Strong and Sexy (Sky High Air #2)(22)

Strangers. They were complete strangers, she reminded herself. Strangers who couldn’t keep their hands off each other.

Why was that, anyway? She had no idea, but whatever was happening between the two of them, it had to stop. Immediately. Mostly because she appeared to be in the middle of a breakdown. That, or someone was stalking her. Neither was exactly conducive to a well-rounded relationship.

Not that she was thinking about a relationship.

Oh, no. No, no, no. Because Shayne? He was a walking, talking heartbreaker if she’d ever seen one. And if she was stupid enough to even think about taking this to the next level, a level that she hadn’t been to in an embarrassingly long time, then she had no one to blame for that certain heartbreak than herself. Because once she slept with someone, she tended to get her heart involved, and…

Oh, hell, who was she kidding? She hadn’t slept with him, at least not yet, and already her heart felt involved. She couldn’t help it, Shayne Mahoney was a combination of some of her favorite things—sharp and quick-witted, willing to put himself on the line for whatever he believed in, not to mention an even more attractive willingness to help a perfect stranger.

Or in this case, a not-so-perfect stranger.

God. She pushed back her hair and wondered how much longer she could stay awake on her feet.

And wondered something else too, something she’d already voiced to Shayne. “What if it’s the same gun that I saw at Sky High?”

The two brothers, taking up all the spare room in her living room with their big, built bodies and undeniable presence, exchanged a long look.

Had she thought she couldn’t read Shayne’s thoughts? Because she knew exactly what he was thinking.

That she was as crazy as everyone said.

They spoke softly to each other, so softly she couldn’t hear the words, and then Shayne walked Patrick to her front door, and when she looked up again, Shayne was standing in front of her, hands in his pockets, hair still wet from the rain, expression unreadable. Through all of this, his proximity had always been able to affect her, and now was no exception. He still smelled good, delicious in fact, and though he wasn’t looking at her with his usual heat, it didn’t matter because he was looking at her with a gentle kindness.

Devastating, really. She wanted to put her hands on his incredibly soft shirt and feel his incredibly hard body beneath. Instead, she tried to joke. “Let me guess. He recommended you run far and fast from me, right?”

He didn’t respond to that, but pulled his hands out of his pockets and set them on her arms, stroking up and down over her coat. “You look beat.”

“A very true statement.” She resisted setting her head on his shoulder, barely. “So what did he say?”

“Who’d want to scare you, Dani?”

“Well…”

“You piss anyone off lately?”

“You have a lot of questions.”

“Are you going to answer any of them?”

She let out a shaky breath. “Are you asking me if I have any enemies?”

“Or friends that aren’t really friends.”

“So…you believe me,” she said, shocked to find her throat tight over that. “You believe that something is going on here.”

“Something, yes.”

“Okay.” She concentrated on breathing. Breathing was good. “Okay, now I’m really scared.”

“You should be. Enemies, Dani? Pissed-off family members? Scorned boyfriends? Jealous coworkers?”

Taking a step back so she could lean against the couch, she nodded.

“Which?”

She tried to smile and failed. “Well, would you believe all of the above?” When he arched a brow, she let out a short laugh. “I know, it sounds ridiculous. I mean, look at me.” She spread her hands. “I’m a mess. But it’s shockingly true.”

“Tell me.”

“I was promoted today—yesterday, now,” she corrected, looking at the clock, finding it well after midnight. “To head mammal keeper. It’s mostly just a title, with a joke of a pay increase, really. I’ll still be poor as dirt, but I get to make management decisions and I get the good schedule.”

“Anyone upset about that?”

“The only other person eligible was Reena, and she’s a close friend. We got hired at the same time, so the promotion could have gone either way, but she’s happy for me.”

Crossing his arms, he sent her a get-real look.

“She is,” she insisted.

“She can be happy for you and still really pissed off about it.”

“Pissed off enough to kill someone? Enough to break into my place? To plant a gun on me? Seriously, this is ridiculous. What happened tonight has nothing to do with my work.”

“Okay, so what about family?”

“You know my mother. She’s a stuck-up, narcissistic snob, but she’s not a gun owner. And she’s not a murderer.”

“Siblings? Stepsiblings?”

“I—” She closed her mouth. Tony’s and Eliza’s faces flashed across her mind.

“What?” Shayne murmured, watching her carefully, an unsettling thing because the look in his yes implied he cared. A lot. “What are you thinking?”

That she was going to have a hell of a time resisting him, that’s what. “I think my stepsiblings would like me to vanish, but they like their cushy trust funds too much to actually off me.” She tried to smile, but didn’t feel especially amused.