Seduction in Session (6 page)

Her stomach clenched at the thought of hurting her dad. It wasn’t fair that her actions could blow back on him, but at least Connor had given them a viable alternative. “I’ll say nothing beyond how scared I was.” Although it would give her a good platform. “Then I can use it as a call to further protect citizens from guns.”

Connor and her dad both groaned. Almost identically.

Connor ignored her very practical option, preferring to continue talking to her dad. “Have your staff draw up a statement for her, too. We’ll nip this in the bud while I start trying to figure out what’s happening.”

Her father turned to Connor. “Look, I thank you for protecting my daughter and you seem like a guy with a good head on his shoulders, but I don’t know you. I don’t know a thing about you. I can’t trust my daughter’s life in the hands of a man I don’t know anything about.”

Connor withdrew a letter on very official crisp linen stationary. “This is a letter of recommendation.”

The senator barely glanced at it. “It will take too much time to
verify this is actually from Captain Spencer, whom I’ve also never met. Besides, I’m not much of a Navy man. My family’s roots are Army.”

Connor reached into his pocket. “I understand. I don’t like to use this reference very often, sir, but I think if you call this number, you’ll feel better about your daughter employing me.”

Her father took the card, looked at it for a moment, and then stared back up at Connor. “Is this what I think it is?”

“I did some work for him back in the day. Please feel free to ask him anything you like about me.”

Her dad held the card up. “Don’t think I won’t know if this is a fake. I’ll be back.”

He stepped out.

“Who’s your reference?” Whoever it was had her father jumping to attention. Very few people could do that.

Connor shrugged. “An old acquaintance.” His eyes hardened, his whole body losing that calm presence he’d had with her father and becoming predatory. “Now, we’re going to talk about how this will work because I will no longer buy your bullshit that you don’t need a bodyguard. In fact, I’m fairly certain you need a keeper.”

“A keeper?”

He leaned in, nearly pinning her to the bed. “Yes. You need someone to make sure you don’t get yourself killed. The good news is I no longer have to hold back and hope you’ll let me do my job. In about three minutes your father will walk back in here and he’ll be completely on my side. There’s nowhere left to run, little girl. From here on out, it’s going to be my way all the way, and the first rule of this partnership is that I’m in charge.”

“That’s rude and I don’t have to put up with it.” She was deeply grateful for the blanket between them because her nipples were acting up again. “I’m your employer.”

There was that sexy caveman smirk again. “No, you’re not. As far as anyone knows, I’m your boyfriend and we’ll have to keep up that pretense in public. I’ve found whenever I’m going undercover it’s best
to keep up the pretense in private, too. You’re less likely to slip up that way. Now that I think about it, I should really thank that fucker on the bike since I hated the thought of sleeping on your couch.”

His mouth hovered above hers, and suddenly her lungs didn’t seem to function. He was close, heat radiating off his body in waves. All she had to do was lean forward a little before her lips would touch his and she would know what it meant to kiss him. “There’s nowhere else to sleep at my place.”

“Sure there is. Do you like the right or the left side of the bed, sweetheart? Actually it doesn’t matter. I’ll take the side closest to the door.”

The thought of sleeping next to him was a little too tantalizing. It had been forever since she’d slept next to a man, and even then he’d been more of an overgrown boy who stole the covers and claimed he couldn’t sleep if she was too close to him. Tom hadn’t been a cuddler. Not that Connor would be. Somehow she couldn’t see him wrapping that lean body around a female to sleep. What would it be like to turn over in the early-morning light and have him resting between her and whatever might come through her door? She would feel so safe. But she couldn’t give in because she wasn’t about to let him think she was some doormat. “Or I can fire you. Then I wouldn’t have to pretend anything at all. I don’t like your attitude.”

“Oh, you might not like what I’m saying to you because you’re not used to having to play by anyone else’s rules, but I think you like me. I think you like me just fine.”

She managed to shake her head.

With a little twist of his hand, he pulled the blanket from her, unveiling her rigid nipples against the superthin material of the hospital gown. He looked down. “Cold, sweetheart?”

She pushed against his chest. “Asshole.”

He stepped back but didn’t go far. He sat on the edge of her bed with a little sigh, as though he was sad their play was over. “I’ll take care of you, Lara. I won’t let anyone hurt you, but you might not always like how I do it.”

She was feeling stubborn. Stupid, actually, because she was still thinking about kissing him. This was dangerous. She wasn’t about to get involved with a meathead who thought he could be all nice and polite one moment then take-charge, protect-the-little-woman the next. Nope. She didn’t care that her nipples liked him just fine. She was more than the sum total of her girl parts. Her biggest girl part was her brain, and her brain didn’t like him. Mostly. “Or we could just call it quits here.”

“Oh, we’re past that choice. Unless you want your father to take over. I think you’ll find he’s very comfortable with handing you over to me now. And I’ll allow you to work. Hell, I’ll help you. If you go with your father, you can’t work out of his place and you can’t ever let the guards he hires know what it is you do for a living.”

Damn it. Connor was right.

“I still think you should sleep on the couch.”

When he really smiled, fine lines crinkled slightly around his eyes. She was already beginning to differentiate his smiles. There was the arrogant smirk that seemed to be the most common in his repertoire. There was a little half smile that seemed to come when she said something he thought was stupid. Yeah, she could read that on his face. And then there was the smile that kind of lit up the room.

“How about I promise not to make love to you until you beg me? Would that make you feel safer?”

She blushed and wished he wasn’t sitting so close. “That’s not ever going to happen.”

“Then you don’t have anything to worry about, sweetheart.” He raised his hand and brushed his index finger against her nose, a sweetly affectionate gesture. “Who knows you were hiring a bodyguard?”

“Kiki.”

“The girl from the coffeehouse?”

She nodded. “Oh, and Tom.”

A single brow arched over his eyes. “Who is Tom?”

“He’s a friend. He’s cool. He clerks for a judge. Our fathers have
been friends for years.” For some reason, she didn’t want to tell him that Tom had almost been her husband. She deserved to keep a few secrets.

“Tonight you’re going to call them and explain our situation. If anyone asks, they need to say we met through mutual friends at a party and we’ve been talking online for a couple of months. We decided it was time to move this relationship to the next level.”

“See, to me the next logical level would be on my couch. And there’s no way they buy any of that story. We’re really close.”

The door opened and her father walked in, looking a little pale. He slid his cell phone into his pocket. “Lara, you do whatever this man tells you.”

“He just said he intended to sleep with me. Should I do that?”

Connor rolled his dark eyes. “I believe I told her I wouldn’t touch her in any physical way unless she begged me. Your daughter is apparently afraid that if I stay in her apartment, she’ll be overcome with lust. I’m a little worried about it, too, but I think I can handle her.”

“Connor.” She hit him with her pillow.

“Senator Armstrong, I’m sorry. Your daughter brings out the sarcastic jerk in me. I’ll keep it reined in. I’ll step out and give you two a moment. Lara, we need to get moving if we’re going to avoid those reporters.” He left the room, not quite shutting the door behind him.

“Dad, who was his reference?”

“The president.”

“Of the United States? POTUS? POTUS was his freaking reference?” Who the hell was this man?

Her father nodded. “I just had a nice chat with Zack Hayes. He claims Connor is one of the most honorable men he’s ever met and that I couldn’t be putting my daughter in better hands. He also invited your mother and me to a private dinner.”

“But he usually ignores you.”

“I don’t know that I would use the word
ignore
. We’ve met on several occasions, but he’s never met with me privately. Apparently
your bodyguard is also a POTUS whisperer. Lara, do you understand what it would mean to become friendly with Hayes?”

It would mean backing from a popular president. It would mean taking a bigger position within the party. It would mean her father could get his agenda pushed through. Still, Lara didn’t entirely trust Zack Hayes. She would likely never trust anyone who had reached such a pinnacle in politics, but there was something going on with this president. Her confidential informant had hinted that the leader of the free world was tied to some unsavory events. Then there was all the research she’d done on the murder of Joy Hayes.

She wasn’t so certain the president hadn’t had his own wife killed, and now it seemed her bodyguard was close to the man. And her father didn’t mind that one bit.

“Wait. Are you seriously pimping me out to get to the president?”

“Of course not. I would never do that.” He cleared his throat. “Although Connor is a very attractive man, Lara.”

Lara laughed, her whole body shaking with amusement. Her father sat on the edge of the bed, a smile on his face that faded after a moment. She let go of some of her worry. How close could Connor really be to Hayes? It was unlikely the president was best buds with a guy who seemed to be a drifter.

“I could have lost you.” He gripped her hand.

She squeezed his in return. “I’m okay.”

“Promise me you’ll let that man do his job. Baby, I couldn’t survive losing you. Your mother and I would . . .”

She leaned against the man who had been her rock for twenty-six years. He almost never understood her, but he’d always loved her just the same. “I promise.”

*   *   *

N
ow that the police had asked Lara “a few” questions and left, Connor could finally get her home. He looked up and down the hospital’s sterile hallway. So far he hadn’t seen a reporter, but it didn’t
mean they wouldn’t show up at any moment. He’d half expected them to be waiting when they’d pulled into the ambulance bay.

He made a mental note to start files on Lara’s friends. If they knew her secret, then they were as close as Lara claimed. They had to be pretty good friends if they’d known about her blog for this long and the secret still hadn’t come out. Still, even well-meaning people could fuck up at any point.

In his pocket, Connor’s phone buzzed. He slipped it out and walked just out of the Armstrongs’ earshot.

The pain in his shoulder flared up as he swiped his thumb across the screen. He’d taken some blows when he’d covered Lara’s body with his own. He would feel it in the morning. Maybe he could groan and whine a little and get her to massage his poor sore muscles.

Of course that turned another muscle of his hard and wanting. Damn, he had to admit they had chemistry. It was a dangerous thing.

“Hello?”

“So I just got a call from Senator Armstrong.”

As Connor made his way out of the room and the door shut behind him, he couldn’t help but smile. It wasn’t every day the president gave him a ring. “I should have warned you.”

“What? And made my day a little less surreal? Want to explain why I just gave you a sterling recommendation to an ally of mine?”

“I didn’t know you were close.”

“We’re not, but you gave me a convenient way to remedy that. He’s actually influential in a very quiet way. I invited him to dinner. So why are you protecting Lara Armstrong? I thought you were going to have Capitol Scandals shut down, not play bodyguard. Wait. He said she was in the hospital. Was she involved in the shooting on 2nd Street?”

He had to give his commander in chief credit. He wasn’t slow on the uptake. “The police suspect it was random, but they were trying to get Lara, Zack. He pointed that gun straight at her head. She needs me, and I need access to her daily life if I’m going to find whatever information she knows. Now I have access, and in order to keep her cover,
we’ll play boyfriend and girlfriend. Don’t be surprised if you see pictures of us. No matter what I do, a senator’s daughter getting caught in the middle of gunfire is going to make the news.”

So he would play her mystery guy. He already had everything in place. His cover would hold. The reporters who looked him up would see exactly what he wanted them to see.

“You really think she’s going to lead you to Nata?” She’d been Zack’s childhood nanny. From what Connor knew about Zack’s upbringing, he was fairly certain Natalia had been more of a mother than Zack’s biological mom. There had been rumors for years that Mrs. Hayes had a drinking problem. Her accidental death had been blamed on slick roads, but the whispers had never ceased.

“I think she’s the only lead I have. We know the informant wanted Everly to reach out to Lara. He said Lara had another piece of the puzzle. I’m betting that piece is Natalia’s location.” In fact, he was betting a lot on that.

“I don’t know, Connor. I’ve been talking to Roman about this. Maybe we should leave it alone.” Zack’s voice turned low, a sure sign he was uncertain.

In this case, he couldn’t follow Zack’s lead. This was Connor’s area of expertise. “And potentially have this come back to bite you in the ass?”

“Me? Whatever happened was probably my dad’s doing, but his dementia is getting worse every day. Last week, when I reminded him that I was his son, he told me he didn’t have one.” Zack cleared his throat, and Connor had no doubt his old friend was struggling with his father’s degenerating illness. “So I don’t think my dad will care what the press says. And it couldn’t have been my fault. I was a baby. I don’t think even the press can come up with a way to pin this on me.”