After the rally, everyone was eager to keep moving and get to the inn, which was little more than an hour away. Hazel was tired but happy. She’d attended several of Alec’s campaign rallies when he ran for the Senate three years before, but hadn’t been to anything in the intervening years, having spent much of that time overseas. It was exciting. Exhilarating even, to be with like-minded people who were trying to create positive change. She’d forgotten what it felt like.
The people she worked with at ICMP were also trying to make a difference, but the work was the darker side of justice, where you only saw the horror humans commit, not the ways in which activists tried to make a difference by making their voices heard.
“I’m really glad we did that,” she said.
“Me too,” Sean said. He pointed to his phone in the console. “Since I’m driving, can you text my sister and tell her to turn on the news? She’ll get a kick out of it.”
“Sure.”
“Pass code or thumbprint?” She held out the phone to him.
He kept his eyes on the road and gave her the six-digit code. It was ridiculous that she got a little rush at the idea he trusted her with his pass code, but she did. Pathetic woman takes great joy in tiny signs of man’s interest. Click to read more. Her life was certain to become a hit limited series on Netflix.
She opened the address book. “Her name is Katrina?”
“Yes.”
“Found her. Tell me what you want to say.”
“Just say it’s you because I’m driving and to look for the rally on the news.”
She typed out a message and hit Send. A moment later the reply came.
Katrina: Thanks for letting me know! I’ll tell our mom too. So are you and Sean serious? I can’t remember the last time he introduced a girlfriend to the family, and I hear we’re all having dinner next week.
She laughed and tried to figure out the best reply.
“What?”
“Oh, nothing. Just chatting with your sister.”
“Crap. I really should have thought that through. I should’ve used voice commands.”
“Yes. Yes, you should have.”
She typed a reply that wouldn’t set up any big expectations.
Hazel: I’m not sure about serious. Just seeing where this goes.
Katrina: Can’t wait to meet you. It’s about time Sean moved on after the fiasco in Grand Cayman.
Hazel jolted and let out a small gasp.
“What?” Sean asked.
“Nothing.” Her voice was a little higher pitched than usual. She stared at the screen. How to respond?
“I should probably mention that Kat is my twin. We’re close. But she tends to…overshare.”
Sean’s voice was nervous. She liked that. But still, she looked at him askance. She hadn’t even known he had a sister until Monday, and now she found out Katrina was his twin?
Hazel: I feel like I should tell you my full name. I’m Hazel MacLeod.
Odds were, even if Katrina hadn’t known her first name, she knew the fiasco had been Ivy MacLeod’s sister.
The reply was immediate.
Katrina: Oh shit.
Katrina: I’m going to claim chemo brain. Yes. Definitely chemo brain. Sean, when you read this, it was the chemo. Or, Hazel, maybe you can be a sweetheart and delete?
Hazel: I think you’re fine playing the chemo card.
Katrina: Finally chemo is good for something.
Hazel couldn’t help but laugh. She liked Katrina already.
Hazel: Hope you are feeling better.
Katrina: Much. Only one more round and I *should* be done. I can’t wait.
Hazel: I’m so sorry you’re going through this.
Katrina: It sucks. But Sean has been amazing. Really. He’s a great guy. And OMG, you are HER. Looking forward to dinner next week! (Now I’m REALLY looking forward to dinner…)
Hazel: Me too.
Katrina: Have fun at the wedding! I’m going to watch the news now. Looks like they’re about to talk about the rally. Ohh. Love your hair. I can see why Sean is obsessed with you.
Hazel: Really? Tell me more.
Katrina: I think the baby’s crying. Gotta run. See you next week.
“How old are your nieces?” Hazel asked.
“Three and five.”
She smiled. Not exactly a baby, but close enough. She set the phone in a slot on the center console and turned in her seat to stare at the handsome man driving the large SUV. She was fascinated by everything about him. Was it possible he’d harbored some kind of crush on her?
She doubted it, but it sounded like she’d at least made an impression. A fiasco of an impression, but the words “move on after the fiasco” were strangely encouraging.
Katrina thought what had happened in Grand Cayman had been holding Sean back. Why? What had Sean told his sister?
The hotel room was going to be a problem. Not that it wasn’t perfect. It was. For a couple. But for Sean, who was on bodyguard duty for the next forty-eight hours, it would be a nightmare. At least the bed was big enough to share. It was a giant four-poster with gauzy curtains. Romantic. Made for sex.
And then there was the huge Jacuzzi tub adjacent to the bed. The tub could be in the bathroom, but no, this tub was in the center of the room so a couple could relax together in the hot, bubbling water and watch the sunset through the huge west-facing picture window that overlooked the lake.
Hazel oohed and aahed over the bed, tub, and window. “I think this might be the most gorgeous room I’ve ever stayed in.”
And the way the afternoon sun hit her hair, she was the most gorgeous thing in the room. He wanted to scoop her up, drop her on the bed, and finish the kiss they’d started several hours ago. He wanted to hear her call out his name as he made her come repeatedly. Then he wanted to soak in the tub with her before lifting her to the ledge, spreading her legs, and going down on her.
He wanted this weekend to be real and the bodyguard part to be a charade. But she wasn’t his girlfriend and he would be on duty. And he didn’t fuck around on the job.
She bent over her open suitcase, which sat on a low rack at the foot of the bed.
Her ass in the air like that made him hard. But then, after the kiss today, all she had to do was breathe and he got hard.
He needed to get out of this room before he forgot himself and violated one of Raptor’s main rules for operatives: no screwing around with the client while the job was ongoing.
“We can unpack later. Trina wanted us to gather in the garden for the results of the scavenger hunt.”
“We have twenty minutes. Did you send her our selfies?” Hazel asked.
“Shit. I forgot.” He pulled out his phone and tapped the message app. Hazel’s conversation with his sister was on top. He glanced at the thread, and his stomach dropped.
He looked up to see Hazel’s crossed arms and a satisfied smile on her face. “Don’t worry. I sent them to Trina while you were driving.” Her words and tone were innocent sounding, but her smile was anything but.
He set the phone aside and advanced on her. Screw the rules. She was too damn irresistible when she smiled like that. In two steps, he’d scooped her up and dropped her on the bed, then crawled up over her. He had her pinned between his hands and knees, even though he didn’t touch her. He could feel her body heat, a warm caress on his exposed skin. The fresh scent of citrus and mint clung to her hair, and he wanted to eat her.
“I bet you have some questions for my sister,” he said.
“I do.”
“Ask me. Not my sister.”
“I don’t think so.”
“Please?” He wasn’t above pleading.
“No.”
“You’re a beautiful woman, Hazel.”
She smiled and licked her lips. “Thank you.”
His cock thickened at the sight of her tongue. “I never said I didn’t want you.”
“You never said you wanted me either.”
“Wanting and having are two different things.”
“I’m well aware of that.” She reached up and stroked his cheek. “I’m going to lay it all out now. One hundred percent real. I want you. I’ve wanted you since the first dinner party at Alec’s house four and a half years ago.”
He knew that. He’d always known that. “I’m your bodyguard. What you want, even what I want, is irrelevant. Raptor has rules against fooling around with clients.”
“Yet here I am, pinned beneath you.”
He started to pull back, to do the right thing, but she grabbed his shirt, keeping him above her. “You aren’t working for Raptor right now, and I’m not a client.”
“You are—”
“No. Alec is your client. I don’t even think I’m in danger.”
“We can’t, Haze. Not while I’m protecting you.”
“You think Alec and Isabel won’t be having sex this weekend because he’s protecting her?”
“I really don’t want to think about Rav’s sex life, thank you very much.”
“And I’m calling bullshit on your rules. I’m not in danger. I’m not your client. And you aren’t working for Raptor. Those are all excuses. And you know it, or you wouldn’t be pinning me to this bed.”
He stared down at her. His body throbbed with need. She was everything he wanted, and he could have her.
But want had nothing to do with it. This wasn’t right. Not when she was vulnerable and he was ready to bolt. He wouldn’t stick around, and that would hurt her. Worse, they could have weeks ahead of them stuck in their roles of fake relationship. If he fooled around with her now, things could get damn awkward when it was clear he didn’t want more. “Maybe I don’t want to have sex with you.”
It was his biggest lie in a day filled with them, and he suspected she knew it.
“And maybe you do.”
There was no “maybe” about it.
“We’ll finish this conversation later,” Hazel said. “Let’s go meet the others and collect our prize.”
He climbed off the bed and offered her a hand to pull her up. As he did so, he said, “We could be stuck in this charade for weeks. Sex is a bad idea.”
She stood and patted his cheek. “You can tell yourself that, Sean. But what you’re really doing is running scared.”
She crossed the room to the couch where she’d set her purse and scooped it up. “Let’s join the others and get our prize. Then I’ll claim exhaustion and retreat in here so you can hang with the guys without having to pretend for a while. Deal?”
“Hazel—”
“I’m trying to make this easier for both of us. I’m mindful of the fact that this is your best friend’s wedding and you should be here to have fun. Let me give this to you, okay?”
He nodded. Anything else would be a dick move, considering he was the one who’d just refused her blatant offer. He’d hurt her, yet she wasn’t making this weekend about her.
Two things were certain. Hazel MacLeod was too good for him, and he sure as hell was running scared.