Rachel is silent for a moment and then says in an ultra low voice. "But you aren’t alone."
"True," I reply as I push up out of the chair, assuming Rachel must have heard the music and moaning. My pants barely cling to the edges of my hips and I've lost my hard-on, a matter that needs to be rectified immediately. I walk around the bed and stare at the beautiful, luscious creature lying there. "But that's none of Jocelyn's concern. We're nothing to each other but business."
"Gotcha, boss," she says, and I can hear the amusement in her voice. Rachel's known me for years, and we were fuck buddies for a time. She caught me on the tail end of my and Jocelyn's breakup, and I got easily lost between her legs as we traveled the world, seeking adventure and thrills.
But Rachel and I aren't like that anymore. We became colleagues at Jameson over a decade ago, and it's been purely professional since. After Jerico sold the company to me, Rachel took the spot as my most trusted peer in this business. She's also non judgmental and won't hold it against me if my treatment of Jocelyn is less than civilized.
The redhead comes to her knees and scoots toward me. Her fingers work at the buttons of my shirt, and she leans in to place a kiss on the center of my chest once it's bared to her.
My cock comes back to life, and I disconnect the call.
Jocelyn is forgotten.
For the time being.
Jocelyn
“Kynan's done well for himself,” I murmur to Rachel as we pull into the driveway of a monstrous Spanish Colonial-style mansion. It's bigger than my house, and mine sits at just over seven thousand square feet of space that I never use.
"That he has," she replies as she puts her Maserati Quattroporte in park and cuts the engine.
I don't make any move to open the door and neither does Rachel. My heart is pounding at the prospect of seeing Kynan again after all these years, but this isn't as scary as what happened in my house last night. Unconsciously, my fingers come to my throat where they skim the purple bruises there.
"How old is your kid?" I ask Rachel as I turn slightly to look at her. She blinks at me in surprise, but I throw a thumb over my shoulder to the child safety seat in the back.
"He'll be six months old on the twenty-third."
I smile as I do a quick calculation in my head. "He was almost a Christmas baby then."
"Yup," she says with a laugh. "My husband Bodie insisted his middle name be Kris in honor of the holidays."
Kris Kringle. Cute. "What's his first name?"
"Anthony, but we call him Tony," she replies.
Traditional sounding. "Family name?"
She shakes her head with a laugh. "No. We named him after Tony Stark."
"You're kidding me?"
"I never kid about the Avengers." She grins for a moment before her expression turns reassuring. "Ready to get this over with?"
I nod back at her, but what I really want to do is tell her to just start the car again, take me to the nearest airport, and let me take a flight somewhere that no one will know about. I can melt away into obscurity, and the psychopath who is after me will be left far behind.
Except . . . he's managed to find me time and time again over the last few years. I've moved four times, purchasing my homes under fake aliases, but always, he still finds me. Threatening notes followed by long, flowing love letters. Bouquets of flowers at the gated entry to my house or decapitated squirrels, depending on his mood. It was sporadic enough that I'd sometimes get a false sense of security that he'd gotten bored and moved on, but then something else would happen.
But he had never come into my home before.
And I knew it was him.
My stalker.
He managed to cut the power, which alerted me that something might be wrong. When I heard glass break near the back patio, I dialed 9-1-1 and raced toward the panic room. Even though he cut the power, my security system had a battery backup, and I knew a silent alarm would be ringing somewhere, hopefully notifying the police.
It was a good thing too, because the man took me down in the hallway just mere feet from the door to the panic room and before 9-1-1 could even answer my call. My only saving grace was the security company alerting the police and a cruiser just blocks from my house. The wailing sirens as they pulled up in front of my house caused him to run. Which was good, because I was very close to losing consciousness from his hands locked around my throat.
My fingers drop away from the bruising, but Rachel's gaze lingers on it, surveying the marks he left behind. When she looks back at me, her eyes harden. "Kynan will protect you. We'll figure out who this shit head is, and he won't bother you anymore when we're done with him."
I manage a tremulous smile. "That's the most reassuring thing I've heard in a long time. The police haven't been able to do much with what they've had over the last few years."
Her eyes go soft and almost apologetic. "I don't know the details of what happened between you and Kynan, but I know the general gist of things."
Heat flushes through me, and I drop my gaze to my lap. "He hates me."
"I have no clue as to that," she remarks simply. "But don't expect him to be nice. If you want him for this job, just be ready to deal with that."
I nod in acknowledgment of something I was pretty sure she didn't need to explain. Kynan and I split ways twelve years ago, and it wasn't pretty at all. It's one of my greatest regrets in life, but that doesn't make things any better for either of us.
My gaze rises and locks with Rachel's. "I know exactly how Kynan feels about me, and yet, I'm still here. He's the one for this job."
"Why?" she asks with a head tilt. "There are a lot of other great security firms out there."
She’s right, and I researched them back when the stalking started. I've even used some of them for personal security services and could easily use the same ones again, but something tells me they wouldn’t be enough.
My lips curve into a sardonic smile. "No matter his feelings toward me, Kynan is a man of integrity. And I know he'll take this far more serious than anyone else would. I trust him."
"All right then," she says as she grabs the handle to her door and opens it up. "Let's go on in."
I follow Rachel up the walkway, which is lined with cacti and tropical-looking plants. Even though it's June in Vegas, I pull the sides of my zip hoodie around me for protection. I'm not looking my best, that's for sure. After I refused an ambulance to the hospital, I gladly accepted a police officer's ride straight to the airport. I'd thrown on some yoga pants, a tank top, and grabbed my hoodie from the closet. I didn't bring anything else other than my purse. I have no makeup on, my hair is a rat's nest, and I don't even have a brush because I don't keep one in my purse. No, I wouldn't do something as common sense as that. I had to have the huge cosmetic/vanity bag in addition to my purse, which held all the essentials I needed to stay looking glamorous at all times. I never even thought to bring that with me because my only thought was getting out of Los Angeles and getting to Kynan for help.
There was never any doubt of where I'd go once I approached the ticketing agent at the airport. The police officer kindly came in with me and stayed by my side until I made it to the security line. Still, I didn't stop looking over my shoulder until I was on the plane to Vegas and every last passenger had boarded. My life is now one that is led by fear and survival instinct, and I know I can’t survive it alone.
We get to Kynan's front door, and to my surprise, Rachel punches in a security code and walks in without knocking.
The splendor of his house is lost on me, not because I'm immune to opulence but because it isn’t important to me. Over the years, many things I thought were important have become trivial.