by Joss Wood
Knox sucked in his cheeks. “I’ll take your suggestion under advisement.”
“That means he will,” Coe said, rolling his eyes. “Ugh.”
“One day you’ll also kiss girls,” Flick told him.
“I’d rather die,” Coe solemnly told her.
Flick snorted, and her eyes dropped to Rufus. “Kiddo, why is Rufus’s head wet?”
Coe winced and rocketed to his feet. “I need to brush my teeth,” Coe said, spinning on his heel and heading toward the door. His father snagged the back of his sweatshirt and stopped his flight.
“Not so fast, kid. Let’s try that again. Why does Rufus have a wet head?”
Coe shrugged his small shoulders and looked up at the ceiling. “We were in the garden and I peed on his head,” he admitted.
Knox threw up his hands. “Why would you do that?”
“I wanted to hit a target and his head was there.”
“Dear Lord,” Flick muttered. She looked at Knox. “Is not coming inside to pee and using a dog’s head as target practice normal boy behavior?”
Knox nodded, bemused. “Pretty much.”
“Boys are weird,” Flick murmured.
Reagan lifted her finger and pointed at Coe, then Knox. “I’m a not taking a dog who has a pee-soaked head in my car. Sort that out and we have a deal.”
Knox scooped Coe off his feet and carried him back into the house, Rufus lumbering after them. When they were out of earshot, Flick let out a long rumble of laughter. “Really, it’s a miracle that the world has survived centuries of men ruling the planet.”
“Amen, sister.”
***
At Caswallawn HQ, Reagan rapped on the door to Axl’s office. Her stomach flipped over and inside out when he looked up and smiled. “Hey, I thought you were at the estate.”
“Bryn is there. I’m on Coe duty,” Reagan said, jamming her hands into the pockets of her cargo pants and leaning against the doorframe to keep herself from dropping into his lap and kissing him senseless. “Coe and Rufus duty, I should say.”
“You’re a brave, brave woman, Hudson,” Axl stated, leaning back in his leather chair. “Where are the two hellions?”
“Mac nearly had a fit when he saw Rufus in the gym, so he took them both out onto the obstacle course. He still hasn’t forgiven Rufus for eating his punching bag and vomiting all over his feet in the middle of his fight with Kai. Were you here for that?”
Axl shook his head. “Nope. You?”
Reagan shook her head and stared at her feet. “Sometimes I think I miss out on so much of the fun stuff happening around here because I’m on the road so much.”
“I do too. I feel like I’m always catching up.”
Axl’s admission surprised her. He seemed so self-contained and reticent, but she kept seeing glimpses of a lonely man beneath his hard-as-nails shell. Reagan walked into his office and perched her butt on the edge of his spare chair, linking her hands together. She gestured to the laptop computer which, she suspected, had enough processing power to launch a couple of nuclear warheads and a space rocket or two. She smiled at him, thinking that he looked super sexy wearing his wire-rimmed reading glasses.
“Since when?” she asked.
Axl pulled his glasses off and tossed them onto the desk and pulled a face. “A couple of months. They are a damned nuisance; I’m pretty sure I don’t need them.”
Reagan tried, unsuccessfully, to hide her smile. “If you don’t need them then why are you wearing them?”
“You can be ridiculously annoying on occasion, Hudson,” Axl said, his tone holding no heat.
“It’s a skill,” Reagan agreed. She leaned back and crossed her legs. “Have you made any progress with your parents and blocking the adoption process?”
Axl blew air into his cheeks. “Neither of them are taking my calls at the moment so, unless I make the trip to see them, I can neither discuss their crazy plan nor make any arrangements to retile the flooded house.” Axl rubbed the back of his neck. “It’s their favorite way of dealing with me . . . Lie low and hope like hell that I get busy and forget about them.”
“And does their plan work?” Reagan asked.
“Sometimes,” Axl admitted. “Sometimes I just get so sick of fighting with them that it’s easier to let them have their way than argue. But I will fight them on the adoption; that’s not a battle I’m prepared to walk away from.”
He was such a good man, Reagan thought. Caring, protective, morally unambiguous. His family didn’t realize how lucky they were to have him looking out for them. What would it be like to be loved by him?
He wouldn’t be an easy man to live with, but whoever he made his life with would never be in any doubt that she was loved, that Axl would jump in front of a bullet for her. Pity she was the type of girl who could stop her own bullets. She wished she was the type of girl who could live with that, who didn’t feel that being protected was akin to strangulation.
Who didn’t equate love with control.
She wished she was normal, not so very screwed up. Capable of being in and sustaining a relationship. She wished she was brave enough to throw caution to the wind and jump into that twisty, topsy-turvy tornado.
Uncomfortable with what-ifs and what-might-have-beens, Reagan looked from the window to the floor and back to Axl’s handsome face. Sometimes she thought that she could, genuinely, wake up to that face for the rest of her life . . .
Okay, enough fantasizing now, Hudson. It was neither professional nor productive, two things she prided herself on being.
Reagan nodded at his laptop. “Any luck on finding out what’s on the flash drive?”
Axl glanced at his screen and his fingers danced over the keyboard, fluid and assured. He made love the same way, Reagan realized. Confidence was such a turn-on.
“I’m getting nowhere fast,” Axl said. “The files are seriously corrupted.”
“Deliberately or by accident?”
Axl shrugged. “Probably by accident. There’s no reason why anyone would keep a flash drive of corrupted files that can’t be watched. I think the likely cause of the corruption was that someone was in a hurry to copy them and pulled the drive out before the transfer could be completed.”
“So are we going to be able to view the files?” Reagan asked.
Axl looked at his screen again. “There’s a slim chance that I’ll be able to recover enough to give us a sense of what we are looking at, but I wouldn’t hold my breath.”
“How much longer?” Reagan asked, impatient.
“It could take hours, or days. As I said, they were badly corrupted. This isn’t a Hollywood cybercrime TV show, Hudson.”
Before Reagan could respond to his teasing, she heard voices in the hallway outside.
“You’re shit out of luck, little dude,” Mac said in his Scottish brogue. “No Twinkies in this vending machine.”
Reagan stood up and pulled a face. She walked to the open door to scowl at Mac. “Dammit, McDougal, no swearing! The kid is like a parrot, he repeats everything!”
Coe appeared in the doorway, dirty and muddy from top to toe. He had mud in his hair and mud on his clothes and mud, Reagan noticed with a grimace, up his nose. Rufus, who wandered into Axl’s office and stretched out on the heavy-duty gray carpeting, was equally dirty.
Reagan ducked around Coe and looked down the passageway to McDougal’s departing back. “I asked you to show him around, Mac, not roll him in mud.”
At the end of the passage Mac turned and grinned at her. “Kid’s amazing. He scaled the spear dipper like a natural.”
“He’s four, Mac. Four!”
“Kid’s alive, isn’t he?” Mac drawled before disappearing around the corner. Reagan scowled at the empty space and walked back into Axl’s office. Coe was sitting in between Rufus’s legs and munching from a pa
cket of chips.
“I was gone two seconds, where did you get that?” she demanded, wincing at the filthy hands lifting the food to his mouth.
“Axl gave it to me,” Coe replied. His blue eyes looked even more startling in his muddy face. “A man needs to keep his energy up.”
Reagan looked at Axl, who was standing next to his desk, not remotely worried that his carpet was now streaked with brown mud from the dog and the child.
“He’s filthy,” Reagan said, stating the obvious.
“Dirt washes off,” Axl told her. “Did you bring extra clothes for him?”
“In my backpack,” Coe helpfully said. “Dad always packs a spare set ’cause I’m a walking accident.”
Well done, Knox, Reagan thought. “Right. Then we need to get you clean.”
“And Rufus,” Coe insisted.
Reagan shook her head and lifted up her hands. “Coe, I can put you in a shower but Rufus is on his own. But I really don’t want that dirty mutt in my car and Flick will not be happy if I send him back to her in that state. Dammit, Mac.”
“Rufus can shower with me,” Coe said. “Then we can go for a burger and a shake.”
“I’m exhausted already,” Reagan muttered.
“And a movie,” Coe said, leaning back against Rufus and crossing his legs. Droplets of mud fell from his sneakers onto the carpet.
A movie? If it meant Coe sitting still for a little while then Reagan was in. Kids, she was fast discovering, were exhausting. Or maybe it was just this kid.
She might be new at this babysitting deal but she was smart enough not to box herself into a corner. “We’ll talk about it.”
Coe’s smile was pure gotcha! He looked at Axl. “Do you want to come to a movie with us?”
Axl actually managed to look regretful. “Can’t, bud, I’ve got to work.”
But before they could go anywhere she needed to get this kid and the dog clean. She shuddered. Coe she could manage, but Rufus was a hundred pounds plus of crazy. There was no way she could manage him on her own. Well, she could, but that would mean she’d need a shower too. She turned her head and for the first time in her life she batted her eyelashes at Axl.
He just stared back at her and looked confused. Then a huge smile crossed his face and he shook his head, laughing as he walked backward toward his desk. “No! No, no, no. You’re on your own. With the kid and the dog . . .”
“It would be so much easier if you helped me.”
Axl sat down in his chair and pulled his laptop toward him. “Sorry, busy, lots of work.”
“Jerk,” Reagan muttered.
Coe popped another handful of muddy crisps into his mouth as he slowly stood up. He looked at Axl and back up to Reagan. “I think Axl is trying to tell you that you’re shit out of luck, Reagan,” he said, his tone helpful.
Axl’s laugh bounced around the room and Reagan closed her eyes. “Yeah, pretty much.”
***
Reagan, dressing in the female locker room, felt like she’d run an ultramarathon. Coe insisted on helping her wash Rufus and, since it was too cold to wash him outside, they’d waited until Mac left the gym and the two of them pulled him into the women’s showers and placed him in a stall. Rufus, it turned out, loved to shower, and when Coe saw how much fun the dog was having under the spray, he’d stripped down to his underwear and joined the dog, spending the next few minutes trying to catch the shower spray with his mouth. Somehow both dog and child rinsed off most of the mud, and a little soap took care of Coe’s face and hands. It took her using her best don’t-mess-with-me voice to convince both children, human and canine, to leave the shower. Rufus showed his appreciation by shaking his massive body to dry off, splattering the bathroom with droplets, and Coe had thought that was a fine idea and imitated his new best friend.
Rufus barked his appreciation and Coe echoed that action, and she thought her head might explode. Somehow, using every last bit of willpower she had, she got Coe dried and dressed, Rufus marginally dry, and she cleaned up the lake on the bathroom floor. Leaving them in the bathroom with strict instructions to sit and stay, she slipped next door into the women’s locker room and changed out of her Cas uniform into soft Levi’s, a long-sleeved top, and a battered, sheepskin-lined aviator’s jacket. She brushed her hair, slicked on some gloss, and thought longingly of something long and tall and exceptionally alcoholic.
It didn’t escape her attention that bad guys wanting to do bad things to whomever she was protecting didn’t leave her feeling half as wiped as a kid and a dog did. Or was that a kid and a dog who thought he was a kid?
After checking the safety twice, Reagan shoved her pistol into her shoulder holster, slid her smaller piece into her ankle holster, and pulled a beanie over her hair. She slammed her locker closed and held her cell and her keys in her hand, her bag over her shoulder.
She hauled in a deep breath and then another. She was an experienced operative. She could cope with those two hellions outside.
They weren’t where she told them to wait, and she found them in the gym with Rufus sniffing the newly covered punching bag. Reagan sucked in her breath as she saw his teeth sink into the soft leather.
“Hey!” Reagan yelled, and Rufus’s eyes rolled toward her, but he didn’t loosen his grip on the leather. “Drop it!”
Rufus didn’t obey and Reagan hurried over to him, thankful that he was just holding the bag and not gnawing on it. Maybe Mac wouldn’t notice the teeth marks. Rufus had chewed the punching bag before and he was, technically, banished from Mac’s gym. If Mac caught him chewing on a piece of equipment again, he’d freak. Though she knew that Mac would never hurt Rufus, Mac’s temper was a living, breathing, ferocious entity and she wanted neither Rufus nor Coe to experience it.
Reagan reached Rufus, grabbed his leash, and tugged him off the bag. Rufus sent a longing, loving look at the bag when she walked him away from it. One under control, where was the other one?
Reagan looked around and her heart stopped when she saw Coe halfway up the indoor climbing wall, sans ropes. This gym used to be a storage warehouse and the walls were high and the top of the climbing wall hit fifty feet. Coe, the monkey, was steadily making his way upward. Soon he’d run out of something to grip on to and he’d be stuck.
Sure, there were mats on the floor to break a fall, but the kid was four! Four! From that height he could break a leg, an arm, twist his neck.
Reagan told herself not to panic and stood beneath him, braced to catch him when he fell. As Coe looked above him to figure out his next move, Reagan thought about what to say to him, how to get him safely down.
“Do not tell him not to fall, to be careful. Do not scare him, then he’ll freeze and we’ll have a problem on our hands,” Axl said in her ear.
Reagan bit her lip, her eyes darting between Axl and Coe. “So what do I do?”
“You do nothing,” Axl said, lifting his foot so that he could rip off his shoe. His sock followed, and he repeated the actions on his other foot. He shrugged out of his jacket and handed it to her to hold.
“What are you doing?” Reagan hissed.
Axl sent her a quick smile. “I’m going to get him, of course.”
“I can—”
Axl sent her a hard look. “Jesus, Reagan, just let me do this, okay?”
Coe looked down and saw Axl. “Hey, Axl, look at me!”
“That’s pretty amazing, dude, but have you thought about how you’re going to get back down?” Axl asked, his voice only betraying curiosity.
Coe looked down at Axl and looked at the wall again. “Uh . . . no? I don’t think I can go down.”
Coe didn’t seem remotely concerned. He just shrugged and looked at Axl.
“Guess I’m going to have to come and get you?”
Coe nodded. “Guess so.”
“Okay, hang tight.” Axl used o
ne hand to pull his button-down shirt and sweater over his head. In just his jeans, he walked over to the wall and put his hands onto a yellow grip. Reagan felt the flash of lust as the muscles in his back rippled, but it was quickly doused by the realization that Axl was going up the wall without any ropes. “Wait. You need a harness and ropes!”
Axl flicked her an impatient look. “I’m good. Relax. I’ll have him down in thirty seconds.”
Before she could protest again Axl was halfway to Coe, easily and steadily pulling himself up the wall. Muscles bunched and lengthened, and Reagan sighed at his command over his body. He stopped next to Coe and the two of them exchanged words too low for her to hear, both man and kid happy to grip the wall, looking like they could hang out there forever. Then Axl dropped his arm, placed it around Coe’s waist, and a little awkwardly, with Coe’s help, pulled the boy onto his back. When Coe’s arm gripped Axl’s neck and Axl’s grip returned to the wall, Reagan released the breath she was holding. Axl worked his way back down the wall, his passenger laughing all the way down.
Reagan glanced at her watch . . . Yep, thirty seconds.
Coe dropped to his feet with a whoop and started to belt toward Reagan, a three-foot tower of excitement. Axl, grabbing the tail of his flannel shirt, halted his progress. Axl dropped to his haunches and proceeded to give Coe a very pointed and very explicit lecture about walls and ropes and needing to think before you acted. Coe, faced with those serious eyes and intimidating face, was neither scared nor intimidated. He just looked Axl in the eye, nodded, said sorry, and thanked Axl for rescuing him.
Then he bounced back to Reagan to throw his arms around Rufus’s neck. Reagan heard the words he muttered in the dog’s ear. “That was fun!”
Good luck, Knox. This kid is hell on wheels.
Axl walked over to her, holding his shirt and jersey in his hands. She saw the amusement in his eyes as he glanced down at the kid. She knew that he was thinking the same thing, that his impromptu wall climb had been fun.
“Pretty impressive, Rhodes,” she said, trying to avoid looking at that golden skin and those rock-hard abs.
