Page 16 of Too Guarded to Love

“Okay, Captain Cranky Pants. Gloria said her brother authorized you, and only you, to receive information about his sister, but this Jonathan is adamant about seeing her. Apparently, they had a little argument in the airport terminal after flying in on separate flights and she stormed out.”

Nic snapped the pen in two. Was this Jonathan prick the reason she’d seemed uneasy?

Joe eyed the broken pen as an eyebrow shot to his receding hairline. “The fiancé⁠—”

“Alleged fiancé.” What he’d done with Kane’s sister had been bad enough. Doing it with Kane’s engaged sister bordered on criminal.

Joe pulled another pen from his pocket and scratched something on his notepad. “Ms. Darren’s alleged fiancée is all worked up because he told her not to drive in the rain, but she left anyway. When she didn’t return his calls, he figured he’d find her with her friend, who owns a place on the bay. Nobody was home, so he came here.”

Nic initiated a mind comms call to headquarters.

“Status?” Ryan asked.

“Secure. Run a check on a Dr. Jonathan Garrity. He’s here claiming to be Olivia Darren’s fiancé.”

“On it.”

Nic ended the connection and pulled a mint from the container. He’d discovered recently that sucking on something calmed the buzzing in his neck.

Joe tucked his notepad into a pocket in his utility vest. “Want me to get rid of Doctor Garrity?”

Nic shoved the mint into his mouth and cracked it with his back teeth. Was she engaged? Running from her alleged fiancé because he’d hurt her?

A positive answer to the first would piss him off. The outcome of the first question had no bearing on the answer to the second. No man had a right to scare a woman.

His steel fingers twitched at his side. He curled them into a fist and reminded himself why he only gave women what he could afford—his charm, his body, his protection—and not a damn thing more.

He rubbed his nose with the back of his hand. Olivia’s scent of rain and flowers still lingered in his nostrils. So had his moment of vulnerability when he’d wanted to answer every question she’d muttered about his steel. And not just her clinical inquiries, but share how much his surgeries had hurt. How thankful he was to be alive, yet still suffered, and how nightmares about losing it all plagued him in his sleep.

He feared if he got any closer to Olivia, he could lose everything. Actions, especially ones in situations without all the intel, had consequences. Hadn’t history proved that? If this Jonathan guy were a threat, Joe could handle him.

Stay with my sister. Keep her safe.

But hell, Olivia wasn’t safe, and he’d made a promise. She may have lied by omission, but his gut told him Jonathan was trying to lie his way in to see her. His gut also told him Olivia’s near head-on collision wasn’t by chance, and the anxious glances over her shoulder had been real. So was the bullet he damn well hoped he wasn’t responsible for.

The morbid connect the dots in his brain didn’t lead to a clear picture, but if the man scaring her was on the other side of those doors…

He scrubbed the back of his neck with his knuckles. Fuck, he’d already screwed up once tonight with Kane’s sister. He shouldn’t chance screwing up again, but fear of his nightmares becoming reality rooted his steel leg to the floor.

Joe could handle Jonathan Garrity. He was a good cop. A good guy.

Yeah, but what kind of guy does that make me?