Thrive (Guardian Protection) Read online

  The human psyche was a crazy beast. I could physically feel the hate brewing inside me when it came to Mira York. How that somehow flared with jealousy was beyond me.

  That wasn’t true. Any man with a dick would have felt the same way.

  Despite what I’d said, Mira was still fucking gorgeous. Maybe more so than she had been as a girl. She’d filled out. Those natural curves she’d always possessed had deepened and softened. Her hair was shorter now, ending just above the swell of her full breasts. But her eyes—they were exactly the same.

  Which, for me, might as well have been the kiss of death. Those eyes had always been my undoing. They’d assaulted the backs of my eyelids long after I’d sworn her off.

  Seventeen fucking years and I couldn’t escape that woman. Yeah, I’d moved on with my life. Got married. Made babies. Set up a family. But, with one single glance into those deep-brown eyes, I knew I’d never truly forgotten her. I’d buried her memories deep. So deep that I’d been able to convince myself that they no longer existed.

  But, as I marched into Guardian after I’d been released from the hospital what felt like eight hundred years later, I knew those feelings still burned hot.

  And I knew there was not one goddamn thing I wasn’t going to do to finally extinguish them forever.

  “Where is she?” I growled, stopping in the doorway of Leo’s office.

  “How ya feeling?” he asked, never tearing his gaze off his computer screen.

  It sounded genuine, but I was all too aware that it was only a pleasantry before he laid into my ass. Given the fact that Johnson wasn’t sitting across from him with his feet propped up on the desk as they shot the breeze, it was safe to assume that Leo had already dished out a ration of shit to him for going with me.

  “Where. Is. She?” I repeated.

  He turned to face me and arched an incredulous eyebrow. A smirk pulled at one side of his mouth as he said, “Interesting. I heard you were all fucked up over this woman…but this. This is impressive.”

  “I’m not all fucked up. I don’t even know her.”

  “That’s not what the sworn affidavit the cops had me sign earlier stated.” He rocked back in his chair and steepled his fingers under his chin. “You know. I’m getting real sick and tired of lying on behalf of my men when they don’t seem to have the courtesy to give me a heads-up before flying off on a kamikaze mission. First Apollo, now you? I gotta say, Lark, you’re the only level-headed man I got. I did not expect this bullshit from you.”

  Funny. When I’d woken up that morning, I hadn’t expected it, either.

  Yet there I stood.

  “Can we possibly have the father-son I’m-so-disappointed-in-you chat in the morning? I’ve had a hell of a day.”

  “Tomorrow? No. You’re suspended.”

  My body locked up tight and I winced when pain stabbed in my shoulder. “Come again?”

  He rose to his feet and planted his knuckles on his desk. “No pay for two weeks. Same goes for Johnson.”

  “What the fuck, Leo! You can’t do that.”

  “I can. And I did. You’re lucky I didn’t suspend Devon and Alex too. What you four did today… For fuck’s sake, you all could have been killed.”

  “What the hell are you talking about? You send us out with clients every goddamn day where our sole job is to put ourselves in harm’s way. Oh, but suddenly, it matters that Mira wasn’t a paying client?” I stabbed my hand into my back pocket and retrieved my wallet before slapping it down on his desk. “By all means, let me cover the men’s time.”

  “You better watch yourself before I skip the suspension and go straight to the pink slip.”

  I didn’t think he’d fire me. This was literally the first time he and I had ever crossed each other, but I valued my job enough to bring it down a notch.

  “I’ll take the suspension, but don’t punish Johnson. He knew I was going with or without him. He was trying to watch my back.”

  Leo laughed. “Full disclosure: It was Johnson’s idea to suspend you without pay. It was mine to extend that punishment to him as well.”

  I blew out a ragged breath. “Of course it was.”

  He moved around his desk and perched on the corner, crossing his legs at the ankle and kicking them out in front of him. “Look, I don’t know what’s going on with you and that woman. Honestly, I’ve never heard of her before today. But, if you felt the need to go all Incredible Hulk and charge the gates of Hell over her, I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that it was for a good reason. But I will say this… You aren’t one of the boys living carefree. You got two kids who depend on you. Something happens to you, that changes their lives. You better make damn sure Mira’s worth the risks.”

  “She’s not,” I replied immediately. I could almost taste the bitterness in my tone.

  His brow furrowed. “Then that makes today exponentially more stupid.”

  He wasn’t wrong. I hadn’t been thinking. Not about my girls. Not about my life. Not the safety of the men who had come with me.

  Nothing but Mira.

  I couldn’t afford to make that mistake twice.

  “I’m gonna take her home and be done with it.”

  “You sure that’s a good idea? Word is she’s got a shitstorm swirling around her.”

  I shrugged…and it fucking hurt. “I don’t care what she’s got swirling. That is not my war. She was in trouble. I got her out of it. End of story.”

  “All right,” he chirped, clapping his hands and rising to his feet.

  But this was Leo. All right never meant all right. It actually sounded a whole lot like he’d called bullshit.

  “I’m serious. I’ve done my job. The rest is on her.”

  “Okay.” He grinned and walked back around his desk.

  “Leo, I’m serious. This thing with her—”

  “Lark, I’m not arguing with you here. You say it’s over. It’s over.” He grabbed a folder off his desk and flipped it open. “Oh, by the way, Johnson took her home with him.”

  My chest got tight, and before I could stop it, “What the fuck?” flew from my mouth.

  Leo glanced up, the biggest smile I’d ever seen the man wear splitting his face. “That a problem?”

  I glared.

  If possible, his smile got bigger. “I haven’t seen Johnson interested in a woman in a long time.”

  “Don’t do that.”

  “What?” He laughed.

  “It’s not gonna work. He wants her, he can have her.”

  He sank down into his chair. “Oh, good. Because he offered to let her stay with him until things settled down.”

  “He doesn’t even know her!” Yeah. I couldn’t stop that, either.

  He intertwined his fingers and rested them on his stomach. Still. Fucking. Grinning. “But, according to you, you don’t know her, either.” He partitioned his mouth off as if we weren’t the only two people in the room and said, “But it sounds like somebody is trying to get to know her. If you know what I mean.”

  “Oh, fuck off, Leo.”

  He laughed again. “Just look at it this way. At least it wasn’t Braydon. With Johnson, you got a fifty-fifty chance that she won’t be naked when you pick her up.”

  He was prodding me. More than likely, Devon and Alex had gotten back to the office running their mouths, filling his head with shit they did not understand. A man almost gets shot while blindly flying into a house to save a woman who was in danger and suddenly the country’s premier protection firm turns into a goddamn episode of Love Connection.

  But the worst part about the shit he was spewing? It was working.

  Turning on a toe, I marched out of his office. Destination unknown.

  Okay, fine. That was a lie. Explanation unknown was more like it. I didn’t know what excuse I was going to use or how I was going to spin it, but I was going to Johnson’s place to find her.

  “Oh, come on, Lark. Be a good sport!” Leo yelled, his footsteps followi
ng after me. “She’d be good for Johnson. I might finally get godchildren.”

  I winced, but it wasn’t from pain—at least not in my shoulder. I felt like a maniac, shifting back and forth between emotions so fast that it was a wonder I didn’t have whiplash. But I couldn’t stop myself. That woman got under my skin.

  “You go anywhere near Johnson’s house, you’re fired,” Leo called behind me.

  I froze, a new rage bubbling inside me. “Stay out of this, Leo.”

  “I tried to,” he said, sauntering around me. His smile was gone, and his face had become hard. He pointed to my shoulder. “But you brought this to me the moment you decided to walk out that door this morning. You handled that shit your way and look where it got you. Now, we’re handling the rest of it my way.”

  “And your way is getting godchildren out of the situation?”

  “No. My way is not hanging her ass out to dry. Cops still can’t find her friend, and you’re talking about dumping her back at her house after she turned seven hundred thousand dollars over to the authorities? Jesus, Lark, she’d be as good as dead.”

  “What the fuck do you expect me to do?” I huffed, raking a hand through my hair.

  He laughed without humor. “The thing you were trying to do this morning when you went after her in the first place. And the thing you were about to do before I stopped you from racing over to Johnson’s house and more than likely having your second near-death experience of the day.”

  “I don’t know what that is!” I roared. And, for the first time since I’d gotten that phone call, I realized it was the God’s honest truth.

  I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know how to feel. I didn’t know how to react. I’d never once considered a scenario when she’d reenter my life.

  I did hate her.

  But I’d also loved her. Once.

  Nothing made sense anymore.

  I mean…were people even allowed to be angry about something from so long ago? We’d been kids, and I was holding the choices she’d made against her like it had happened yesterday. What the hell did that say about me? But I knew… It said that I was a dick.

  I allowed my head to fall back between my shoulders and stared up at the ceiling. “This woman… She fucks with my head.”

  He chuckled. “This is not a newsflash.”

  Blowing out a ragged breath, I looked at him. “I’m sorry. For all of it.”

  He shrugged. “I guess it made the day interesting enough. Though I could have gone without Melissa calling and laying into me after she’d heard you’d been shot.”

  It was my turn to laugh. “Yeah. She gave me an earful too, until she found out it was just a nick. Then she got mad and gave me another earful for scaring her and not being shot.”

  “Damned if you do…”

  I extended a hand his way. “Damned if I don’t.”

  He took my hand and pulled me in for a quick back pat.

  When he stepped away, he crossed his arms over his chest and cocked his head to the side. “So, what are you going to do about Mira?”

  “Well…” I scratched the back of my head. “I guess I’m gonna call Johnson and—”

  “She’s downstairs with Rhion.” He winked. “Johnson flew out of here like a bat out of hell when I suspended him.”

  My mouth gaped open. “You son of a bitch.”

  He barked a laugh. “I’d like to apologize, but it got me more answers than you were ever going to give me.”

  “And what answers were those? Because I gotta be honest here. I’m clueless.”

  He shrugged. “Actually, you being clueless was one of the best answers I got. Never seen you off-kilter, Lark. And I’m not looking forward to seeing it again. The group of men I got, one of you is always on your period. I guess it was finally your turn.” He tipped his chin toward the front door. “Go. Get out of here. Figure out whatever the hell is or isn’t going on with you and this woman. I’ll let you know if I hear anything about her friend. I called in a few favors. I’m hoping they’ll help.”

  “What kind of favors?”

  He smiled and backed toward the hall. “The kind you don’t talk about unless you’re calling ’em in.” He winked. “Let me know if you need anything.” He paused. “Well, anything besides a paycheck.”

  “Hilarious,” I deadpanned as he disappeared down the hall toward his office.

  Sucking in a deep breath, I made my way out the door and to the elevator.

  I had no idea what I was going to say to her. Or what I was planning to do. And, as I exited the elevator and stood outside Rhion’s front door, that confusion only got stronger.

  She was in there. After all those years, Mira York was only one door away.

  I knocked and waited, equally hoping Rhion wouldn’t answer while also wishing she would hurry up before I lost my nerve.

  Finally the door swung open and Jude was standing on the other side, a knowing smirk pulling at his lips.

  “Christ, not you too,” I grumbled, planting a hand in the center of his chest to push past him.

  “I wish I could have been there,” he said, his voice full of humor. “Even getting bullets shot at you had to be better than babysitting Apollo all day.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” I said, scanning Rhion’s huge, open living room and kitchen. Mira was nowhere in sight.

  “Devon said it was quite a show.”

  “Devon’s got a big fucking mouth.” I brought my gaze back to Jude. “Where’s Mira?”

  He pointed down the hall. “Ocean room.”

  Rhion Park was a special snowflake in a lot of ways, one of them being that, when she’d first bought that apartment, she’d hired a contractor to build her a room that simulated being at the beach. From the sound of the waves crashing, scents of the salty water, all the way to lighting to mimic the sun, it was a true experience. And it didn’t surprise me one bit that it was where Mira had chosen to hang out.

  Back in the day, we’d driven to the gulf once. It had been one of our typical late nights in the woods when she’d told me how much she’d loved the beach as a kid. Kurt had been in the field and my company was on a ninety-minute recall, but there wasn’t much I wouldn’t have done to make her happy. So, with a cooler stocked with beer and pop, a couple of gas station sandwiches, and a never-ending supply of laughs, we left for Destin, Florida. For over four hours, we’d driven, the windows rolled down, country music blaring, her head in my lap, her bare feet hanging out the window. And, for every single minute of those four hours, nothing else had existed except the two of us.

  In all the years since she’d been gone, I hadn’t been able to go back to the beach without thinking of that night spent under the stars, our feet in the sand, her snoozing in my arms as the sun rose on the horizon. I was never the same after that night. It was only a taste of how good life could have been if we had been together, but it made me an addict.

  And I’d been in withdrawal for too long.

  “You want me to get her?” Jude asked, snapping me out of the past.

  The loss was staggering.

  I shook my head. “Nah. I’ll…get her.” Only I didn’t move. I just stood there, staring down the hall, silently debating if the emotions spiraling inside me were that of excitement or dread. And then I wondered if maybe those two things were one and the same when it came to her.

  But one thing was clear.

  She was there.

  Only a few yards away.

  And I’d never been more terrified of someone in my entire life.

  I was beyond exhausted. My head ached, and my eyes were painfully swollen from crying. The adrenaline had worn off, leaving me spent, but my frazzled mind refused me any rest. The cops had asked me a million questions, most of which I had been able to answer honestly. A few were half-truths, like the ones about Jeremy and me being old friends.

  There was no word on Whitney.

  Or Bitsy.

  And, as time passed, I began to fear
there never would be.

  “Are we talking about the same Jeremy Lark?” Rhion asked, toying with a large diamond hanging at the base of her neck.

  We were sitting crosslegged on a king-sized bed in her guest room, the sound of the waves crashing all around us. If I hadn’t been in the middle of the worst day of my life, I would have been jealous of that ocean room. It was the coolest thing I’d ever seen. From the sound and the smells, it was just like being on a beach without the gritty sand and suffocating heat.

  I smiled weakly. “Yep. He got into the security guard’s face and told him that he was Garth Brooks’s little brother.”

  Her eyes flashed wide. “Did you get into the concert?”

  “Good God, no. We were lucky we didn’t get arrested. I’ve never run so fast in my life.”

  She fell over laughing, and I smiled, watching her.

  Rhion reminded me a lot of Whitney. Well, minus the apartment that might as well have been a mansion and the closet full of Jimmy Choos. But she had Whitney’s kind heart and infectious smile. And, because of that, everything she said had made my chest ache.

  And, Jesus, the woman could talk. So, in the six hours since Johnson had dropped me off with her and her boyfriend, Jude, my heart had hurt a lot.

  I glanced to the clock on the white, antiqued nightstand. It was getting late and I still hadn’t heard anything about Jeremy. A beautiful, dark-haired man, who looked like he might or might not be Hispanic, named Leo James had assured me Jeremy was fine and would be by for me later. But, due to our little showdown in my bedroom, I didn’t completely believe him. Nor was I sure if my heart could withstand going toe-to-toe with Jeremy again.

  I just wanted to go home and forget the last twenty-four hours of my life. I wanted Whitney to come into my room and wake me up because I was having a nightmare. I wanted Bitsy to curl into my chest, safe and sound, reminding me that I was safe and sound too. I wanted my house, my bed, my life, no matter how shitty it was. It was mine.