by Marie Harte
“I didn’t realize you had a claim on her.”
“I don’t,” John grumbled. That was the whole problem in a nutshell. He had no claim on her. He didn’t even know if he wanted to claim her. Yeah, she turned him on, but what could he offer her? Certainly nothing long-term. What would an active, vibrant woman like her want with a broken man like him?
John tried to think of other things as he finished his sandwich, and ignore the ache in his chest.
*
SHANNON HATED TO leave the break room. She saw John so little, but they were all busier recently. LNF Investigative Services was expanding exponentially as more people learned of their ability and dedication to get a job done. Contracts were rolling in or extending out for the security division. The agency had gone from the three partners when they first started five years ago to almost twenty men now. Shannon knew that Duncan had stacks of résumés from other disabled vets who would love to work here. New ones came in every day.
Just this week they’d hired a brash young Marine that had been a canine officer in Afghanistan. Two weeks before that they’d hired a former helicopter pilot.
Settling into her chair, she began typing up Chad’s dictation notes from his surveillance on the Malone divorce case. A couple of weeks ago she’d found him in the spare office hunting and pecking on the keyboard with his good right hand. He admitted that the report writing was difficult, because he did not have the same mobility in his left hand and arm he used to.
The scars that wrapped around his left arm showed that he had been burned terribly, and Shannon’s soft heart had gone out to him. All of the men that worked at the agency had been in their prime when they were injured. Most were adapting to their injuries, but a couple still visibly struggled. As the only woman around, she tried to make it a point to bring hominess and comfort to the office. Several of the men had left their families to come to Denver to work for Duncan, because he had been a great Company leader. He’d evoked enough loyalty for several members to move from several states away.
Chad walked into the office and through the reception area to her desk, smiling broadly. Shannon could not help but return his smile as she reached for the candy container in her lower desk drawer. Chad Lowell had a sweet tooth that would not stop and Shannon found that the candy needed to be hidden or it would all mysteriously disappear. In jest, she had tried to hire him to find the missing candy, but he gravely told her it would be a waste of her money, because he did not think the candy was ever coming back. Occasionally, giant bags of his favorites would materialize on her desk. Chad was already turning into a great friend, in addition to a fabulous boss.
“Hey, Chad,” she greeted. “What are you up to?”
Chad put on a wounded look that was totally ruined by his twinkling blue eyes. “I don’t know what you mean. Why would I be up to something?”
Shannon laughed outright and put the plastic container at the edge of the desk within easy reach. “Right…”
Chad dug a couple of pieces of caramel out of the container. “We have an interview in a while. Boss man wants to talk at us before the kid gets here.”
“Jennings?”
“That’s the one. Duncan wants to see what we read from him.”
Shannon gave a single nod, and kind of hoped that they didn’t hire the recently discharged young Marine. There was something that nagged at her about his eyes. Almost as if there was a disconnect there and he seemed to be going through the motions to present himself correctly.
But it wasn’t really her place to say anything. If he got hired, she’d do her best to make him as welcome as she did the others.
She saved the work on her computer and printed off the notes she’d just typed up for Chad’s case, then attached them with a paper clip and handed them to him.
“Oh, Shannon, you are a doll. That would have taken me two hours.” His pretty eyes lost their twinkle.
“It only took me ten minutes. And it was no big deal. I’m trained to do it. You aren’t. I do appreciate you using the dictation machine, though.”
Chad shifted in front of her and grimaced. “I don’t like talking into that thing. Feels weird. Don’t be surprised if I’m knocking on your desk again before too long,” he told her as he slipped into Duncan’s office.
John wheeled in seconds later as she put the lid on the candy container. He chuckled as he pulled alongside her desk, making her shiver convulsively. The man was sex on wheels, literally, and it was all she could do not to jump into his lap. A hint of his deodorant wafted over her. Shannon clenched her teeth in an effort to control her roaring response but it was always the same. And he seemed totally oblivious. Of course.
“Hi, John.”
“Shannon. I see Chad’s already been here.”
She nodded and held the dish out to him, but John declined. His sweet tooth leaned more toward baked goods. Fridays she usually brought in some type of cake or cookies. She’d brought in his favorite today, German chocolate.
“Hey, I wanted to see if you could find a copy of an invoice for me.”
Shannon sat back in her chair, fingers ready at her keyboard.
He reeled off the company name and the list of what he’d ordered, and Shannon frowned. “I just put a copy of this on your desk yesterday. You lost it already?”
John glowered, clamped his jaw and scrubbed a broad hand over his short black hair. His heavy chest expanded in a slow breath. He didn’t say anything for several long seconds, and when he looked up, his dark brown eyes were calm. “My desk is pretty terrible right now. Maybe it is there. I’ll look after I talk to Duncan. Thanks, Shannon.”
He turned and powered his chair through Duncan’s doorway.
“Lunch was awesome, by the way,” he said just before he disappeared.
Shannon could not keep the goofy grin from spreading across her face. John very rarely commented positively on anything. Within thirty seconds she had gotten an “ok, I’ll check” and a “lunch was awesome” out of him. That was a new record. Not that he was a grouch or anything. Well, maybe he was a bit on the grumpy side. It seemed like he was genuinely trying to be a little friendlier, though. They’d had to go through some growing pains when she was first hired.
There’d been an incident a couple of months ago when she’d gone off on him. She wasn’t even sure what the original conversation had been about, but he had demanded some paper or another that she had already given him. John had said flat out that it was not on his desk. Shannon had to physically walk to his office and pull the paper from his overloaded desk before he believed her.
As she left his cluttered office, she’d snapped at him, “And you could be a little nicer about it, too,” before she slammed his office door shut.
Since then, John had tried to temper his snappishness, at least with her. The men were another story entirely. If one of them did something wrong, John let them know immediately. But constructively. She had to give him that; he always yelled with a purpose.
Shannon strongly believed that his paralysis had darkened his already reserved demeanor. And she didn’t blame him in the least. If Shannon were in his place, it would have done the same to her.
With his shorn hair, serious eyes and shadowed jaw, John’s dour expressions seem to fit his dark coloring naturally. His heavy brows drew down when he was upset, and his olive complexion darkened. More than once, she had compared him in her mind to a swarthy pirate yelling at his crew, or a Bedouin chief directing his desert army. In her daydreams, though, the anger changed easily to lust.
And there was no wheelchair.
Not that being in a chair seemed to have slowed him down at all. He was such a dominant personality, and the chair was such an integral part of him, that she hardly even noticed it after a couple of days. She’d seen him race Chad down the long office hallway and beat him. She’d walked into his office one day and found him rocking backward on two wheels, with the front dangling in the air. It had scared her a little and she’d aske
d him if he’d ever fallen over that way. She’d snapped her mouth shut, because she hadn’t meant to sound so informal with a man who was, technically, one of her three bosses. The twinkle in his dark eyes had brightened, though, and he’d grinned at her. “I have, but not in front of anybody.” It was one of the friendliest interactions they’d had at that point, and the beginning of her infatuation.
The outer office door opened, and Cameron Jennings stepped into the reception area. Shannon forced herself to greet him with a smile. “Mr. Jennings. If you’ll have a seat, please, I’ll let Mr. Wilde know you’re here.”
He stalked across the office and lowered himself to one of the leather couches directly across from her desk. Shannon called Duncan to let him know his appointment was waiting, then turned back to her computer. She didn’t know why the man across from her put her on edge, because he looked decent. Short dark hair, pale eyes. Lean body. In fact, he kind of reminded her of her brother Chris. The entire time she sat there though, she could feel Jennings’ gaze resting on her. When she looked up, he would turn his head away. Very disconcerting.
This was his second interview. Duncan put every new hire through the wringer when he considered them. There were criminal background checks, interviews with friends, family and former commanding officers, psychological testing. There was a whole gamut of tests to make sure they were ready for whatever Duncan would throw at them. If they weren’t ready, they would be nudged to seek counseling at the VA hospital. Shannon had hoped Jennings wouldn’t make it through. The first day he’d come, he’d looked at her as if he’d seen a ghost, and spent most of the time waiting staring at his hands. Shannon glanced up and caught him glaring at her again, but this time his eyes didn’t shift away. “Can I help you with something?”
Jennings shook his head. “No, ma’am.”
Still, his eyes didn’t shift away.
Chad stepped out just then to shake hands with the Marine and guide him into Duncan’s office, and the tension eased from her spine. For some reason, Jennings’ face took on a vitality that hadn’t been present in front of her, and she wondered what was going on with him. For half an hour, the door stayed firmly shut. She heard raised voices once, then Jennings suddenly lurched out of the office and stopped in front of her desk to stare at her for several long seconds. Shannon sat back in her chair as his eyes drifted up to her hair, then back down her face. Her soft heart actually went out to him as desolation swept over his features and he turned to let himself quietly out of the office.
John came out of the office and stopped at her side. “Are you okay?”
She blinked, shook for some unknown reason. “That was very strange. Is he okay?”
John looked at the door, but the young man was already gone. “He will be. He needs to take some time, though.”
Shannon made a deliberate effort to calm herself, but things kept replaying in her head. Strange was becoming a way of life recently and she didn’t like it. John looked at her for a long moment before she waved him away. He rolled down the hallway to his office and out of sight.
She glanced at the clock and was amazed to see it was almost three already. Her stomach twinged with renewed anxiety at the thought of going home alone, but she pushed it away. Tonight she would put the truck in the garage, like she should have done last night. She just hadn’t wanted to chill the kittens in the garage when she pulled in. Tonight, they would have to be cold, and hopefully she’d have full tires tomorrow. It was probably just kids messing with her.
At five o’clock, she cleaned her desk off and dug her purse from the depths of the drawer. She wrapped her muffler around her neck and slipped her dark green coat on, then made sure her gloves and hat were in her pocket. The weatherman had called for more snow tonight, and the temperature had already plunged into the twenties. Although that was nothing new for Denver, it was only the beginning of November. Winter had moved in early.
She ducked her head into Duncan’s office. His close-cropped gray head lifted when she entered. “I’m heading home, boss. Do you need anything before I go?”
Duncan seemed surprised as he looked at the clock on the wall. “Is it five already?”
Nodding her head in amusement, Shannon tucked her hair behind her ear. “A bit after, actually.”
“Ugh,” he grumbled. “The time just got away from me, I guess.”
“Again,” she reminded him. “Why don’t you do something crazy, like go home early tonight? And do something other than work over the weekend.”
Duncan chuckled, but he didn’t promise her anything as she headed out the door. She wished he would take her advice. He was a good looking man, with his gray hair and lean face. His brown eyes seemed more tired recently, though. The man worked all hours, keeping abreast of every case they had under contract. Even when the case was complete, he followed up with and maintained contact with previous customers. Shannon was seriously impressed with the work ethic she’d found working there.
Maybe it was a Marine thing.
She’d never had close contact with anybody in the military and it had been an eye-opening experience listening to the repartee and insults that flew between the men. And the cussing. Jeez! But every word was said, or yelled in many cases, with a friendliness that amazed her. They didn’t technically have rank in the office, although there was a hierarchy of power. Everybody deferred to Duncan, as was appropriate for the owner of the business. Chad and John had both been sergeants and were next on the list. But even with the rest of the guys, she could definitely tell the leaders from the followers.
She retrieved her Crockpot and cake pan from the break room, and turned to leave, but didn’t see John stopped in the doorway. Her toe caught on the edge of his wheel. She flailed, trying to maintain her balance and hang onto the Crockpot and lid, the trailing electrical cord, her purse and cake pan in the opposite arm. She gasped as her purse slipped off her shoulder to land on her forearm, which made the lopsided cake pan tip over.
John snatched the heavy pot out of her left arm, unburdening her. The lack of weight itself was enough to overbalance her in the opposite direction, but she clamped everything to her body and righted herself. Immediately, she could feel her cheeks burn in humiliation. Good God, you almost landed on your ass with your legs in the air.
John tried, and failed, not to laugh. She could see it in his eyes. He attempted to pass it off as a cough, but Shannon knew better. In the six months she had been at the agency, she could count on one hand the number of times she had heard him let it all out. It was a very distinctive bass rumble. She allowed herself to sag back against the doorjamb and disintegrate into giggles. John laughed with her, and it was the most amazing thing she’d ever heard.
That was how Chad found them a few moments later, with John shaking his head and Shannon wiping tears from her cheeks.
“What did I miss?”
Shannon giggled, one hand over her mouth. “Chad, did I ever tell you my middle name was Grace?”
John let out a roar of laughter, even as he turned his chair toward the elevator.
“Come on, Grace, let’s get you to your car.”
Shannon followed obediently, trying not to let the act mean too much to her needy emotions. He was just escorting her to her car, not offering her anything more.
They were both quiet on the long ride down in the elevator, but Shannon knew she was still smiling. It was nice being with him, and having his attention centered on her for a few moments.
“Is your middle name actually Grace?” he asked finally.
Nodding her head, Shannon pulled her hat out of her coat pocket, tugging it over her head one-handed.
“I swear. It was the bane of my existence, because it’s so totally opposite of how I actually am.”
John shook his dark head, and Shannon was ecstatic for having brought some humor into his day. Walking through the doors in the lobby, she was also pleased she had worn her heavy coat to work that day. The temperature may have been in the tw
enties, but the wind chill dropped it at least fifteen degrees. She frowned at John.
“I can take it from here,” she told him, and reached for the pot.
John wheeled around her and shot toward the parking lot. “C’mon, Shannon.”
“John,” she warned, “you’re only wearing a t-shirt. I’m clear in the back. You’ll freeze out here.”
“Not if you hurry up, damn it.”
Shannon shut her mouth and jogged after him as he dodged vehicles to get to her white Blazer in the back. There was no hesitation on his part, and Shannon shouldn’t have been surprised he knew exactly where she parked. John always seemed to know too much.
She dug her keys from her coat pocket and rushed ahead of him to unlock the doors.
“Don’t slip on the ice, Grace,” she heard him mutter.
Daring fate, she smiled at him over her shoulder, not too flirtatiously, she hoped, as she crossed the last few feet. No calamity befell her, and Shannon mouthed a silent “thank you” to the heavens. She threw her purse in the backseat, tossed the empty cake pan on the passenger side floorboard, and turned to take the crock pot from John’s hands. She took a minute to glance at her full tires.
“You have a spare, right?”
She nodded at him, and forced her smile to stay unconcerned.
“Thank you so much for helping me. Now, you better get inside before you catch a cold.”
John tipped his beard-shadowed chin towards the vehicle. The man acted as if he wore a parka rather than a thin blue t-shirt. Although if she had a chest like his to show off, she’d probably do the same thing. “Make sure it starts and I’ll go.”
Shannon slammed the passenger door shut, then scrambled to the driver’s side. The hardy little truck started immediately, and Shannon gave John a thumbs-up. With a wave, he turned the wheelchair and started back across the snowy lot. Against her will, her eyes followed him as he wove through cars and finally rolled into the front lobby and disappeared.
What a fascinating man.
Shannon flicked the heat on, sat back in the seat and waited for the vehicle to warm up. Three seconds after he was gone and she was already wondering what he’d be doing this evening. She knew he was single. Most of the guys were.
