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The door to her room was wide open. Through it, he could see both of her parents were with her. They wore matching embroidered silk robes and slippers while Lexi was dressed in a black tank and shorts.
Despite just being woken in the middle of the night, she looked every bit as beautiful as she always did, maybe even more. Various strands of hair had escaped the loose side braid she had fashioned for sleeping somehow making her seem younger than her years. He felt a protective instinct kick in.
At his arrival, her face registered surprise, then confusion. Stonewall’s was a blank, however, with no discernible expression other than annoyance at being disturbed this late hour.
Seeing Lexi, Bud trotted straight to her, greeting her with a solemn lick of her hand. Her fingers curled around his head.
“Hey, Fella.” Kane couldn’t help noticing how, despite how strange it must be to have them all in her room like this, she still had time to welcome his dog.
“I’m assuming there must be a reason for us to have been gathered together at his ungodly hour?”
It was remarkable how Stonewall made it seem like this was Kane’s fault, given the circumstances.
“One of the new alarms we installed this afternoon was tripped.”
“Faulty wiring?” Stonewall questioned, one bushy brow raised.
“There’s nothing wrong with my men’s work, as I’m sure you’ll discover. It looks as if someone was attempting to get onto the grounds — my team found climbing gear left by the location of the alert.”
Mandy inhaled a sharp breath and shot a piercing look at her husband. Stonewall issued the briefest shake of his head. Whatever Mandy might have said next died a fast death on her lips.
“This is the same person, isn’t it, the one who took the pictures of me?” Lexi asked.
She still thought it was regular paparazzi though Kane doubted pictures was all they were after not — this was a lot of effort and risk.
“I’m following up a lead on those pictures. I’ll let you know as soon as I hear back but it would be negligent to dismiss the threat, not when we’ve had two in such close succession.”
He looked pointedly at Stonewall, silently urging the man to come clean to his daughter. It was madness not to. Catching the look, Stonewall retaliated with a glower of his own. He shifted the weight on his feet, somehow managing to make the gesture look menacing.
“But you’re sure whoever it is never made it to the house?”
“Yes. The cameras would have picked them up. Bud and I still need to check ourselves but for now, it looks like whoever it was, is gone.”
Hearing his name mentioned, Bud’s ears swiveled around to him.
“If it’s just another pap trying to sneak shots, couldn’t your men have handled it?” Lexi asked.
“Yes, of course,” Kane replied without thinking, his brain not quite firing on all cylinders yet.
“Then why are you here in the middle of the night?” She stared at him as if something wasn’t sitting right with her. He waited for her parents to make this easier for him, but when they stayed silent, he knew he had to lie, however much he disliked himself for it.
“I was already awake when the alert came. It wasn’t an issue for me to come.”
His answer seemed plausible, but Lexi was picking up a great deal of weariness around him. She knew it had more to do with what had happened between them than this late-night alert.
She understood that it might not be a great idea to be involved with a client, though his reaction had still hurt. Until the moment he had pulled away, there was a real connection between them. They hadn’t seemed so different then, just two lonely people finding an attraction to one another…
And that was before he had sung to her with a voice that she could still feel in her bones even now. Losing herself, she had leaned into that kiss and felt the electricity surge between them…
And then nothing.
On that long drive home, he’d barely said a word.
Picking up on the vibe, Johnny had turned on the radio to drown out the awkwardness. He’d thanked Kane for the meal — the best he’d ever had — but Kane hadn’t engaged in much of a conversation other than to say he was welcome.
All the closeness she had felt with him, the playfulness and joking around as they’d worked side-by-side earlier in the day had vanished. A wall had come up between them.
Her heart ached as she once again felt that stinging rejection that always seemed to follow her. What was it about her that stopped people wanting to be close? Why could they never see her as who she actually was?
