Assignment: Bodyguard

“What a charming story.”

Shane nodded, took a sip of his drink. “My father, William, died a few years ago. So now, it’s hard for Lady Samantha to come to Texas. It reminds her too much of him.”

Kit put her elbow on the table then dropped her chin onto her upturned hand, making her look more like a fresh-faced debutante than an attractive, mature woman. “I can certainly understand that feeling. Sometimes, I’d like to get out of this state myself.”

Shane noted that. “I’m sorry for your loss. From what I’ve heard, your husband was a good man.”

She blinked, realized she wasn’t sitting up properly and just like that, her spine went ramrod straight, no longer touching the back of her chair, while the curtain on her emotions came down with a feminine sigh and an elegant lifting of her chin. “Thank you. Now let’s talk about why you’re here and what I need to do to make this as unobtrusive as possible.”

Shane put his hand on his heart. “Unobtrusive? You want me to be unobtrusive?” She didn’t need to know that he was an expert at sneaking in and out of most places completely undetected.

She actually laughed and the sound of it flowed over Shane’s highly aware nerve endings like delicate bells moving through a warm wind. “What? You’ve never tried being that way before?”

“Not in my arsenal, I’m afraid. I prefer to operate on the principle of hiding in plain sight. I like to be out there, very visible, but very aware. My plan is to be seen with you a lot, so that the society ladies who love to gossip over lunch at the club or while hitting tennis balls back and forth on the court, will take notice and spread the word. I want us to be seen as an item.”

“Your premise being?”

“My premise being that an attached woman is much safer than a single, alone woman.” He shrugged. “And besides, it will make my job that much easier.”

Her eyes went dark again. “I am single and alone and I’ve learned to live with that, regardless of making your life easier.”

Shane hated himself for making her think along those lines but it was necessary for her safety. “All the more reason to seem involved. My presence could throw off a potential enemy.”

“Or invite that enemy to fight to the finish.”

“I see you know more about your father’s work than you let on.”

“Yes, more than I want to know.” She pushed at her immaculate upswept white-blond hair. “I don’t like living this way. I don’t want to walk around in fear.”

“You won’t have to if I’m with you.”

“But how long will this ploy work? Are you prepared to stay by my side all the time, even when I leave the country?”

His pulse quickened at that. “Especially if you leave the country—make that—if you’re allowed to leave the country. I have my orders.”

“Of course you do. And I like my privacy and my dignity, and I won’t be told what I can and can’t do. So I don’t intend to be part of some facade or deception. It’s not right.”

“It is right if it means saving your life, Katherine.”

She stood up, dismissing him in a shimmer of silk and a whiff of lily-scented perfume. “That’s the CHAIM way, isn’t it? Always. Might makes right. All for the good fight, the good cause. Do you ever get tired of all the secrecy and the conspiracy?”

Shane almost answered yes to that question. Yes, he did get tired, of war, of the horrors of injustice, of all that he’d seen in his covert travels around the planet, but he’d joined this organization after his father had introduced him to Gerald Barton. They’d both seen something in Shane that he hadn’t even seen in himself. A restless need to avenge good people, to help save lives when innocence clashed with evil, when good men had to fight ruthless criminals that no amount of man’s law could stop. He’d been trained from birth to hunt, shoot, and fight like a gentleman—at his mother’s insistence, but with his father’s help, he’d learn how to think like a combination street gang fighter and gunslinger, with purposeful intent and take-no-prisoners determination. And even though he might sometimes have to get down and dirty to do his job, he worked to fight the good fight and he believed in saving lives, not taking them. So he looked up at Katherine Atkins and said nothing.

“Your silence speaks volumes,” she said, whirling to leave.

Shane was up and by her side in a flash. “There are some things a lady doesn’t need to hear.”

She glared up at him, her eyes a sea of unfathomable green. “And there are some things a gentleman should tell a lady. Such as what kind of danger she is in and why? But your loyalty lies with my father and CHAIM, right? So I can’t count on you to tell me the truth.”

He moved in front of her, blocking her way while those curious gazes all around the room stayed centered on them. They’d make the society columns tomorrow and that would work just fine with their cover. “You can count on me to protect you, to give my life for you if necessary. That is my job.”

“Don’t you think you’re being a bit overly dramatic?”

“Don’t you think you could possibly avoid making a scene and listen to reason?”

She looked around, realizing much too late that the room had grown quiet, that the orchestra was on a break. The music had stopped and all eyes were on the two of them.

“This is your fault,” she said just as a camera’s flash blinded her. “Great, now you’ve brought out the paparazzi, too. So much for hiding in plain sight.”

Shane trained his eyes on the person who’d taken that picture and that’s when he saw it. Just a flash in the crowd, a quick bit of action that seemed entirely out of place. There behind the roving photographer, a man dressed as a waiter stood silent and still near an exit on the other side of the orchestra stage, not far from where they were. Shane directed his gaze to the man holding the linen napkin across one arm and saw in that one second, as his gaze locked with the other man’s, that the man had a gun trained on Katherine.

In a move that he’d remember later as pure adrenaline, Shane pushed Katherine to the floor behind the table, threw himself down to shield her and screamed at the top of his lungs, “Everyone down. Now!”

A rush of panic hit the room and then bullets started flying all around them. Chaos took over as people either ducked or ran for the nearest exit. But there in the corner behind the protection of a flimsy table, Shane held Katherine’s trembling body close to his, his heartbeat racing to match hers, his prayers asking for protection as he tried to get a line on the shooter crouching near the big stage.

Speaking with shouted emphasis into his earpiece, he called for backup, his gaze never leaving the determined shooter. In spite of the shouts, screams and confusion all around them, the man crouched and moved with purposeful intent, weaving between chairs and tables to finish the job.

And Katherine was the target.

“Don’t move,” he whispered into Katherine’s ear. “We’re going to get you out of here, just hold on.”

Then he reached for the Glock semi-automatic pistol he was carrying in a shoulder holster underneath his tuxedo.

THREE

She couldn’t breathe.

Kit twisted, her hands clutching one of the lapels of Shane’s tuxedo. He’d shielded her, putting his body between her and the bullets, and now he was trying to peek around the table. He had a sleek, strange-looking gun in his hand. This was real, too real.

“Shane?”

He didn’t answer at first. His body tensed, his gaze fixed on someone across the room.

“I’m here,” he finally said, giving her a quick look. “Stay down. I’m right here. But Katherine, listen to me, all right?”

“I’m listening,” she said, wanting to laugh. He’d tried all night to make her listen but now that she was tossed in a corner like a sack of potatoes—her dress torn, her hair coming undone, and someone hiding in the now-silent room with a gun—she was willing to listen. More than willing. She listened just to hear Shane’s breath.

“Kit, could you let go of my jacket?”

Mortified that she was holding on to Shane for dear life, she dropped her white-knuckled hand. “I’m sorry.”

“No need to apologize. I want to get a better angle. And I want you to stay behind this table, understand?”

She lifted her head then took her first real breath since he’d pushed her down behind the table. And with that breath, she was back in action herself, her fear turning to a rage that screamed for release. “Shane, I can’t stay down here while others are in danger. There are a lot of people in this room besides me. Let me up.”

“No, no. I mean it, Kit. You can’t—”

“How many?” she asked in a tight whisper.