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“Hey,” he started, his voice so gentle it forced one of those tears I was fighting back loose. “I’m sorry. If I said something wrong, I didn’t mean—”
A watery laugh slipped from my throat. “No. No, you didn’t do anything wrong.” I sniffled and batted at my cheek. “It’s just... it was a really nice thing to hear. I’m not sure there’s a harder job in the world than being a parent. Half the time I feel like I’m screwing up, and the other half I don’t even know what I’m doing. I’m constantly worrying that I’m going to ruin her life somehow. What you said was really sweet, that’s all. I just got a little emotional. Sorry about that.”
“Nothing to be sorry for,” he husked, his voice low and rich like melted chocolate. He curved his hand along the side of my neck, holding it there as his thumb traced across my jaw, back and forth, back and forth, sending delicious shivers across my spine. “I can’t begin to understand how hard it is to be a parent, but I have enough friends with kids to know that what you’re feeling is totally normal.” Each word was said in the softest, most sincere voice, and I could have sworn our faces inched closer together.
“And I don’t need to have a kid of my own to see that you’re doing a phenomenal job. That little girl in there is special.” His chest expanded on a deep inhale, his eyes growing darker. “You’respecial,” he ended on a whisper.
Just like that, something inside of me snapped, a thread that had been pulled so tight it had begun to fray. Closing the rest of the distance, I pressed my lips to his.
* * *
Trent
The kiss shouldn’t have takenme by surprise. I’d felt it before it happened, we’d been leading up to something explosive in those last few seconds. But it still hit me like a punch to the gut.
Her lips were softer than I imagined, and in the past several days, since that goddamn run-in at the coffee shop, I’d imagineda lot. Those full, pillowy lips were a temptation I couldn’t deny. Hell, the whole fucking night had been a test in self-control. One I’d clearly just lost, because I couldn’t stop myself from parting her lips with my tongue and dipping inside. I had to have a taste. Just one. Even though I knew it was wrong.
I was no longer teetering on that dangerous edge. I’d just stepped right the hell over, crossing a line that should never be crossed. By kissing her I wasn’t just betraying Dalton and Charlotte, I was betrayingher.
On that thought, and on Sawyer’s soft, melodic moan, my brain finally caught up with reality. Placing my hands on her shoulders, I gently pushed her back, breaking the kiss that shouldn’t have been one of the best I’d ever had, but absolutely was all the same.
“Trent?” she asked, her voice breathless confusion. “Is everything okay?”
I squeezed my eyes closed because it wasn’t. Not by a fucking long shot.
I opened my mouth to say four words I knew to my bones were the cold, hard truth, but still felt wrong all the same. “That shouldn’t have happened. I’m sorry, Sawyer.”
Her back shot straight, humiliation carved into her gorgeous face, seeping out of her pores and staining those gorgeous eyes the color of autumn leaves.
“Oh God,” she breathed, slapping her hands over her mouth. “Oh my God. I’m so sorry. I thought—you were just—did I read this whole night wrong?”
She hadn’t. Not at all. The truth that was being denied all this time was that I’d fucked up long before the kiss. I’d compromised the job by developing feelings for the subject. I’d known if I came tonight something was bound to happen, simply because I wouldn’t be able to help myself, and as the time ticked by, that realization only grew more obvious. The more time I spent in Sawyer’s company, the more I wanted her. And now I’d formed an attachment to that little girl that felt like a physical thing pulling at my skin and burrowing down deep inside of me.
“It’s my fault,” I grunted, forcing myself to take a step back even as my body fought against it. “I should go. I’m sorry.”
I spun on my heel and headed for the closest exit, the sliding glass door that would lead me out to the beach. As much as it killed me, I didn’t let myself look back as my feet ate up the sand between her cozy little cottage and the one I’d rented.
I’d broken the number one rule in my line of work: never get personally invested.
If I were a smart man, I’d call Lincoln and have him pull me off this job, replace me with one of the other guys. But I clearly wasn’t smart, because there wasn’t a chance in hell of me doing that.
Sawyer and Renee’s protection was my only focus, the only thing I could think about, and as good as the men I worked with were—and they were the goddamn best in the business—I couldn’t trust anyone but me.
Sawyer might have been living like there wasn’t a threat, but I knew better. I knew for a fact evil lurked in the shadows, searching the entire fucking country for her. And I’d be damned if I’d let it get them.
I’d die first.
So while I knew I’d fucked up, I wasn’t pulling out. I just had to make sure to keep that line drawn clearly in the sand.
And hope like hell I didn’t slip again.
Chapter Eleven
Sawyer
I’d never been happierto have a day off in my life than I was today. It meant that, after dropping Renee off at daycare, I could go back home, keep the curtains drawn, and burrow even deeper into the dark pit I’d been stuck in since the night before.
I wasn’t sure I’d ever felt such an overwhelming sense of humiliation before. I’d never read a situation so wrong. I’d been so sure he was going to kiss me, or at least that he’d wanted to. And if I looked back on the night before—something I was doing with alarming frequency—Istillfelt like that was what we’d been leading up to.
