Guarding Her Assets Read online

  That stoic stare fell back onto me, and I sighed.

  “We got in because that’s part of our job. How we did it isn’t important,” Ace said.

  “We flashed our badges at the front desk and the manager let us in,” Officer Kinsey said.

  I scoffed and rolled my eyes as I walked into my condo—that had been officially invaded.

  “The last thing I need right now is a bunch of men under my feet!” I exclaimed.

  “You won’t even notice we’re here, Dawn,” Ace said.

  “Oh, really? I won’t notice an over six-foot-tall wall of muscle looming in the corner?” I asked.

  “She’s got you there, Ace,” Officer Kinsey said, chuckling.

  The two men in the living room buried their laughter as my eyes fell to my opened front door. Ace walked in before Officer Kinsey, and my eyes pinned him, just like he pinned me in my office. I wanted him to know how frustrated I was and how unwelcomed this intrusion was.

  Despite how good-looking Ace really was in the sunlight.

  “You men stay out of my bedroom and my bathroom. If you want a place to lie down or piss, you can use the room and bathroom on the other side of the condo. But this side?” I asked.

  I waved my hand around behind me to give them a general picture.

  “This is off-limits. Got it?” I asked.

  “Yes ma’am,” they all said.

  Except for Ace. He didn’t say anything.

  “Got it?” I asked him, my eyes hooking into him like eagle talons into someone’s skin.

  But all he did was turn on his boots and walk back outside, taking up his station he had previously before I walked off the damn elevator and saw him standing there.

  Great.

  Apparently, I’d get no privacy at all in my life now.

  Chapter 3

  Andrew

  “Everyone, on high alert. Position Two. Go. Now,” I said into my earwig.

  “What is it, Ace?” Stash asked.

  “You. With me. I just got a disturbing message from downstairs,” I said.

  “What is it?”

  “An unmarked package has shown up for Dawn.”

  I sent my team to be on the lookout for anything out of the ordinary. Then, Stash and I made our way downstairs. We handled the package with care as we went into a back room off the lobby, and we slowly opened the package. Stash had his hand on his gun, and I was ready to bolt. I closed my eyes, slowly slicing the tape and peeling the flaps of the cardboard box back.

  “Oh, fuck,” Stash said.

  “Catalog this. Take pictures. Send it all off to the lab to see if they can get prints or DNA off any part of this damn thing. I need to go find Dawn,” I said.

  “What are you going to tell her?”

  “The truth. Maybe then she’ll be a better sport about all this. And talk to the front desk after you’re done! See if anyone saw who dropped that damn thing off. Pull security footage if you have to.”

  The woman hadn’t been home for more than an hour, and already shit was dropping at her doorstep. I raced back up to her condo and barged through her place. I barreled down the small hallway, my shoulders practically rubbing against the walls as I made my way for her bedroom door.

  But it was locked.

  “Dawn, it’s me. Open up,” I said.

  I knocked a few times, but I didn’t hear anything on the other side.

  “Dawn, are you all right?”

  And when I heard soft mumbling behind the door, the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end.

  I brought the butt of my gun down onto the door, breaking the knob. I pushed the door open and rushed in, my gun in front of me as I cased the room. I heard the soft murmuring. It sounded like someone was in pain. Anger rushed through my veins as I slowly pushed open a door at the far end of the room, and slowly the sound grew louder. The murmuring. The screech-like cat sound.

  My eyes bulged when I saw Dawn in the tub. Naked. Covered in bubbles. With her fucking headphones in her ears.

  The woman was singing.

  And it sounded like a cat dying.

  I holstered my gun, but I couldn’t pull my eyes away. I was filled with lust at the sight of her. That long leg of hers, draped over the side of the tub with her thick thigh on display. Nothing but white bubbles covering her pussy. Her tits sat gloriously against her body, covered with a bra of popping bubbles that threatened to reveal her beauty to me. I couldn’t stop looking. I couldn’t get my damn lips to move.

  Until…

  “What in the world?”

  Dawn’s cry pulled me from my trance, and I whipped around. I heard her getting out of the tub, and I reached for a towel, holding it behind me for her to snag. She was cursing me under her breath, muttering a want for my own death as I closed my eyes. The image of her nude and nubile body was forever burned into my retinas, etched into the neuronal pathways of my mind.

  “What the hell are you doing barging into my bathroom, Ace?” she asked hotly.

  “There’s an elevated threat,” I said gruffly.

  “And you couldn’t have knocked?”

  “I did. You didn’t answer.”

  “You didn’t hear me singing?”

  “I heard someone in pain. Or, so I thought,” I said.

  “Well, thanks for that,” she said flatly.

  I grinned as I clasped my hands in front of me.

  “Whatever it is, you’re probably overreacting. Like you have been all day. Congressional members get threats like this all the time. And they aren’t walking around with personal security,” she said.

  “When a threat is deemed credible by Homeland Security, we step in,” I said.

  She paused. “Homeland Security?”

  “There was an unmarked package delivered. Which means the perp knows where you live. It had multiple surveillance pictures of you in there, along with a picture that had your face circled before a red X was drawn through it.”

  “What?” she asked breathlessly.

  “I’m escalating the threat level based on that alone. Which means a change of location.”

  “Wait, what?”

  “You can work with me, or you can make this hard. Either way, we’re moving you to a secure location.”

  “You don’t get to come in and completely rearrange my life. You’re a total stranger, Ace. I’m not leaving my home. No one is forcing me out of my home. Do you hear me?”

  “Pack a bag and meet me downstairs in ten minutes. If you aren’t down there in ten minutes, my men will drag you down there without a bag,” I said.

  And without giving her a chance to respond, I exited her bathroom.

  I gave my men their orders and told them to watch the clock. Give her twenty minutes, instead of ten. Leaving that bathroom helped me to catch my breath, and rightfully so. I’d never seen a more perfect body on a woman, and I couldn’t drool over her and do my job correctly. I needed to keep my head in the game and make sure whoever this was that was stalking her didn’t hurt her in any way.

  Because I’d kill them if they did.

  I put in a call to my headquarters to let them know we were on the move. I already had a safe house laid out for us in case we needed it. I always took precautions that way. I told my boss I’d report to him from there once we got settled within the hour, and we quickly laid out a plan.

  I opted to keep main security detail on Dawn’s condo and office as a diversion, to make the perp think we were still there. Which meant I’d be guarding Dawn alone at the safe house to keep her location under wraps.

  I drew in a deep breath. Being alone with that woman would be dangerous, in and of itself. But I’d be damned if she’d be alone with any of the other sharks I saw eyeing her whenever she walked through those doors. I knew these other security men were drooling over her, and I wasn’t having it.

  Not one damn bit.

  Chapter 4

  Dawn

  Forty minutes later, after being escorted out the back entrance of
my condominium complex, we were on the outskirts of DC. I wasn’t exactly thrilled with the nondescript and run-down cottage we had pulled up to, especially after Ace announced that it was where we’d be staying for the foreseeable future. It made me nervous, being alone with him, out here in the woods. Not because I thought he would hurt me, though.

  But because being cooped up with this security hunk wouldn’t do me any favors regarding work.

  Just because he’s hot doesn’t mean you have to explore anything with him. Keep your head in the game with work. You promised your constituents a lot.

  Despite my insistence, he carried my things in for me—my two suitcases, my toiletries, my purse, and my work briefcase, all of it at once, as if it weighed nothing. It was hard keeping my eyes off him. The veins that throbbed in his forearms alone were enough to spin my head. I drew in a deep breath and made my claim quickly on a room at the back of the cottage. I needed space away from him so I could work. I needed a place to breathe before he smothered me with his presence again.

  I made promises to people in my state I had to keep. And I had an uphill battle with Representative George White if I had any plans to keep my word on those promises.

  “This was technically supposed to be my room,” Ace said.

  “Well, now it’s mine,” I said.

  “Get settled in while I order us some takeout.”

  “Interesting choice for food, considering you want to isolate me.”

  “I mean, I’m going to order food, and one of the security men I know and trust is going to bring it to us.”

  I scoffed and shook my head as I fell back onto the bed. Ace left the room, and my mind started spinning. And it came to only one logical conclusion. If I wanted to get back to work without his distraction, I needed to help him figure out who was making these threats against me. If we could deal with that shit and move on, he’d be out of my life. I’d be back to work. Things would be back to normal, and I could make the change I set out to make.

  I waited until he called me out there for dinner, and the smell of Thai wafted through the cottage.

  “Hope you like noodles,” Ace said.

  “Smells nice,” I said.

  The two of us sat down at the small table in the corner, and it didn’t take me long to launch into the questions.

  “So, do you have any possible suspects?” I asked.

  “A few,” he said.

  “Have you narrowed them down according to the threats you keep getting?”

  “We’re working on it.”

  “What has to be done? Has anything been sent off to a lab or something? When will we hear back from them?”

  He slowly lifted his eyes to mine, slurping a noodle between his lips.

  “Hey, you’re the one who wanted me to be cooperative,” I said.

  “Asking questions isn’t being cooperative. It’s been annoying,” Ace said.

  I gave him a hard stare as he sat up.

  “And since we’re on the topic of being open with one another, your unwillingness to cooperate is having a negative effect on the case,” he said.

  “And your unwillingness to get a move on with catching this guy is having a negative effect on my life.”

  “Cooperate, and things will go smoothly.”

  “Have better lookouts, and maybe they would have caught the person as they delivered the package this evening.”

  I reached quickly for my glass, ready to take my food into my bedroom. But in my agitated state, I knocked my glass over. The water poured to the floor before the glass fell, shattering all across the cottage kitchen linoleum.

  “Shit,” I hissed.

  “I’ll get it. It’s fine, Dawn.”

  “Just get me a broom.”

  “You’re going to hurt yourself. Cut it out.”

  “My god, are you always such an overbearing jackass?” I exclaimed.

  I slapped his hand away and got up, tiptoeing over the glass. I walked over to the pantry door to try and find a broom, but I felt a heated presence behind me. The door slammed in front of me, barely missing my fingers as it closed. I whipped around and saw Ace looming over me, easily half a foot taller than I was.

  His hands pressed onto either side of my body, caging me in against the door.

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  He leveled his eyes with me, and I saw a fire in them that made my heart skip a beat.

  “This is how this is going to go, and I need you to listen, because your obedience is imperative to your survival,” Ace said.

  I snickered, but he shut me up with a glare that pierced me to my core.

  “I’m in charge. I’m the one that runs this show. And whatever I tell you to do, you’re going to do. Because it keeps you safe and out of harm’s way. Got it?” he asked.

  My nerve endings were sizzling. My knees went weak. I wanted to fall to his feet and kiss his thighs, rip that belt from his pants and pull them down with me. But I refused to give in to his handsome looks. His rumbling voice. His commanding nature.

  I opened my mouth to speak, but he cut me off with a searing kiss.

  My mouth opened and he crashed his lips against mine. An involuntary moan poured into his mouth, and I felt his tongue slide against my own. My back fell heavily against the pantry door as he braced himself against me, allowing me a feel of his muscles. They were thick, taut, coated in a tanned layer of armor. I didn’t know where to put my hands. I raised them up, feeling them tremble as he growled into my mouth.

  My knees gave out, and I plummeted to the floor. At least, I was headed that way.

  Before he caught me in his grasp.

  I gazed up into his eyes before I quickly scurried away from him. I grabbed my food and headed for my room, resolving myself to sink water if I was thirsty. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t sleep. The memory of that heated kiss haunted me throughout the night. My nipples pebbled every time I remembered it. Every time I replayed it, my thighs pressed together.

  I had no idea what the hell had come over him. But I found myself wishing it would happen again.

  Chapter 5

  Andrew

  I was on the floor of the living room in nothing but my boxers. I had been up for an hour, pumping out my morning workout routine to try and clear my mind. That kiss was on my mind all night. I woke up with a raging cock I had no idea how to tame. I pushed through my two hundred push-ups as if they were nothing, then flipped over to do my two hundred sit-ups.

  But Dawn’s soft gasp paused me in the middle of my set.

  I rolled over and quickly stood, painfully aware of what I was wearing. While she was still in her clothes from yesterday, I was in nothing but my boxers. The outline of her curves underneath those crumpled clothes called to me. I felt heat rush over me as electricity sizzled at the tip of my cock. I watched her eyes clock me, sliding down my form before slowly grazing back up my muscles again.

  I watched her chest as her breathing rate increased. And I knew that only meant one thing.

  She was as drawn to me as I was to her.

  I reached for a towel at my side and wiped away the sweat. My eyes locked with hers, and I watched her cross her arms over her chest. But not before I got a sight of those luxuriously puckered nipples against her tank top.

  Fucking hell, this woman drove me wild.

  “Um, could you put on a pot of coffee while I go take a shower?” Dawn asked.

  “Funny. That’s what I had in mind for you to do,” I said.

  She giggled softly as she ran her fingers through her hair.

  “So, who’s showering and who’s making coffee?” she asked.

  I shrugged. “Maybe we could save time and energy by showering together.”

  I was shocked that the words flew out so quickly. But I didn’t regret them.

  “I don’t know if it would save either,” she said, grinning.

  Did she just say what I thought she said?

  I eyed her, expecting her to tell me off, to come
to her senses and pull away from me, like she had last night. I deserved it. I couldn’t keep myself under control around her. One good slap across my face would put me right in line. But instead, her arms dropped from her chest. She slipped her tank top over her head, tossing it over her shoulder. My jaw dropped at the unimpeded view of her waist. Her full breasts barely covered by a lacy bra. The bloom of her hips still covered by her shorts.

  Then, she winked at me before she turned to head back into her room.

  It wasn’t until I heard the shower turn on that I followed her. I made my way into her room tentatively, unsure of what she really meant by all of that. I stood there in the doorway, watching her strip down as she wiggled that thick ass of hers in my direction.

  She looked over her shoulder at me as she took off her bra, dropping it at her side.

  “What’s wrong, Ace? Still scared?” she asked coyly.

  I charged her, wrapping my arms around her naked body as I pulled her close. I fisted her hair and pulled her eyes back, gazing down into them with a silent roar. My cock pressed against her naked pussy folds as her hands slide down my chest. She hooked her fingers into the band of my boxers, slowly easing them down until I could do nothing but step out of them.

  “I’m not afraid of you, Dawn,” I said.

  “You’re just afraid of what I do to you?” she asked.

  I paused, because she hit the nail right on the head.

  “I get it,” she whispered.

  I crashed her lips against mine, feeling her soft curves pouring into the slats of my muscles. I picked her up with my arm around her waist and carried her into the warm stream of water. I pinned her against the tiled wall. Her hands trickled over my arms, my chest, around my neck, and down my back. My tongue raked across the roof of her mouth, and she shivered against me, pressing me on as I wrapped my fingers within the wild curls of her bright red hair.

  I wanted to hear more of her. Have more of her. Taste more of her. And as I kissed down her voluptuous body, I slid her leg over my shoulder.

  I was hungry for my breakfast.

  Chapter 6

  Dawn

  “Oh, yes,” I moaned.