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“So you’re covering up the murder attempt to keep it out of the press,” Tom allowed. “What’s with the lip lock? Are you trying to convince her that sleeping with you is good protection? That’s kind of sleazy, isn’t it? Or is that the way she’s paying your fee?”
After that comment, surely rendering the kid unconscious would be acceptable. Maybe even applauded.
“Tom, are you trying to say I would sell myself?” Lara’s face had turned a vibrant red and Connor finally knew what she looked like when she was actually angry.
Tom backed down really quick, his angry posture changing i
n a split second. His shoulders slumped and his gaze slid away from hers. “I’m so sorry, L. I would never say that. I’m just upset because I think this guy is using you. We should talk to your dad.”
“I told you. Dad is all on board with Connor. Apparently Connor’s in good with Hayes, and you know Dad really wants into that circle.” Lara sat back.
That was a dangerous line of thought. The last thing he needed was someone thinking he was in Zack Hayes’s inner circle. “Not exactly. I did some work for the president back when he was just a kid in Congress. He came overseas on a fact-finding mission. He was part of the Armed Forces Services Committee. Well, what happened after that is classified, but he told me afterward if I ever needed a reference to go to him.”
Zack had actually been in the Middle East with a congressional committee, and Connor had provided security. He’d just been in the CIA when he did it and he certainly hadn’t been merely muscle. He’d been responsible for evaluating any and all threats to the American delegation.
So he wasn’t exactly lying. It was always best that any story he told her held a grain of truth.
“Tom, I have the skills needed to protect Lara. Her father is confident in that and so is she.” He looked her way.
She didn’t appear at all confident but after a few seconds, she got the idea. She nodded. “Yes. I am. He’s right.”
He needed to work on her acting skills. “And I kissed Lara in the elevator because it’s part of our cover, one all of us need to stick to. You two and her parents are the only ones who know that she’s the force behind Capitol Scandals.”
“And that there’s a douche bag who’s trying to murder me,” Lara added.
“Obviously, we don’t want him in on our plan. Tom and Kiki, if anyone asks, I expect you to keep our cover. If a reporter happens to phone you for a quote, you tell them she’s doing all right and she’s happily nesting with her new boyfriend.”
Kiki clapped her hands in what seemed like delight. “You’re going to pretend to be her fiancé so the press doesn’t think she has a bodyguard because then the press would wonder why she needed one and bam, we’re right back where we started. I love this plan.”
“Boyfriend,” Connor corrected. He damn straight wasn’t anyone’s fiancé. He’d never even come close to wanting that.
“Fine, boyfriend with an eye to marriage because no one’s going to believe Lara would just start sleeping with someone off the street,” Kiki explained.
Tom huffed a little. “Right. No one will believe that.”
Lara held up her left hand and those blue eyes sparkled with mischief. “I think I look best with a princess cut, but no blood diamonds. You have to make sure you don’t buy conflict gemstones. We’re going to be an earth-kindness home.”
He held up a hand to stop that line of thought right there. “Hey, slow down, princess. This isn’t real and we’ll just say we’ve been talking over the Internet.”
“Yeah, L. How are you going to explain this to your real boyfriend?” Tom sounded a little like a six-year-old on the playground. “How’s Niall going to take it?”
He watched her flush again, but this time any anger or mischief was gone. In its place was something he feared. Guilt. Shame.
Fuck it all, she thought she was really in love with Niall Smith. Niall Smith, who didn’t actually exist. Niall Smith—Connor’s own creation—was likely going to keep him out of Lara’s bed.
“I’ll talk to him tonight. I’m going to see if I can get him on the phone. I don’t want him to think this is real at all.” The words came out in a rush.
Lara’s hand drifted restlessly over the dog. Lincoln, as though sensing his mistress’s deep distress, settled down and rubbed against her.
“How serious is this thing with you and Niall?” Connor asked.
“We’re friends, but we’ve talked about trying to be more. You know what a great guy he is,” Lara said.
“You know you’ve got a whole country between you.” She had to see that it couldn’t work.
“That’s what I told her,” Tom explained.
He hated being on the same side as Tom, but this was a problem he should have thought of. All his careful planning could go up in smoke. He reflected on everything and realized he’d played Niall far too well. He’d constructed the guy to be a savior of endangered animals, her intellectual equal, and a sensitive activist. In short, her fantasy. Niall seemed a little like a walking vagina to Connor. If he didn’t work this angle correctly, his imaginary creation could screw up everything.
Fantasies always beat out reality. He needed Lara to trust him, to turn to him. Deep Throat was coming back, and Connor wanted Lara to tell him everything because he was important to her.
He couldn’t be as long as Niall was in the picture.
“Who knows,” Lara said with a wistful smile on her face that let him know she’d been thinking about this for a while. “He might like D.C.”
Connor shook his head. “No. That is one California boy. He won’t ever leave.”
“Then maybe I’ll like California.” She stood. “I should go and make dinner. Isn’t your package going to be here soon? I assume you had them deliver something that previously had a face and a mother who probably loved it very much before she was brutally murdered for her meat.”
Niall was a vegan. Another point for him. Shit. He should have sucked it up and eaten whatever she put in front of him. He gave her a wink because there was nothing to do now but brazen through. “You know the secret ingredient to any burger is love.”
She frowned and flounced away, her ugly dog in her arms, likely dreaming of a man who didn’t exist and who would have to prove himself to be all too human very soon.
Tom leaned over, his eyes wide. “Please tell me you ordered enough for all of us because I heard her talking about tofu tacos. I can’t do that. Have you ever tried to pass vegan cheese through your digestive tract?”
Kiki shook her head. “Men. I’ll go help Lara while you two plan your next kill.”
“I don’t kill it,” Tom called out. “It just shows up in a nice plastic wrapper at the grocery store. It could have died a natural death. We’ll never know.”
Kiki stopped in front of Connor. “If you like my friend, you should know that Niall is going to be an issue for her. I think he’s too good to be true and I don’t trust anyone I meet on the Internet, but she’s spent weeks building some serious picket-fence dreams around him. And I’ve seen his picture. He is a very cute boy.”
Connor had used pictures of a barely-out-of-college intern who’d once done work as a wilderness guide in Northern California. He was a twenty-four-year-old kid with too-long blond hair and a smile that could probably get him in the movies. In all the pictures on his social networking sites, Niall was climbing a mountain or river rafting.
Niall wasn’t covered in scars, both internal and external. He wouldn’t use sarcasm as a shield. He was bright and fucking shiny, like Lara herself. Niall didn’t cling to the shadows because the darkness felt like home.
If this was a fairy tale, Niall would be the handsome prince and Connor the villain who tore him away from the fair princess and broke her heart.
Lara was going to have to get used to the fact that this wasn’t a fucking fairy tale and princes didn’t exist. It was time to start resetting her expectations.
“I’m afraid she doesn’t know everything about him.”
Kiki’s eyes closed briefly, and she sighed when she opened them again. “Just let her down easy. She really likes him.”
“He likes her, too, but that doesn’t mean he’s right for her. Or that he’s in love with her.” At least he’d been careful about that. He’d been flirty and nice, but he hadn’t said anything about love. Even when he was playing a role, he would never have mentioned that word.
“Tell me he’s an asshole.” Tom seemed more than willing to talk to him now.
Kiki shook her head and walked off as the doorbell rang. “That’s
probably your food, carnivores.”
When Connor got to the door, he realized it was so much worse.
A small army stood there. They were a motley group. A couple looked damn near homeless, but that was just how twenty-year-olds seemed to dress these days. There were two elderly ladies, one complete with a walker. A worried-looking mom with a child clutching each of her hands.
One of the homeless stepped up. “Is Lara here? We heard about her on the news.”
He was just about to toss them all out when he heard a little cry behind him.
