Jace
Jace
Bodyguards for Hire
Book 1
T. A. GREY
WARNING:
The story in this book contains explicit sexual content. This book is intended
for mature audiences only. It contains sexually explicit scenes that may be
offensive. Please keep your file in a safe area on your computer and away from
minors.
This
book is not transferable. If it is sold, shared, or given away it is
infringement of the copyright of this work and violators will be prosecuted to
the fullest extent of the law.
This
book is a work of fiction. All characters, names, places, and scenarios are
solely the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, though
references to actual events or locations may be real.
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trademarks mentioned herein are not authorized by the trademark owners and do
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owners. Any trademarks used are specifically in a descriptive capacity.
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Jace:
Bodyguards for Hire
Copyright
© August 2013 T. A. Grey
All
Rights Reserved
Chapter 1
Vvvrrrrrm. Vrrrrrrm.
Mara Colgen’s phone vibrated in
her lap with another call. The sixth once since she left work…four minutes ago.
Rolling her eyes, she braked at the red light behind a big black truck and
checked her phone. It was the same number as the last five calls and she still
had no idea who it was.
Fear tingled at the back of her
neck. There was nothing to worry about. She just needed to shake her head of
all these phone calls she kept receiving. It was probably nothing.
The light turned green and Mara
headed down Franklyn Boulevard. The street always made her smile. It was her
favorite. It was a small and cozy neighborhood with cafés, pastry shops,
vintage clothing stores, vintage vinyl stores, tattoo parlors and other trendy
shops. The coffee shops even let customers bring their small dogs inside, most
of which were carried on the arms of girls with too much tan.
Mara had never actually been to
any of these places. She and her best friend, Tia, preferred movies nights at
home with booze, popcorn, and good food. They got together once a week to talk
about their jobs, men, mothers, and who they wanted to win American Idol.
Though Mara never had much to complain about regarding her job. After all, she
worked as a sex toy operator and with all the orgasms she had, she stayed
pretty happy most days. And as for the husband thing, well, Mara never had one.
Not even once.
The last man she’d been in a
relationship with, though she hesitated to call it a ‘relationship’, hadn’t
ended well. It’d ended in a blaze of pain from the blows he’d rained down on
her. That six-month ‘relationship’ had ended the moment his hand curled into a
fist and touched her in anger. Or so that’s what she told her family or even
Tia when they asked her about Corey and that time of her life. She didn’t
actually admit that he’d hit her before that one awful night. That she’d
thought the first time was a real accident.
Vrrrrrm. Vrrrrrm.
“There you go again.”
Mara thought over her bills but
knew she was paid up on time. This was no bill collector. She’d been getting
strange calls recently and though she was hesitant to admit it to herself, she
thought it might be
him
. Now, she had no proof it was him. He never
spoke. All she had to go on was her gut feeling. The person who liked to call
her over the past few months never said a word. Not one. Yet he called.
Sometimes it’d be days before she’d hear anything and she’d forget all about
the strange calls and move on. Or sometimes it’d be ten, fifteen, even twenty
times a day. He never left a message, never breathed like a creep into the
phone. Aside from it being harassment she didn’t know what to make of it. More
importantly, she didn’t know if Corey had found her or not.
Vrrrrrm Vrrrrrm Vrrrrrm.
Worse, she hated to talk on the
phone while driving. Her strict no cell phone use while driving included
texting, video chats, or trying to take pictures while operating a two-ton war
machine—aka, her little VW Bug.
Vvvrrrrm. Vrrrrm Vrrrrrm
Vrrrrrm Vrrrrrm.
Only the calls didn’t stop.
They went on and on. Street after street, she continued to press the off button
to cancel the call. When the person called again she’d let the call go to see
if they would leave a voicemail. No go.
On and on it went. Vrrrrrm
Vrrrrrm Vrrrrrm.
More streets passed and still
she trailed the shiny black truck in front of her while that stupid phone
vibrated with each new call in her lap.
Another call. Another.
Another…until she finally snapped. She answered that stupid phone with all the
charm of a football couch yelling at his team. “What!”
Silence met her on the other
end of the line.
“Stop calling me, you damn
weirdo!”
No breathing, nothing; yet she
knew someone was listening. If a police officer asked how she knew, all she
could say was she had a gut feeling.
Nothing she could prove in
court.
“That’s it. I’m going to get
this number tracked and turn it over to the police. I’m sure you’ll have a
great day when they bust down your door for harassment!”
She hung up, breathing hard and
knowing her threat held no merit. When her gaze flicked back up to the road, it
was too late. For one endless moment, her mind froze at what she saw.
Oh no,
she thought.
She slammed on the brakes
but it didn’t matter. Her little VW Bug barreled into the beautifully shining
black truck in front of her like she was trying to run it over. Only her much
smaller car came to a complete stop right away as if the truck had an invisible
shield protecting it.
The air bag exploded, slamming
her head backward and making everything all fuzzy.
She mumbled, blinking slowly as
her brain shuffled to keep up with the rest of the world. A high-pitched sound
rang in her ears and slowly solidified like someone turning a dial up. That
ringing became her horn which was wailing. A glance out of the broken
windshield made her breath catch.
A man stepped down from that
big black truck. A big man wearing a scowl that could scare a nun. He reached
under her hood looking pissed off.
Hot
and pissed off.
Why hello,
gorgeous
, her feminine side purred. He did something under the hood and her
horn stopped blaring. Her eyes flared. He fixed it. She liked this man already.
Any man who was handy with cars was handy in the bedroom, or at least that’s
what she’d heard. She eyed his hand but didn’t spot a wedding band on his
finger.
Nice.
Please don’t be a gay. Bi would
work, but not gay.
His eyes met hers. Yep, he was
mad. He looked downright violent. Coming around the side of her car, he threw
open the door and got in her face. All she could see were lovely light blue
eyes. The kind that almost looked blue but were really more gray than blue, and
he had a black ball cap pulled low over his eyes, and wearing a white T-shirt,
jeans, and boots. He was definitely mixed with that perfect caramel skin tone.
And he was glaring at her.
“Ahem,” she cleared her throat.
“I’m very sorry about all this. Your truck looked so…nice.” She attempted a
smile.
His eyes narrowed in an
are-you-shitting-me
look. “Lady, what the fuck’s the matter with you? How did you not see me? My
truck takes up most of the damn road.” His eyes flicked down to her lap and his
jaw actually snapped to the side. She could hear it crack. “Fucking texting.
You little bitch, you know that’s against the law for a reason, right?”
Her jaw fell open in shock, but
before she could respond to his name-calling, he threw his hand up in her face.
Actually threw his hand up. In her face.
“Don’t wanna hear it, lady. Get
your license and registration. I’m callin’ the cops.”
He left before she could form a
reply. Only after he wasn’t in her face could she take a calm breath. “Well
that didn’t go well, Mara.” She giggled a little, an involuntary response that
couldn’t be helped, and grabbed the necessary items he’d ordered her to get.
She met him at his truck as he was getting off the phone.
“They’ll be by soon to make a
report.”
He went back to the back of his
truck, shaking his head. From his profile she noticed he had a hard, sleek
jawline covered in rough stubble several days too thick, and hollowed
cheekbones. He had a hard looking forehead. Weird, she never recalled noticing
someone’s forehead before but his looked like he could bash someone’s skull in
with it. Nice.
He was mumbling under his
breath about women drivers and texting. That’s where she had to stop him. Hot
or not, he was wrong about her.
“Listen here, hot cakes, I
wasn’t texting. I don’t text.”
His gaze snapped to her, then
looked her body up and down before cocking an eyebrow. “Oh yeah? Well I don’t
believe that for a second.”
“Why not? I don’t make it a
point to lie to strangers.”
“Oh yeah? You save the lying
for your dear friends instead?”
Mara thought about his point
and nodded. “Actually, yes. Those are the people whose opinions I actually care
about so if I’m going to lie about something like, say, thinking my mom’s new
dress is pretty when I hate it, then I’ll lie.”
After she finished her little
speech he nodded once, a jerk of his head. A silent form of agreement. She
wanted to fist pump at her victory but kept her energy reined in.
“I was actually on the phone,” she
clarified.
He threw up his arms, shaking
his head. “That’s illegal in this state, lady.”
“Oh, I’ve upgraded from bitch.
Very nice.” She couldn’t help smiling at him.
His brow pinched forward. “Now
is not the time for jokes. You just wrecked my rear end.”
Speaking of, her gaze fell down
to his ass and verified that indeed it looked as hot as the rest of him. Mmm,
mmm, good, as her friends would say.
“Excuse me, did you just check
out my ass?” The man looked like he didn’t know what to do.
She made a perfect
Oh did I
just do that?
face. “Maybe.” She cocked her head, gauging his response.
He looked like he might say
something, then shook his head. “If you think being cute with me is gonna get
you out of this then you’re shit out of luck.” He took out his phone and
started snapping pictures of the wreckage. She quickly did the same, since he
just reminded her she should be doing that. She did notice that his truck had
only a scratch and a few smaller dents along the bumper while her entire
front-end was smashed like an accordion.
Mara stood beside him trying
not to smile, and utterly failing, while she snapped pictures for her insurance
company. “So, you think I’m cute?”
“What the fuck?” Shaking his
head, he made some noise between laugh and disbelief. “Hand over your license
and registration.”
Snickering at his cop-voice,
she handed him the docs. He looked them over, paying special interest to her
driver’s license. She knew what he’d find there: 5’5”, brown eyes, blonde, and
a weight she refused to even think aloud. Not too shabby, if she did say so
herself.
“Oh, hold on,” she said,
suddenly remembering. She grabbed her business card out of her wallet and
handed it to him. “Here’s my business card. Keep it. In case there are any
problems along the way. I’ll be sure to fix your truck. I really am sorry. If
it helps, I’ve only been in two accidents before.”
He took the card but didn’t
look at her. “Two? Lady, you make that sound like that’s nothing.”
“Two is hardly anything.”
“You know how many accidents I’ve
caused in my life? Zero.”
“Well, aren’t you fancy.” Her
lips twitched again. Who knew teasing such a big man would be so much fun.
He sent her a withering glare
then looked down at her card. It was a light pink with red, fancy lettering.
“Mara Colgen, Sex Toy Operator.” He said the words slowly as if they were
written in another language.
“Yes.” Honestly, one of her
favorite parts about having her job was the reactions she got when people found
out.
“You are a sex toy operator,”
he said again.
“Mmhmm. Sure am.” Another
winning smile. He didn’t even lift his gaze from the card.
“Tell me, darlin’, what does
that actually mean?”
Oh, now she was darlin’? Oh how
her position had moved up in the world. She was a bitch only five minutes ago.
“Well, as you can see from that card, I work at Aphrodite’s Love and we are one
of the biggest designers and distributers of adult sex toys. I’m a tester. I
also help the production team tweak designs.”
“You…” he scratched the back of
his head, flicked his gaze down her body again, then continued in that measured
way. “Your job is to test sex toys for a living?”
Her eyes lit up. Little pleased
her more than talking about her job. “Yes, I love my job. I have one of the
lowest stress jobs in the world. Did you know that? Just today I got to test
out a new vibrator---”
The wail of a police siren
interrupted the conversation. Just when it was getting good. The police officer
came over and she fessed up to the phone call which distracted her from
driving. The officer didn’t seem to care much that she’d ignored the caller the
first eleven times. After all was said in done, she had a feeling her insurance
rates were about to go up. The officer left, leaving her alone with
him
again. The hottest man she’d ever seen up close in her life.
Jace Mathews.
Or, Mr. Jace Mathews, as the
officer had called him.
How is it that the man’s name
was sexy? The man must have been born lucky. His parents could have named him
Maynard or Ted or Ruby Sue. But no, not this guy. This was Jace Mathews, a man
who drove a big black truck. Mara planned to rectify her lack of knowledge on
this interesting man as soon as possible.
Jace put away the cop’s
paperwork in his truck before coming to her. The man actually had a stride when
he walked. How could he not with those long, sinewy legs? He thrust a business
card at her.
