by Lexi Blake
And so did Tara and Marcy.
Tara leaned over and gave her a hug. “I’m going to change before I really get in trouble. I’m into Darin for double digits with a crop already. If he catches me mooning over the new Dom, he might attach a TENS unit to my pink parts.”
“God, and you’re running from that?” Marcy asked, giving Shelley a wink before she followed her friend.
“I’m glad to see you’re getting along with the other subs.”
He looked so self-satisfied that she had to wonder how much he’d overheard. “They were sympathizing with me because my Dom is so sadly unattractive.”
His grin grew. “Is that right? Poor Shelley. Well, I’m the lucky one because all anyone can talk about is how hot my sub is.”
How did he do that? One minute she was vowing to never be naked again and the next she was perfectly willing to throw off her clothes as long as he took her. What had Charlotte told her to do? Listen to the man. Judge him by his actions. He truly thought she was gorgeous.
“Come on, sweetheart. I’m going to take you home.”
The evening was ending already? “I thought we were going to have a drink?”
“Fet wear only in the bar. I thought we could stop somewhere vanilla. If we stay here, we’ll have to talk to other people, and I would like to focus on you. And then I can get you drunk enough that you don’t fight me when I tell you I’m sleeping on your couch tonight.”
He was what? “Why would you sleep on my couch?”
“Because you got mugged and you might have nightmares?”
The truth hit her with all the subtlety of a runaway train. “You think it was a setup. You think he knew who I was. Why would he steal my laptop? Oh, god, he was looking for information.”
It was happening again.
“Hey.” He reached out and grabbed her hand. “I’m probably being paranoid. As a man who used to fight some of the worst human beings and terrorists in the world, you have to understand that I sometimes see the glass as half empty, and maybe there’s a bomb at the bottom of it.”
But what if he was right? It had always been there in the back of her mind. The press had reviled her for months. It didn’t matter that she’d been cleared. She’d been the one who had unwittingly placed the cameras that had caught the blackmail material Bryce had used on her clients. For months, she’d received nasty phone calls and e-mails calling her every bad name in the world. After a year, it had quieted down, and she’d hoped it was over.
What if it wasn’t over? Her son-of-a-bitch husband was never going to let her go. He still had a hold on her, even from beyond the grave. She was going to have to give up another man she cared about.
She shook her head. “No. You should stay here. You shouldn’t get involved in this.”
Wolf took a step forward, his lips curving into a snarl. “What did you say?”
“She said you should leave her alone, Wolf. She obviously wants to be assaulted.” Leo was suddenly beside him, the Meyer brothers taking up all the available space.
She found herself pressed against the wall. “I’m trying to protect him.”
Leo snorted and slapped his brother on the back. “Protect him? This two hundred and twenty pounds of pure Navy SEAL?”
“He isn’t a SEAL anymore,” she pointed out. He could be out of practice.
“Once a SEAL, always a SEAL, love.” Wolf’s tight smile seemed predatory.
And Leo’s matched him. “So you think you’re going to be able to handle a potentially dangerous situation better than Wolf?”
He was willfully misunderstanding her. “I think Wolf shouldn’t have to handle this.”
Leo’s head shook. “I disagree, and I damn sure think he disagrees. I watched him bring you to orgasm not half an hour ago. You had your legs spread wide for him, and you gave him everything he asked for. He owes you his protection.”
“He doesn’t owe me anything.” The last thing she wanted to do was to bring Wolf into her nightmare. It wasn’t fair. He hadn’t done anything wrong, and he could get seriously hurt if he got involved. She couldn’t live with Wolf getting hurt any more than she’d been able to handle the thought of Bryce hurting Leo.
“Then you were using me?” Wolf asked, his eyes stony.
“I told you,” Leo said to his brother in his first sign of sibling solidarity. Naturally it was against her. “She did the same thing to me. When she no longer needed me, she told me to get out of her life. At least she gave you some sort of excuse. She told me to leave. No reason.”
He hadn’t been willing to discuss this for almost a year and a half, but he brought it up now? Frustration threatened to overtake her. “I had a reason. I tried to explain that to you. I didn’t want Bryce to hurt you.”
Leo’s eyes rolled. “Yes, Bryce Hughes, who I outweigh by forty pounds of muscle. Bryce Hughes, who ran away from a bar fight. Yes, he was going to take me out. Bullshit. It’s a ridiculous argument, and it won’t fly.”
“He had guns. I found them that day.” She could remember how terrified she’d been when she’d opened the drawer to Bryce’s desk and found his gun. All she’d been able to think about was Leo taking one of those shiny bullets.
“Yes, dear, because no SEAL ever had to deal with guns.” Sarcasm dripped from Leo’s voice.
Wolf pulled at the side of his jacket, and sure enough, there was a gun in a shoulder holster. “I have a permit to carry concealed. Julian made sure of it before he hired me. Besides being one of his resident Doms, I’m also considered a trained bodyguard. Finn has worked some controversial cases in the last few years and a rich man’s wife is always a target.”
She turned to Leo. She’d never imagined that he would be walking around Dallas with a gun. “And you?”
Leo stood, his legs apart in a stance she was sure had once terrorized new recruits. “I don’t carry in The Club, but when I escort Dani or Finn or even Julian himself somewhere, I carry. And, sweetheart, that day you dumped me, I had two SIG Sauers and a sniper rifle in my truck. I also do some training work with Dallas SWAT.”
Wolf turned to his brother. “Are you seriously telling me that you don’t have a weapon on you?”
“Well, I don’t have a gun on me right this second.”
“And if I checked your boot?” Wolf asked.
“You might get your hand sliced up,” Leo admitted.
Shelley stared for a moment. The world seemed to have tilted slightly. “You have a knife?”
Leo tapped his boot against the floor. “More than one, if you have to know. And I had more than one on me the day you dumped my ass. It was only my remarkable patience that kept me from killing your asshole husband the night before in a bar fight. I thought you might have been angry.”
Had she made a terrible mistake? Was she making one by trying to protect Wolf?
“I’m going to make this easy on you, sweetheart.” Wolf crossed his arms over his chest in a show of mulish stubbornness. “You don’t get a choice in this. I am going to take you home. I am going to stay on your couch. And I am going to bring you back here tomorrow. If you want to safe word on me, go on. I won’t be your Dom anymore, but until I’m certain that you’re okay, you won’t be able to get rid of me unless you call the cops and have my ass hauled to jail.”
“I’m not calling the cops.” Tears blurred her vision. She’d given up so damn much, and now Leo was standing here telling her it had all been for nothing. If she’d gone with Leo that day, would things have turned out the same way? Or would Beth and Bo have been in an even worse position?
Misery washed over her. Regret.
“I’m glad to hear that,” Wolf said, his voice softening. He reached out for her, his big hands enveloping hers. “Shelley, this is what I want. This is who I am. I want to protect you. I want to be the big badass who stands in front of you. It’s all I’m fucking good at.”
“You’re going to have to work on his self-esteem,” Leo said. “But he’s right, and if you try to
get away from him, I’ll call your brother in. How do you think Trev will handle this? He’s trying to settle in and now Beth is having a baby. Do you want him to have to leave his new ranch and his pregnant wife because you’re too stubborn to accept protection?”
“Damn it, stop being so hard on her,” Wolf complained, pulling her close. “She’s had a rough day. She’s not going to call the cops.”
But Leo’s words had formed a hard knot of guilt in her belly. Wolf hugged her, but she simply stood there in his arms. She’d been happy when she’d heard Beth was pregnant, but there was a nasty kernel of envy in there, too. Trev had done everything wrong and still managed to build an amazing life for himself. She’d sacrificed everything for the people she loved and she was alone, and it seemed she always would be.
“I’d like to go home now.” The words came out in a flat monotone. “I think I need some rest. Wolf can stay on my couch.”
“Baby, don’t be so glum,” Wolf cajoled. “I really can protect you.”
Leo took a step back. “And tomorrow we’ll all sit down and discuss it. It’s Saturday. We all have to have breakfast with the boss to discuss the weekend’s parties and scenes. We’ll talk about your situation. And we’ll put Ben and Chase on the case. It’s been forever since Chase got to hack something. He’ll be thrilled. I think I saw Tag in the locker room. I’ll let him know we might need extra help. I won’t let anything happen to you. I didn’t before, and I won’t now.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” She looked up at Leo. “You haven’t talked to me for over a year.”
Leo frowned and looked like he wished he hadn’t said anything, but Wolf’s face lit up.
“Julian didn’t pay Finn, did he? You did. Finn was her lawyer.”
Shelley thought her heart might break. Leo had paid Finn? “I thought he was doing it pro bono. Trev told me he was.”
Leo wouldn’t quite look her in the eyes. “Finn would have done it, but I knew damn well that he wouldn’t be able to give it his full attention if he was still working on his other stuff. So I paid him to get you to the top of the list. Finn didn’t actually make the money. He used it to bring in the consultants we needed to hurry things along. I also had Alex McKay put a good word in for you with the feds. He used to work for the FBI and he still has good contacts there. Money and power were the only way to solve the problem. If I hadn’t given Finn money to grease a few wheels, you would still be under a cloud of suspicion.”
“Why would you do that?” He’d acted like he couldn’t care less whether she lived or died. He’d utterly ignored her, refusing to take her calls and making up excuses to not see her.
“It doesn’t matter now. It didn’t matter then. I spent a lot of money making sure you were okay. I would prefer you didn’t blow it all by not allowing Wolf to protect you. And he can handle a few bullets. Half of him has been replaced by titanium rods and his skull is far too thick to ever let a bullet pass through it.” Leo turned and began to walk back into the locker room, retreating. “I’ll speak to you both in the morning.”
Wolf grinned down at her. “Wow, he is such a coward. He ran back to the men’s locker room because he doesn’t think you’ll walk in there with half the Doms in The Club down to their bare asses.”
“He’s right.” Her mind was reeling. What did any of it mean?
Wolf kissed the top of her head. “Well, it’s progress all the same. Now, let’s go get that drink. I could use a beer. There’s a store across the street. We’ll grab a six-pack and head back to your place.”
She stared at him. It seemed to her it was time to start training her Dom.
He stopped, and she could see him thinking. “Or we could get a bottle of wine.”
He waited as if hoping against hope he’d penciled in the right answer.
“I would love a white, thank you.”
“And a six-pack of beer.” He was back to grinning as he led her down the hall.
Shelley looked back at the door Leo had disappeared behind. It seemed one of them was always closing the door on the other.
* * * *
Wolf took Shelley’s hand as he walked past the security guard.
“Mr. Meyer? Do you want me to bring your truck around?”
He wasn’t sure why this guy needed to bring his truck around when he himself had two legs, but he figured it was a “Julian Lodge” thing and he should get used to it. The same young man had insisted on parking the truck when he’d driven in, so he guessed this was the new norm.
He was going to have to start watching Leo and taking his cues. Wolf had been either in the Navy or on a ranch most of his life. He sure as hell wasn’t used to wealth and people doing stuff for him, but it seemed to be the way The Club ran.
“Thanks, Nelson. We’re going to run to the store across the street. Just have it ready when we get back. Give us ten minutes or so.” It seemed silly to get into the truck, drive across the street, and then look for parking when they could dash over there and avoid the headache.
But maybe Shelley didn’t want to walk. God, he was so out of practice. He’d spent the last freaking year of his life trying to get back into the Navy, fighting his discharge. He’d forgotten how to treat a lady.
He’d high-fived her. He felt a flush go through him. “I’m sorry about the high five. I was feeling pretty good. I’ll be more formal next time.”
“Don’t you dare.” She stepped out of the garage onto the sidewalk. The streets were quiet at this time of the night, but there were a couple of restaurants and a bar that still seemed to be hopping. She turned her face up to his, her skin luminous in the moonlight. “Wolf, I want you the way you are. I really do. I get that you were in the Navy for a long time, but the man I’ve been talking to through e-mail and on the phone is one of the nicest, most charming men I’ve ever met. I can handle the occasional high five. And you’re obviously very smart, so I wish you would stop talking about yourself like that.”
He growled, but it was definitely not at her. “I get this way around my brother. I’ve kind of been in his shadow for a long time. Our dad left when we were young, and he took care of me. He became the man of the house. Leo went into the Navy because he didn’t have the money for college. When he got out he whizzed through his undergrad and straight through to his PhD. He’s the smartest guy I know.”
They walked down the street toward the corner. “Well, you’re no slouch.”
“I read a lot.” He’d gotten ribbed for his reading tastes by his teammates. He’d read in his downtime. Pretty much anything his mom or brother would send him. Thrillers. Mysteries. History books. Books on psychology and sociology. But he didn’t have a formal education.
“You can learn a lot from books. College is nothing but having a guide to reading the right books.” Her hand in his felt so damn right. She took a long breath. “Mexican food smells good.”
Well, he could fix that. “Come on. I’ll get you some enchiladas. And a margarita. You’ll see. This whole thing is probably nothing, but it’s best to be safe.”
A cloud of worry passed over her face, but he could see plainly that she had accepted the inevitable. “I will feel safer if you sleep over. But maybe we can talk about the couch thing. It’s small and probably uncomfortable.”
And the only way he didn’t end up burying himself in her before the end of the night. “I’ve slept in worse places.”
And then he felt it. It was a little thing, but he’d learned to trust it. A prickle ran up his spine as though his body could process his surroundings faster than his brain could, and it sent a warning. He stopped in the middle of the street.
The night was quiet, only the muted sound of mariachi music coming from the restaurant down the street. He looked up and down but there was no one out. Just him and Shelley.
But he knew they weren’t alone.
“Hey, did you change your mind? We could get some wine and go back to my place.” Shelley looked up at him.
He held a h
and up, his fingers in a tight fist.
“You want to punch something?” Shelley asked, her mouth hanging open.
Of course. It was a habit. That fist would have told anyone in the military to go silent, but she hadn’t served for years and didn’t have the same instincts he had. “Hush, love. Stay still. If I tell you to run, you run.”
Up ahead there was a long line of bushes that garnished a small store. The store’s lights were out, but the streetlight glowed through the leaves. Except in one place. There was a man-size dark spot. Wolf looked down. Shoes.
Fuck.
Adrenaline, his old friend, began to pump through his body. He loved the fight. God, he’d missed the fight. Even now his muscles were loosening and his mind sharpening as he got ready to fight for his life.
But he had Shelley.
Double fuck.
His need to kill would have to wait. He pulled his SIG and grabbed his cell, pressing a single button. “We’re heading back to the garage, love. You stay behind me.”
Those feet were starting to move.
“What’s up?” Leo asked over the line.
“Trouble. Grab Taggart and come now. I’m taking her to the garage.” He slid his cell back in his pocket, certain Leo was on his way.
The streetlight above the shrubs flickered, and Wolf could see that whoever had been waiting there was moving a bit faster now, hugging the brick of the wall. Wolf gave the guy thirty seconds before he hit the end of the shrubs, and then he would be out in the open. There would be no more play. There would be a bullet.
It was the lightest of sounds that had him turning, realizing that Shrub Guy wasn’t alone. Someone was coming up from behind him, and it sure as hell wasn’t his brother. Leo wouldn’t have made that mistake. Leo wouldn’t have made a sound. The only way Wolf would have known Leo was there would have been when Leo wanted him to know. It would be the same with Ben and Chase, who had also put in their time with the Teams.
So it was an easy thing to turn and, in the blink of an eye, the scene played out in front of him. A single tango coming in at a run. The infiltrator held a gun in his right hand. He wore all black, and he’d covered his face with a balaclava.
