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“There aren’t any,” Cam said. “Orton earned his money the old fashioned way—he inherited it. Everything’s in a billion dollar trust fund.”
“What about the staff?” the judge asked.
“No criminal records.” Cam shrugged. “No large deposits into their bank accounts.”
“This gives me a lot to think about, but it’s getting late. You two look like my heart feels.” The judge rubbed his chest in tight concentric circles. “I do not recommend even a minor heart attack. One event and I ended up with this guy as a shadow. He came all the way from South America to play nurse maid. Can you believe it?”
Cam rolled his eyes. “Don’t start the whining again. If you could have blown your own nose a year ago, I never would have had to leave the beaches of Brazil to come back here in the dead of winter to wipe your snot.”
Harris glanced up at the clock and pointedly back at them. “Cameron, will you help Drea get settled in the blue guest room? I’m assuming you’ll be good with your old room? In the morning, we’ll get elbows deep in my files about Harbor City’s favorite crime boss.”
“Yes, sir,” Cam said.
Watching the obvious dude affection between the men lightened the load weighing down Drea’s shoulders.
Cam led her up the stairs. His hand on the small of her back made her picture all of the things he could do to her with those hands. Her nipples pebbled as the graphic images of them naked and sweaty filtered through her mind.
Sex had always been an escape for her, a release. Sure she’d had long-term boyfriends, but sometimes a girl just needed to get laid, and Drea had always gone after what she wanted. Be it a new life, a college degree, or building up her own freelance makeup business, she played the odds and always bet on herself.
Right now, what she wanted was Cam.
But she couldn’t have him, not unless she could guarantee she’d be the one to walk away first. Along with everything else, today had brought into perfect focus just how much she hated not being in control of what happened next in her life. No wonder she had so much trouble being around Cam. He wanted control as much as she did. But one of them had to give, and if she had her way, it would be him.
As they made their way up, she took in the pictures of high school graduates lining the stairwell. Judging by the hair and makeup, these photos looked more recent than those she’d seen downstairs.
“Does he run some type of scholarship program?”
He turned left at the landing, leading her down a narrow hallway that only emphasized his wide shoulders. “Sort of. He all but adopts kids who don’t have anyone else and helps them along.”
“So why’s your picture down there?” It wasn’t just idle curiosity. She wa
nted to fill in the blanks on Cam Hardy.
He stopped at the third door and opened it, revealing a bathroom, then moved on. “I was one of those kids.”
“I find that hard to believe.” Everything about Cam screamed alpha. None of it said at-risk teen.
He stopped at the next door, left his hand on the door knob, and pivoted to face her. “Funny, I figured you’d be the one person who would.”
His heavy-lidded gaze dropped to her lips, intense enough to be palpable. Her lungs became irrelevant because her ability to breath had been temporarily suspended. Pulse pounding in her ears, she parted her lips—not exactly meaning to, but not not meaning to either. Shit, lately when it came to him, she didn’t know if she was coming or going. Discombobulated, that’s what her mother would have said. The word fit perfectly.
Hanging onto the conversational thread like a lifeline, she pulled it together enough to make a retort. “Believe that you’re trouble? Oh hell yes, I believe that. What I don’t see is a kid who needed the judge’s help.”
His thumb dragged across her bottom lip and left a tingling want in its wake. “Looks can be deceiving—even when you look as good as I do.”
That made her laugh. God, he was a hot mess. “Your ego is out of control.”
“Probably.” He blinked several times, as if remembering where he was, and then pushed open the guest room door. “So here you are.”
“Yep.” She didn’t move. “Here I am.”
A hungry heat came off him in waves as he stared at her mouth. He was within a hairsbreadth of her—not touching, but close enough that the distance between them was a cruel joke.
Desire pooled in her stomach, and the urge to touch and be touched rippled across her skin. Need. Want. Crave. They all swirled inside her and made her forget all the reasons against having sex with him again. The more she fought it, the stronger the attraction grew.
She didn’t have a frame of reference to judge him by anymore. Each time she thought she finally understood him, he surprised her. He’d gone from ego-driven ladies man to stalwart protector. She’d been fighting all of her battles on her own for so long, the idea of having a loyal partner who wouldn’t leave seemed as likely as eating ice cream cones in hell.
Still, here he was, right by her side, no matter what came at them. She couldn’t stop asking herself: What was one more time? She slid her palms up his solid chest, his muscles rippling under the tender assault.
