Accidental Shield (Marriage Mistake #6)(87)

We lie there for some time before I realize she’s sleeping. No wonder.

I’m sure she didn’t fall back asleep easy last night. I didn’t.

I laid there fighting my animal side until the sun came up.

Now, the fight only gets harder.

She’s too right. We’ll want round two, round four, round twenty of what just happened, and it’s sure to complicate everything. Not just with her and her family, but with mine.

As gorgeous as she is, she’s a walking dilemma. This chick could destroy a big heaping piece of me.

I’m not about to drag a strange woman into Bryce’s life, just to have her disappear, which is precisely what’ll happen after I’ve managed to fix up her life.





15





Under Wing (Valerie)





I’m ready for my applause.

Having decided my old life sucked, I just made my new one as complicated as possible.

Awesome.

I roll over, staring at the ceiling. Flint isn’t in bed. I have no idea how long he’s been gone or how long I’ve been asleep. Not that it matters. What’s done is done.

There’s no taking back what just happened. I don’t think I’d forget that even if I suffered ten more blows to the head.

I’ve had sex before, a few times back in art school. Nothing like the soaking wet, screaming, sexy freaking sex I had with him, and it’s not just because the boys were too soft, too immature, too bland.

Because my heart was never in it. It was this time.

It is this time.

Present tense.

That scares me worse than any bad memory.

I can’t fall in love with Flint Calum. Can’t afford to fall in love with anyone.

Not now. Maybe not ever.

My family has so much baggage, I couldn’t do that to anyone. Especially not a man who’s already had to wade through the muck of my life neck-deep.

I throw my legs over the bed, sitting up straight, releasing a heavy sigh.

Here we go again.

Damned if I do and damned if I don’t.

This quiet, hot anger builds inside me. I’m so sick of it. So exhausted with not being able to live.

I climb off the bed, gathering up my clothes. I see Flint swimming in the ocean. He’s just as gorgeous as he was naked, pushing his sleek, strong body through the waves.

Regret swells in my chest, hating how deeply I’ve involved him in all this.

There has to be something I can do.

Ideas roam around in my head while I shower, get dressed, and pad through the kitchen. Flint’s in the kitchen now, on his computer. He looks up and flashes me a smile that wants to banish every last doubt I have.

“Hi.” I give him one back, which isn’t hard considering how achingly handsome he is. The hard part’s trying to act and sound normal. “So, I have an idea...”

His brows arch. “About what?”

I sit down across from him, telling myself not to think about what happened earlier. How fantabulously wonderful it’d been. I know I can’t hope for a repeat, whatever jokes we’d cracked about probablies.

“My situation. Something we can do with the people looking for me,” I say quietly, looking down.

Why is it so hard to hold his eyes?

“You want to be a lot more specific, babe?” He closes his computer and leans back. “Why do I get the feeling I’m not gonna like this?”

“Well, it involves letting them see me and—”

“Nope.” His gaze sharpens.

“Hold up, just listen. I wouldn’t let them catch me.”

“Off the table,” he growls. “It’s too risky. You give them a target, the slightest opening, and it might be the last mistake we make.”

“But that way they’ll know I’m alive and—”

“They already know you’re alive, honey. They followed us, remember? When we left your ma’s house?”

My shoulders droop. Of course I remember.

It just seemed so abstract then, more like some weird adventure ride. It’s easy to forget what might’ve happened if they’d caught us, if we hadn’t had backup, and he hadn’t sent them careening into that trench.

“You’re right, they do know I’m alive.” I lean my elbows on the counter, frustrated I hadn’t thought things through. “Guess I’m just trying to figure this out. There has to be something I can do to help catch these freaking monsters. Something I can do to get my life back to normal.”

“We’ll catch them,” he says. “The guys working with me are good. Very good. All trained and vetted, skilled in high stakes tactical scenarios. We’ve done shit like this before and know what we’re doing.”

“I don’t doubt that. I just want to help. Want to contribute something.”

“Well...” he says hesitantly.

“What?” I ask, unable to wait. “What can I do?”

“If I could get inside King Heron’s office, I might find some evidence. Something to help break through the wall we’ve run into.”

He’s still acting cautious, and it dawns on me why. “When are you going over there?”

He quirks an eyebrow. “I never said—”