KIRKLAND: A Standalone Romance (Gray Wolf Security) Page 6

  I picked up her hands and held them between mine.

  “It’s fine. I understand.”

  She pulled away and stood, wrapping her arms around her chest. “What if this is the parent of some girl who killed herself because of what I’m doing to make money? What if my business is built on the backs of girls who feel like they’ve ruined their lives because of people like me?”

  “And what if it’s just some psycho who thinks you stole his parking spot?” I stood and moved up behind her, resting my hands on her shoulders. “I’ve been doing this for almost three years. I’ve seen a lot of people do a lot of things for stupid reasons. It’s not always something you did that catches the attention of someone crazy enough to want you dead.”

  “But what if it is?”

  “Then you deal with that when you know for sure. But there’s no point in beating yourself up until you do know.”

  She turned to face me, a small smile taking some of the panic from her eyes.

  “Thanks.”

  “No problem.”

  She gestured toward the back of the house. “Are the bedrooms back here? I think I need to lie down for a little while.”

  “Sure. You take the master, the last door on the left.”

  “At least you get to sleep in a real bed tonight,” she said, her smile widening.

  I just returned her smile.

  I glanced at the camera on the wall, wondering if David had been watching. An hour later I got my answer when Ricki showed up at the door.

  Chapter 8

  Mabel

  There was this panic down deep in my stomach that wouldn’t go away. I tried laying down, but it just got worse. So I walked around the room, opened the closet door, and discovered women’s clothing in all styles and sizes. How many times had they had to bring a client here? How many women were shocked to realize the threat against them was real? How many had Kirkland laid in this bed with?

  Okay, that last thought wasn’t part of my panic, but I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I heard the comment the detective had made and wondered what she was talking about. Obviously, she meant his lothario ways. Was he really that much of a playboy? Did he really enjoy moving from woman to woman like that? I’d always wondered about men like that, like the men who starred in the movies I sold. Was it really just about sex? Weren’t they missing out on something better?

  Not that I was an expert. I sold porn and I’d never been with a man.

  Why was it that someone had planted a bomb under my car, but all I cared about was whether or not Kirkland had slept with a woman in this room?

  “Hey, Maybe!”

  Ricki walked into the room and immediately came over to offer me a big hug. It was nice, almost like falling into my mother’s arms after a long, bad day. She squeezed me, then moved back just enough to look into my eyes.

  “How are you?”

  I shrugged. “I’m okay, considering.”

  “David told me what happened. Did it freak you out?”

  “It did, but Kirkland got me out pretty quick.”

  “Good.”

  She took my hand and led the way to the bed, pulling me down on the edge of the mattress beside her.

  “Tell me he’s being good to you.”

  “He is. He’s very polite.”

  “Polite. Not something I imagine Kirkland Parish being.”

  “He is. We talked last night and he was really sweet. He seemed really interested in what I had to say.”

  “Of course he did. That’s how he gets into bed with the women he wants.”

  That’s not me.

  I climbed off the bed and began to pace a little bit, moving up and down the length of the room.

  “This whole thing is pretty insane,” Ricki said.

  “Is this how it was for you?”

  “My situation was different. I didn’t have anyone living with me day and night.”

  I turned and looked at her. “Yet, you still got the guy.”

  “After a lot of soul searching and butting my head up against the wall.”

  I started pacing again. “I just want this situation over. I don’t like the realization that there really is someone out to get me.”

  “Neither do I. When David called and said they found a bomb…” She came to me and touched my arms. “I’m so relieved you’re okay.”

  Okay, but confused. I wanted to go out into the living room and see for myself that Kirkland was still there. But, again, I wanted to stay in here and hide out. I had to keep reminding myself that this whole thing was real, that this bomb had been real. Someone really wanted to hurt me, the most unassuming woman in the world.

  “I met Donovan.”

  “Did you? What did you think of him?”

  “Did Gray Wolf Security find all their operatives out of a GQ magazine or something?”

  She laughed. “And his wife is in my wedding party. You’ll meet her tomorrow at my bridal shower.”

  “If they let me come.”

  “Oh, they’ll let you come if I have to go directly to Ash and make sure it happens.”

  “I can’t believe you’re getting married.”

  “Sometimes, I can’t believe it either.”

  “How did you know?”

  Ricki shrugged. “After we broke up, all I could think about was David. I was so drawn to him that I snuck into his rehab sessions and watched him gain the ability to walk again. I didn’t want him to walk, but I was so proud of all the work he put into it. And then, when he came to me and told me he’d never stopped loving me…I just knew it was meant to be.”

  “That’s such a romantic story.”

  Ricki shook her head, turning away from me. “It doesn’t matter to anyone but us. Just like your story, when you have one, won’t matter to anyone but you.”

  “I don’t think I’ll ever have a story.”

  “You’re young, Maybe,” she said, smiling at me. “You’ll have more stories than you can ever imagine.”

  I thought about Kirkland just outside this door, probably sitting bored on the couch. Would he be one of my stories? Would he be an important one? Was I ever going to get to know him better than I already do?

  I doubted it. But I wanted to.

  ***

  Ricki left after an hour or so. I took a shower, thinking the hot water would calm the tension in my shoulders, but it didn’t. I dressed in a pair of shorts and a t-shirt I found in the closet, the most normal set of clothing I’d worn since I left home for college. Kirkland was sitting at the kitchen table, playing a hand of solitaire—and clearly cheating at it.

  “You suggested food earlier.”

  “There’s a fridge full of food. Anything in particular you want?”

  I shook my head.

  He gathered some vegetable and sausage from inside the fridge and started to cut them on the cutting board. I moved up beside him to help, standing a little closer than I probably should have. He handed me a knife, and we worked in silence, chopping onions and peppers and sausage into small pieces before he threw it all into a skillet with a little salt and black pepper.

  “Do you know poker?” he asked.

  I smiled. “My brothers taught me how to play when I was little.”

  We took our food to the table and within minutes, I’d beat him at two hands of poker.

  “Let’s make this interesting,” he said. “How about we bet pennies?”

  “What about dollars?”

  He pulled out his wallet. “I only have thirty dollars on me.”

  “I know you’re good for it.”

  He looked at me for a long second, then cracked a big, genuine smile. “Okay.”

  We played until the food was cold and the sun was beginning to set. I beat him so many times that I lost track of how much he owed me. But he didn’t.

  “Fuck!” he cried as I showed a full house to his two of a kind. “How do you keep doing that?”

  “I don’t know. Good luck?”

  He j
ust shook his head. “I owe you something like five hundred bucks now, so I think we’d better quit.”

  “How did you learn to play poker?” I asked as I dealt a new hand anyway.

  He groaned, picking up the cards with some reluctance. “My father had a group of friends over several times a week to play.”

  “And you watched?”

  “I played with them. Was good at it, too…with a little help.”

  “You cheated them?”

  “It was my dad’s thing. And the guys probably knew, they were just too drunk to do anything about it.”

  “But you just went along?”

  “I was a kid. I went along with everything my dad said we should do.”

  “What about your mom? Didn’t she ever say anything?”

  Kirkland set down two cards, waiting for me to deal two new ones. I did, watching his fingers as he picked up the cards. He had what my mom would have called a pianist’s fingers. They were long and slender, almost delicate for a man. Especially one that looked like Kirkland.

  “My mom wasn’t around,” he finally said.

  “Why not?”

  “She took off when I was about five. She said she’d had enough and she didn’t want any more of it.”

  That struck me as one of the saddest things I’d ever heard. I mean, I knew kids whose parents were divorced for one reason or another. Not as many as other kids in my school, but I knew a few. But I’d never met anyone whose mother just left because she couldn’t handle being a mother.

  I was a sheltered kid.

  “Did you have older brothers and sisters?”

  “Two brothers. They were much older though. My dad always said I was a menopause baby: one of those pregnancies that the mom mistook for menopause at first.”

  “I was sort of one of those, too. My mom thought she couldn’t have any more kids when I came along.”

  “Coincidence.”

  Kirkland laid down a royal flush. I hadn’t even been paying attention.

  “Your luck is changing.”

  “Not really. I was just distracting you.”

  He stood up and stretched, pulling his arms so high over his head that the bottom edge of his silk shirt slipped out of the sides of his slacks. He focused on the cards for a moment, then smiled that charming smile.

  “We’ll have to play again sometime when we can drink and do it up right. I’ll kick your ass.”

  “I bet you would.”

  I gathered the cards and put them back in their box before taking the plates to the sink in a reverse of the day before. He moved up beside me and silently took the plates to pop them into the dishwasher.

  “Thanks,” he said when we were done.

  “I’m sorry about your mom,” I said softly.

  He shook his head. “I never really knew her.”

  “And that’s the really sad part.”

  “Naw. The really sad part was that she never got to know me.”

  I giggled a little. “Yes, that is definitely the tragedy.” I dried my hands and leaned back against the sink. “We’re you close to your dad?”

  Kirkland looked up at the ceiling, as though he were really contemplating my question. “Well,” he said, a hint of a southern accent coming into his voice, “my dad was an alcoholic saxophonist who spent most of his time lying to the federal government about how many children he had so he could get food stamps.” He looked at me, his face guarded, as if he expected me to judge him on his father’s bad deeds. “We weren’t terribly close.”

  “Is he still alive?”

  “No. He died while I was in the military.”

  “Is that why you joined? So that you could get away?”

  That’s when the wall I’d expected to see when he first started talking about his family fell over his face. I’d hit a sore spot, and he wasn’t comfortable talking about it anymore. I wondered why. What was it about joining the military that was more personal, more uncomfortable, than his screwed up family life?

  “You should go to bed, Mabel,” he said softly. “You have Ricki’s bridal thing tomorrow.”

  “I do. Is it okay that I go?”

  “Of course. I’ll be there.”

  I smiled. “Of course.”

  I made my way to the archway that led to the hall. As I was about to turn and look back at him, to wish him a good night, he surprised me by asking a question.

  “Did I hear Ricki call you ‘Maybe’ instead of Mabel?”

  “Yeah.” I kicked my toe against the linoleum, once again embarrassed in front of this beautiful man. “When we met at the conference, she couldn’t see my name tag. She asked me what my name was and she thought I said ‘Maybe.’ So she’s been calling me that ever since.”

  “‘Maybe.’ It’s cute.”

  “Indecisive.”

  “That’s definitely not you.”

  “You think so?”

  “You are a lot of things, Mabel, but indecisive is not one of them.”

  I smiled so big I thought my jaw was going to crack. “Thanks.”

  I walked away feeling as though I was walking on air.

  Chapter 9

  Mabel

  Laughter rose all around me. I watched the women I knew and the ones I didn’t, wondering what I was doing here. I’d left home to avoid this sort of thing. But, again, this wasn’t the sort of thing we would do back home. There wouldn’t be mimosas flowing like water. There wouldn’t be sexy lingerie. There wouldn’t be dirty jokes and cakes that looked like men’s penises. And there wouldn’t be my good friend, Ricki Dennison.

  “I can’t believe Kirkland is here.”

  I glanced behind me. He was standing a safe distance away, leaning against the far wall near the front door. We were at the house Ricki had recently purchased with David. They’d been living in his small cottage on the compound where Gray Wolf Security had its headquarters, but Ricki—understandably—wanted more space. The house was two stories, in a gated community, five minutes from the Gray Wolf compound—a compound I had yet to see.

  Kate, the woman who’d whispered those words, was Donovan’s wife of almost two months. She was one of the bridesmaids. The other, Joss, hadn’t been able to make the party. Something about a doctor’s appointment.

  “He’s working,” Ricki said, without indicating me even though everyone had seen us come in together.

  Kate did look at me. She smiled almost apologetically.

  “Gray Wolf does a great job,” she said. “Donovan particularly.”

  “I met him yesterday.”

  Her eyebrow rose. “Yeah? He just got back from Las Vegas. He was guarding a singer, but he won’t tell me which one.”

  “It must be hard, being married to someone who won’t talk about his work.”

  “He doesn’t want to worry me, but I think my imagination worries me more than the truth would.”

  I nodded in agreement. She was probably right.

  “I guess you’ve met Ash, too.”

  “I did. When they first started working for me.”

  “Ash?” one of the other women said. “Is that they guy on the website?”

  “It is,” I admitted, having looked over Gray Wolf Security’s website myself when Ricki first told me about David. And again when she pushed me into hiring them.

  “He’s hot,” she said.

  The women all began to giggle. It was obvious which ones had looked up the website and knew what we were talking about, and those who hadn’t.

  “What is his story?” another woman asked.

  Kate glanced at Ricki. Ricki was about to be Ash’s sister-in-law, so it seemed more appropriate for her to tell the story, especially since I didn’t know it and Kate seemed to feel it wasn’t her place.

  “He and David grew up in Austin, Texas. Their father was a state senator. After college, Ash went into the military and—”

  “No. Is he married, or does he have a girlfriend?”

  More laughter. I glanced back at Kirkland a
gain. He looked a little tenser than he’d been moments ago. And he had that wall over his face again, that one that told me we were treading where we weren’t wanted.

  Ricki shook her head. “He was engaged, but his fiancée went missing in Afghanistan some years ago.”

  “That sucks,” someone said.

  “Then he’s single?” the first woman asked. Ricki tossed a bow she’d taken from one of her gifts at the woman. She laughed, holding up her hands. “Hey, the guy’s hot. You can’t blame me for asking.”

  “It’s kind of sad,” Kate said. “Donovan told me he still looks for her from time to time, following up on information military buddies offer him.”

  “Why is it the good ones are always already taken?”

  The women sobered up then. Half of them were single. The other half either were in relationships or married. That didn’t seem to matter, though, as they all sulked a little over the loss of another good man in Ash.

  ***

  I was still thinking about it when Kirkland led the way to the SUV.

  “Did you know Ash’s fiancée?” I asked him.

  He shook his head. “All I know is that she was CIA and she disappeared on his watch. He took it hard because of that.”

  “Not because he loved her?”

  Kirkland opened the passenger side door for me. “Ash is the kind of guy who feels a great deal of responsibility for those under his command. When Alexi disappeared, not only did he lose the woman he loved, but he also lost a woman he was responsible for protecting. It’s his duty to find her and bring her home to her family.”

  “But he loved her.”

  Kirkland’s eyes moved over my face. “It’s not always that simple.”

  “Do you believe in love, Kirkland?”

  His eyes dropped to the ground. “I believe people believe in love.”

  “But do you? Have you ever been in love?”

  His eyes came back up to mine. There was something there, something new that I couldn’t quite define.

  “I believe that people can’t be trusted. And without trust, there can’t be love.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, a profound sadness coming over me for reasons I didn’t want to understand. I touched his face lightly, my thumb sliding over his chin. I had no right to touch him that way, but I wanted to—just once. I wanted to feel something intimate with him in that moment because I didn’t understand how one person could feel so deeply, yet not believe in love.