Jean tapped a figure at the edge of the frame. Younger, leaner, but recognizable. “He never wanted to be in the photographs. Always standing guard instead of celebrating.”
“Some of us were working,” I said from near the fireplace.
“He was the best we had. Kept us safe when things got dangerous, and learned more about ancient metalwork than half my graduate students.”
That was my cue to leave. “I’m going to get some wood.”
Jean winked at me as he steered Grace toward a worn leather chair and gestured for her to sit.
I made my way through the kitchen, out the back door, and quickly found the woodpile. There was more than enough to bring in for the evening, in case it cooled off enough to warrant a fire. But there was far more uncut wood, and an axe leaning against a stump. Time to work off a little tension.
After verifying the axe was sharp, I balanced the first log on the stump, hefted the axe, and swung. It lodged halfway through the wood, and I lifted the whole thing up to swing again. The two halves flew to the sides. That wasexactlywhat I needed.
When the next log was in place, I imagined the face of the man who’d followed Grace.Thunk. The look in her eyes when I’d found her.Thunk.Next piece of wood. How she’d frozen at Tristan’s when I told her the police confirmed someone had been in her apartment.Thunk.
Clear your head.
I chopped the next five pieces of wood, focusing on my breath and my movement. Searching for my center. But those green eyes kept invading my thoughts, like they had last night, when I couldn’t sleep. She’d curled up on the little bed next to mine, and I couldn’t stop thinking about how close she was. And about how my job was to protect her, not make comments about carrying her tired ass up the stairs—especially when it had resulted in her exhausted smile that went straight to my dick.
Thunk.
What was it about her? I’d worked security for plenty of gorgeous women in the past, and I’d never had this problem. More than half of them had come on to me at some point, whichwas one of the reasons I kept moving from contract to contract. Separating my head and my heart had always been easy with my clients. Hell, separating my head and mydickhad always been easy.
But now? On this job?
Thunk.
Sweat trickled down my spine, and I peeled off my shirt, glowering at the stack of wood. Grace and Jean would talk each other’s ears off for hours if I left them to it. Probably for the best. She likely needed someone to talk to after hanging around with me for a couple of days.
So cut all the fucking wood for him.
If I did that, my muscles would ache in the morning, and if anything serious happened, I wouldn’t be able to take care of Grace. She was my job. Everything else came after.
But as I rolled my left shoulder to loosen it up, another pair of green eyes invaded my brain. Carissa’s. My memory flew back seven years, when I’d taken the only bullet that had dared to find me. It had been little more than a graze, but Pendragon had flown me to Bagram and onward to Landstuhl, then home for two weeks to recoup before coming back for light duties.
And what did I find when I came home?
An empty fucking apartment. Carissa had been screwing some other guy since before I’d even left the States. The phantom pain that popped up when I thought about her ordered me to stop chopping.
Fuck that.
I grabbed another piece of wood, and as the axe fell, the other pair of green eyes wedged their way in. My mother’s bright green eyes looked up at me from where she lay on the floor. They were bloodshot and swollen, her lip split, and bruises covered her neck. My left shoulder was bleeding from the broken bottle my father had been threatening her with.
Thunk.
It was always green eyes.
Another piece of wood.
I lifted the axe over my head and slammed it through the log with one blow. I kept swinging the axe, breathing and trying to find my center, until the stacks of cut wood on either side of the stump were high enough I had to stop and stack them.
And my brain settled on Grace’s green eyes. It was dangerous to fixate on my client, but far safer than thinking about the other two women. The safest option was to focus on the wood, and I tried my damnedest. Once everything was back where it belonged, I pulled my shirt on and carried an armful of firewood into the house.
“—like they were the most important person in the room,” Grace was saying when I came back in. “She used to say the best conversations happened over coffee. That’s part of why I left my old job to open the coffee shop.”
Her old job? The coffee shop suited her so well, I hadn’t imagined she’d ever done anything else.
“Thank you, Galahad,” said Jean. “The days are hot, but the evenings are cool, so a fire will be welcome.”
