Broken Pasts(21)

“No,” he told me. “You're not.” And then he looked up and stared at me as if he was seeing me for the first time. “And I'm sorry. Still,” he continued as I stood there and tried not to trace the firm line of his shoulders, fantasize about taking off his coat, running my fingers down that crisp white shirt, tearing off those f*cking buttons … I swallowed hard. “You paid for a week of protection, and I'm going to give it to you.” I blinked at him. Talk about sexual innuendo!

“Oh my god!” Jamie squealed and then she was shoving me forward and into Nathaniel's arms. He caught me easily, dragged me into the private, little space bubble around his person and held me there, nice and tight. His hands held my lower back and his firm midsection was pressed against mine. I felt the hard bump of his gun under his jacket and tried to adjust myself so I wasn't so close. It didn't work. Nathaniel was holding onto me like he was grasping for a life line. I looked up into his dark eyes and I was trapped. My inhibitions were down and my body was on fire from the heat and the sweat and the dancing. Before I knew what was happening, I was kissing him.

At first, it was just me, just this tentative little brush of lips against lips. I almost pulled away, almost turned around and laughed it off, but Nathaniel's fingers tightened, digging into my flesh with a painful pleasure that was twice as intoxicating as the Mai Tai I'd had earlier. Before I knew it, he was kissing me back.

Oh. My. God.

If I thought I'd been kissed before, I was wrong. Whatever I'd done before had been a weak, watery prelude to this heat that Nathaniel Sutherland was delivering. He didn't just kiss with his mouth or his tongue. Nathaniel took my body against his, wrapped his arm around my back and grabbed my hip while his other hand found my throat, slid across my skin and buried itself in my hair. He kissed me like a drowning man gasping for air, like he was tasting me, taking me into him. He made my knees weak and my heart strong. I moaned into his mouth, slid my hands up his chest and put my arms around his shoulders. I think, maybe, if I hadn't been drunk that something might've happened between us, something special, a start to something permanent. Unfortunately, Nathaniel Sutherland was the world's biggest gentleman.

“Theresa,” he said as he pulled his face away. I noticed that he didn't take his hands off of me, not yet. “I'm sorry, but we have to stop.”

“Under different circumstances?” I asked, and I hated the way my breath smelt like Vodka. Ech. Nathaniel smiled and brushed some of the hair away from my forehead.

“Unfortunately,” he said and I noticed that Jamie was actually standing with her ear about an inch away from our faces. She'd never been very good at eavesdropping. She was even worse when she was drunk. “Maybe we can discuss this later?” he asked, and I nodded, smiled my best girly-girl smile at him and promptly threw up.





CHAPTER 14

I woke to the horrid screeching of my cell phone. Rhea had been in a dinosaur phase a few months back and had thought it would be cool if my ringtone was the sound of the screeching velociraptors from the Jurassic Park movie. At eight in the morning with a hangover and a horrible sense of vertigo, I can tell you firsthand that it was not.

“What?” I snapped at Jamie. I'd snatched the phone from the nightstand and was now lying with my head hanging over the side of the bed in case I puked. It never occurred to me to check for Nathaniel.

“You're welcome. I took Rhea to school and Joel packed her what he always packs for the boys on Mondays. A nutritious, delicious, cold slice of pizza, a can of Pepsi, and a bag of potato chips.”

“That's great, Jamie,” I said as I yawned and threw myself back into the pillows. “P.S. I hate you.”

“For what? You had a great time! Granted, you did sleep through the entire movie, but at least Mr. Hot and Bothered Bodyguard was there for you to rest your head on. Besides, you should be thanking me. In what other situation would you have had the courage to stick your tongue down his throat?”

“Huh?” I said, but I knew exactly what she was talking about. Okay, well I didn't remember the movie (for obvious reasons), but I remembered the kissing … I could never forget the kissing. I glanced sharply up at the doorway and found Nathaniel's back, clad in … a T-shirt? Oh. You freaking vomited on him, Theresa, like some sorority girl at a kegger. Nice. Real nice. “I'm late for work,” I blurted before she could say anything else. “I have to go.”

“You own your own business,” Jamie replied as I rolled my eyes and checked my clothes. I was still wearing last night's little black dress. It didn't look so hot now, all rumpled up and smelling of sweat. How attractive. “So, how was he last night? You did sleep with him, didn't you?”

“Don't you have a life outside of mine? Go prosecute someone.”

“We're waiting on a plea deal from the defense. I have time to kill.”

“I'm hanging up now.” I ended the call and set the phone on my nightstand.

“Good morning,” Nathaniel said, voice pleasant and perky. He glanced over his shoulder at me and caught my eyes with his. His gaze took my breath away, and I had to glance at the wall to remember a few words in the English language.

“Morning,” I croaked as I swung my legs out of bed and hit the wood floor with a thump. “I, um, am sorry about your suit.” Nathaniel turned around fully to face me and dropped his hands from his bodyguard position so that they hung comfortably at his sides.

“It's alright,” he told me and on his face was a genuine smile that softened up some of that perfection. Honestly, his grin was just a tad crooked, only noticeable if you looked at it just right. It was a feature that my made my blood thrum with excitement and my hands twitch. Why did you have to be such a hottie? “I was wondering,” Nathaniel began and then paused. Something about him was … off. I watched him run his hand through his thick, dark hair and tried to figure out what it was. It took me longer than I care to admit to figure out that he was nervous. Of little old me. Go figure? “Could you go into work a bit later today?” My heart started to pound and my head went all loopy.

“He's out there again, isn't he?” I asked as I scooted around the end of the bed and paused with my fingers inserted between two dusty aluminum slats on the horrible off-white blinds. I rose up on my tiptoes and peered around for Gary with his shiny eyes and disturbingly blank face. He was nowhere to be seen.

“Actually, no,” Nathaniel said as I watched the couple down the street start a rather vicious row on their front walk. He was cheating, so I didn't blame her. He even had the audacity to bring his mistress – some teenager with too-blonde hair and the world's fakest smile – over on Sunday mornings when the Mrs. went to brunch with her parents. Pig. I dropped the blinds and turned around, trying my damnedest to keep my eyes from focusing on Nathaniel's pecs. Granted, the T-shirt he was wearing was tight and he was tight and well, they just sort of stuck out at me. “Since we didn't get the chance to go shooting yesterday, I thought maybe you'd like to go today.”

“Now?” I asked as I blinked at him and mentally ran through all the things on my to-do list. My business couldn't run itself, but perhaps I could go in later and get some work done? After all, if I didn't learn to use that gun now, I was never going to. And when Nathaniel left on Wednesday, I would be on my own. If Gary tried something, anything at all, I wanted to be ready for him. “I have a client with a very specific idea in mind for her website. She's so obsessed with the specifics of it that she won't even discuss it over the phone. I have a meeting with her in … ” I glanced over at the clock. “An hour.” Even the thought of meeting with Ms. Brown was horrifying to me. It made the headache I was already nursing desperate to become a migraine.

Nathaniel's face, although carefully schooled, drooped, just a bit.

“Is that a no then?” he asked me with a gentle smile.

“That's a Let Brenda figure out,” I told him and watched as his face bloomed into a wicked grin.

“Good,” Nathaniel said as I reached up my fingers and brushed them across the Kukui nut necklace. “Because I'm taking you out to breakfast.”

***

“Isn't this a breech of the whole client-bodyguard relationship thing?” I asked Nathaniel as we handed our menus to the waiter and stared at one another from across the admittedly short expanse of tabletop.

“I'm playing the boyfriend, remember?” he asked me as he leaned back and studied my face with a bemused expression. “This is something a boyfriend would do. That is, if I'm remembering correctly.” I laughed even though I wasn't sure if it was that kind of moment and took a sip of my ice water.

“You mean you haven't been on a single date since – ” I couldn't say her name aloud. It wouldn't be right. I looked down at my hands and laced my fingers together.