the pros and cons around, the more he was convinced of what he needed to do. The tapes were part of the evidence against Nico, and now that Nico was dead, they might never come out of their box again. It wasn’t as if their disappearance would hurt the DA’s case against him. He’d paid the ultimate price for his crimes already, and once Vito got what he wanted, it could all be over. Sarabeth would be safe and free to choose how she lived the rest of her life.

  Maybe she’d even choose him.

  Either way, he’d be damned if someone was going to tell him she wasn’t worth the risk.

  She was the only risk worth taking.

  …

  When she woke up, Sarabeth shifted in the bed to find an empty pillow and a man-shaped imprint on the mattress. The place where Gavin normally slept had gone cold since he’d left, and the feel of the cool pillow left a residual chill in her heart. The disappointment of not finding him beside her was a splash of water on the red-hot trend her imagination had taken over the past five days. But the thing that was most unsettling wasn’t that he wasn’t there, it was how much she wanted him to be. How much she’d expected him to be.

  The past few nights they’d fallen into a routine where they’d cook together, often taking an hour or more as they talked and he showed her the proper way to grill a steak or make a meatloaf. She’d actually managed a half-decent pair of pork chops almost totally on her own the night before. Sure, the mashed potatoes were a little gluey, but all in all, not bad. After dinner, they’d have a glass of wine and talk some more, or watch a movie. And then? Things invariably heated up. Her cheeks burned at the memory of some of those nights. She loved being with him that way. Loved who she was becoming. Braver. Bolder. The Sarabeth she felt like she would have been all along if she had the freedom to grow her own way.

  But almost as good as the sex were the moments right after. The quiet moments right before they fell asleep, when he would nudge her to her side and spoon her from behind. One hand resting lightly on the flat of her stomach, his thighs pressed against the back of hers, his breath washing over the nape of her neck as they drifted off.

  He was becoming a habit. A lovely, warm, sexy, and entirely too tempting habit.

  Her throat went tight, and she shot upright in the bed. Leaning off to the side, she scooped up the first piece of clothing she found—a discarded button-down shirt Gavin had left on the floor the day before—and yanked it on. It still smelled like his musky, woody cologne, and she breathed deeply, taking in his scent. The smell comforted her.

  Not good.

  When she’d slept with him that first night, it had been because she wanted him, and for no other reason. Now, five days later, she was perched precariously between wanting to run from his house before she fell so hard that she couldn’t make herself go, and taking her chances and seeing if he could possibly feel what she’d been feeling.

  He’d enjoyed her body for the past few days, and they’d fallen into a routine in the evenings, but in between there were times where he grew distant again. Most of the day, he left her alone with her books when he was off working or on the telephone, and he was very tight-lipped. When they practiced self-defense, it was often in silence, and even then, he seemed distracted.

  Was that some sort of checks and balances system? Where he was pulling away half the time so he could make sure he didn’t get truly close to begin with? He had no use for the neat, proper life he knew she’d go back to, and she was pretty sure that his edge-of-your-seat, he-may-never-come-home lifestyle wasn’t something she could handle either.

  She stood, suddenly sure of one thing. If she kept on this road with him, she was going to wind up in a world of hurt.

  Her throat ached as she colle
cted her clothing from his floor, carrying all her belongings back into the spare room he’d shown her on their second day together because that was where it, and she, needed to stay. She might be in physical danger right now, but if she let Gavin get any closer than she had already, there was no way she was coming out of this in one piece.

  The downstairs door banged open as she began picking out her outfit for the day. She dropped the clothes and rushed to the top of the stairs to find Gavin already stalking toward her.

  “There’s been a change of plans,” he said gruffly, pushing past her to head toward his bedroom. He’d barely looked at her as he went. “You’ll need to stay here, you understand? With your gun. Just in case.” He wrenched open drawers of his dresser, pawing through the garments until he found little metal gears and gadgets she’d never seen before.

  She swallowed hard, reminding herself to maintain her resolve. “What’s going on?”

  “I’ve been contacted by someone who assures me that if I get the footage from The Healing Place’s security cameras, you’ll be safe.”

  “Who contacted you? And what do they need the footage for?” Her heart pounded at the thought of being free of the constant fear, but at the same time, the fact that he was being very vague wasn’t lost on her.

  “Look, the less you know right now, the better. I’m going to do what I need to do in order to make sure you’re safe. I feel confident that if we play these cards right, they’ll call off the dogs and you’ll be free to go.”

  Free to go?

  Her heart plummeted into her stomach. “What do mean, ‘what you need to do’?”

  He didn’t answer, but his face said it all and her skin went cold with growing horror as she took in the items in his hands.

  “You’re not seriously thinking about breaking into the police station evidence locker, are you?”