Fast Burn (Body Armor #4)
Lori Foster
Dear Reader,
I’m excited to introduce the fourth and final book in my Body Armor series, featuring hot alpha males whose überprotective instincts are put to good use in their roles as elite bodyguards.
Brand Berry is the only one of his closest friends who hasn’t yet left MMA fighting behind to join the elite Body Armor personal security agency. Being a bodyguard definitely appeals to him—but so does the agency’s gorgeous and fearless owner, Sahara Silver, and Brand isn’t one to mix business with pleasure, so he’s been resisting her efforts. Yet when Sahara’s quest to find her missing brother puts her in a kidnapper’s crosshairs, Brand doesn’t think twice about appointing himself as her protector—even if working alongside her brings him to a closeness he can’t resist.
I hope you enjoy reading Brand and Sahara’s romance as much as I enjoyed writing it. Many of you have said you don’t want to leave the series…but all good things must come to an end. I promise to do my best to make the next series just as much fun and every bit as sexy.
Have some thoughts on the books? You’re always welcome to reach out to me. I’m active on most social media forums, including Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Goodreads, plus my email address is listed on my website at www.lorifoster.com.
Happy reading!
CHAPTER ONE
SAHARA SILVER SAT behind her enormous desk in her posh office on one of the upper floors of the elite Body Armor agency. Bright October sunshine splashed through tall windows. A large vase of fresh flowers, delivered that morning from a very content client, filled the air with sweetness.
For the most part, she was content.
She ran the most elite security agency in the area, probably in the whole country. To stand out from the crowd, she’d taken a different approach in selecting her bodyguards—sexy competence. To prove the old mantra that “sex sells,” she’d acquired a trifecta of studly employees, ex-MMA fighters with ability, skill and yes, sexiness. Her agency was recently instrumental in solving a high-profile case, but she was no less satisfied with the outcome of other, more personal, cases.
Body Armor saw results. Clients could come to her with a wide array of needs and know they’d be in good hands.
Yes, her life would almost be perfect...if her brother weren’t missing, presumed dead by everyone except her.
Once she found her brother—because in her heart she knew he was still alive—he’d reclaim control of the company he’d founded. He wouldn’t be thrilled with the changes she’d implemented over the past year and a half, but always, from the time she was a know-it-all preteen, he’d encouraged her independence, her fearlessness and her confidence. Scott would understand why she’d had to put her stamp on the agency once she’d inherited it.
Not that it mattered. She’d turn it all over in a nanosecond to have him back. She’d live in a cardboard box on the street if she could just hug her brother one more time.
“Brand Berry is here to see you.”
Surprised, Sahara glanced at Enoch, her right-hand man and very good friend. “Brand is here?” She immediately felt flustered. Absurd. “I wasn’t expecting him. Did I miss a meeting?”
“No.” Enoch lowered his voice in a conspiratorial way. “He said he only needed a minute of your time when you were free, and since you’re free right now—”
“Yes, of course. Show him in.” Even as she said it, a tiny unfamiliar thrill ran through her.
She’d made a point of surrounding herself with some of the finest male specimens on the planet—professional fighters that she’d turned into prime bodyguards, each of them in high demand. It was her vision for Body Armor, to get rid of the stuffy Men in Black clones and offer instead real men, with real muscles, certifiable machismo and lethal ability with or without a weapon.
No, she didn’t fire the previously established bodyguards; that would have been disloyal to her brother, who’d hired them. She simply reassigned them to the more boring cases, and overall they were happy with that.
Anything to do with a celebrity, a dignitary or a politician her elite team now covered.
She desperately wanted to add Brand to that team.
Thinking she’d have a minute, she was just circling out from behind her desk when Brand stepped in around Enoch. Instead of waiting in the guest area, as a client would do, he must have been hovering right outside her door.
Her toes curled in her high heels.
Enoch was on the small side, five-two, slight of build, with average brown hair and eyes. It was his keen intelligence and attention to detail that made him so perfect at his job.
But his size didn’t really matter when he stood next to a man who made most everyone seem small, her included. Brand was a big and badass professional MMA fighter with a solid steel frame of muscle all wrapped up in a cocky attitude.
Faded jeans molded to his thick thighs, going well with his running shoes and an ancient Aerosmith T-shirt that stretched over his chest and broad shoulders. Reflective sunglasses pushed to the top of his head made his golden-brown hair messy. Darker brown eyes held her captive as he murmured, “Sahara.”
Leaning a hip against her desk, she drank in the rugged, virile sight of him. “Be still my heart.”
Wary exasperation rooted him to the spot.