Sheltered

“Isn’t there everywhere?” Frank Jr. asked as he glanced over his shoulder at them.

“Then it’s good I’m living here now. With Lindsey.” Holt’s voice rang out.

He didn’t yell, but he might as well have. It felt as if even the breeze stopped blowing. He sure had her attention.

The deputy turned the full way around and faced them. Kept his focus on Holt as an atta-boy grin crept across his lips. “Is that right?”

She had the opposite reaction. Shock rolled over her. Pretending to be her boyfriend was one thing, and she hadn’t even agreed to that yet. Being her live-in sounded much bigger. To the people in town and everyone at the camp, it would be bigger. But she guessed that was the point.

She hadn’t worked it all out in her head when Holt’s fingers tightened against her back. Ready or not, it seemed he wanted her support. She coughed it up. “Uh, yeah.”

The deputy just stared. Stood on the bottom step and looked them both up and down, never bothering to close his mouth or hide his delight at being the first to dig up this small-town gossip. “Then you have even less reason for worry.”

“That’s how I look at it.” Holt nodded in what came off as a dismissal.

The deputy must have gotten the hint, because he walked the rest of the way down the steps and to his car. Didn’t say anything about the attack in the house or give her any warning or advice. It was as if Holt had spoken and that resolved everything.

While she liked not having to answer questions, the way the whole scene rolled out had her feeling twitchy. Someone broke into her house and went after her, and only Holt mattered to the deputy.

She knew who—New Foundations—and why, but she doubted the deputy did. She’d done everything to keep her past and true identity hidden. Revealing it now out of frustration was not the right answer, so she let the whole thing drop.

Well, not all of it. There was still the small bit of gloating she planned to do. “That was a waste of time. I’ll refrain from saying ‘told you so’ a few hundred times.”

Holt took one step down. The move put them close to eye-to-eye. “Again, the point of that exercise was to send a message. We accomplished that.”

“You want people to think we’re not looking at New Foundations as the culprit.” She got it. The more she thought about the long term, the more she appreciated Holt stepping in with a rational head.

She wasn’t the type to run on emotions, but facing down men with a gun threw off her emotional balance. She still fought to regain a sense of normalcy...or what passed for normalcy for her.

“That and to establish me as the guy they have to get through before they can touch you,” Holt said.

That part didn’t quite fit together in her head. “Speaking of which—”

Holt leaned against the beam holding up this side of the porch. “When they think I live here it becomes less likely they come back.”

“You think they’ll just leave me alone?”

“No.”

Not exactly the answer she’d expected. The guy could use a lesson or two in tact. “That’s not very comforting.”

“I was going for honest.”

And she had to appreciate that. She’d spent a lot of her life trying to ferret out emotions and counteract the games people played. Holt appeared to be a straight shooter. She knew on one level she should love that, but when it came to being dragged out of her own house, she needed a little reassurance.

She also needed to set some ground rules.

“Then, honestly, you should know you’re not living here.” The last thing she needed was a walking, talking fantasy sleeping on her couch. Dreaming about him already messed with her sleep. Having him nearby, hearing him, smelling him, being able to look at him all the time, might just break her control.

Instead of commenting on her point, Holt crossed his arms over that impressive chest. “You danced around it before. Now tell me exactly why they want you. While you’re at it, you can finally tell me what you meant an hour ago with that talk about your identity. Maybe start with how many you have.”

Yeah, she could play this game, too. He stood on her turf. That should count for something. As far as she was concerned, he should go first. “Only if you tell me exactly what you’re really doing here and why. You can also throw in who sent you. Maybe give me a list of what you’ve found out so far.”

Standing there in the quiet he didn’t say touché, but she sensed it.

“Impressive.” He smiled. “I think we’re at an impasse.”

The twinkle in his dark eyes and that dimple in his cheek...oh, so tempting. She had to marshal all her resources to push back and fight off the energy zipping around inside her. “That still doesn’t get you a bed for the night.”

“I’ll take the couch.”

This guy had a ready response for everything. “Hank...Holt...” She actually didn’t know which was right, let alone who he really was and if he could be trusted. Her instincts told her yes, but even letting him plant the seed about being in a relationship with her amounted to a big risk. “Okay, I give up. What do I call you?”

“In public, Hank. If it makes it easier and helps you remember not to slip up, always call me that.”

She preferred Holt. The name fit him. It felt big and secure and special. Not that she could let him know any of that. “I don’t know you.”

He winked at her. “Right back at ya.”

Maybe it was the voice, all rough and husky. Maybe it was the fact he could have hurt her a dozen times, dragged her right up to the compound or let the two goons who broke into her house do it. For whatever reason, a sense of calm washed over her when he came around.

She wished she knew why. “Why should I trust you?”

“You don’t have a choice.”

Wrong. That was the one thing—possibly the only helpful thing—she’d learned from her father. “People always have a choice.”

Holt shrugged. “Fine. Leave town until it’s safe.”

He gave her the out and she should have grabbed it. The words sat right there on her tongue. She could leave, take a few days away and get her bearings. But the idea of leaving him, of running, made her stomach fall. “When will that be?”

“I don’t know.”

The guy did do honesty well. It didn’t always serve his case, yet he stuck with it. She liked that about him. That and those shoulders...and the face...and the hair that looked so soft. “I have work to do.”

“Which is what exactly?”

She couldn’t exactly say: rescuing people from the camp. That would open a whole new line of questioning, and she was not ready to go there with him. Or with anyone. “We’re spinning in circles.”

His arms dropped to his sides and he moved in closer. “Look, I get that you’re afraid and wary and don’t know me. Up until a few hours ago I only knew you as the woman in town who looked so hot in dark jeans.”

Wait... “What?”

He just kept talking. “Now I know you’re messed up in New Foundations, which is a crappy thing to be. Some of the people up there are dangerous, possibly delusional.”

They were all those things and more. She knew because she’d lived there, fought them. Escaped and hadn’t stopped emotionally running since. “I need to stop them.”

“You need to stay away and let me take care of them.” His eyebrow lifted. “You just have to trust me.”