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“But you don’t do personal security?”
“I still meet with our clients, manage their needs, make sure we’re across the latest technologies and training. I travel a lot.”
“Because you like to?” She pondered, sipping her tea, relishing the familiar flavour.
“Sure.”
She laughed softly. “I’m not convinced.”
His grin was more of a grimace. “My business partner, Ashton, is married, with young kids. It’s harder for him to get away for long periods of time.”
“Whereas you avoid commitment like the plague,” she surmised thoughtfully.
His eyes narrowed, studying her. “Generally.”
Another soft laugh, but this one hid an uncertain dipping feeling in her tummy. “At least you’re honest.”
“Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Maybe because we slept together last night?” She prompted thoughtfully, watching his reaction carefully. “You don’t think being so brutally honest could hurt my feelings?”
She’d spoken in a jocular tone but she felt the underlying seriousness of her question, the sharpness in her lungs speaking of an anxiety she wanted, desperately, not to feel.
“Maybe,” he shrugged with carelessness, but somehow she knew it was assumed. “But you told me this morning that you’re only ever into casual affairs anyway, so I’d say our expectations are pretty well-matched.”
She nodded, angling her face to look at the shore, imitating an idle interest in the coastline. “It’s beautiful out here,” she murmured.
The waves lapped gently against the edge of the boat, rocking them ever so softly.
“The thing is, I’m not really a relationship guy. I never grew up with the picture of a happy marriage to aspire too. I saw my dad make my mom miserable, make us miserable, saw the w
ay he messed up with woman after woman, the way he hurt them.” She turned towards him in time to see the grim line his lips formed as he paused for thought. “Then I signed up, went to war-zone after war-zone, lost friends, people I loved, my sister.” His voice took on a graveled tone. “I decided, somewhere along the way, that I like being on my own. It’s not like I ever felt differently, but I know for sure now. It’s just the way I’m programmed.”
She nodded, wondering at the thickness in her throat that made speaking difficult.
“But I like companionship, from time to time,” he said with a shrug of his broad shoulders.
“Sex,” she substituted archly.
He laughed, the sound sending waves of awareness through her body.
“Sure, sex.”
“So you give women this spiel before you sleep with them, to make sure they know not to get any stupid forever fantasies about you?”
He lifted a dark brow, a quirk of his lips sending her pulse into a frantic rhythm. “Does anything about me strike you as a ‘forever’ guy?”
Her heart stammered. She smiled because she felt like it was expected of her but every cell in her body was reverberating. “I think you could be if you wanted to be.”
His own smile dropped. “I don’t. I like to pick up and leave at a moment’s notice. I carry a backpack and a pair of shoes and I’m done. No wife, no kids, no commitments I can’t turn my back on in a flash. The idea of anything else makes me feel suffocated.”
“What about your business.”
“It travels with me.”
“So that’s your significant other?”
“Sure. In a sense. Couldn’t the same be said about you?”
