Forged In Desire. Brenda Jackson

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СКАЧАТЬ she’d opened the door, her striking features had taken him aback, but now it was her outfit...actually, her body in the clothes...that was grabbing his attention.

      She was tall, but he figured at least five inches of that height were the result of those killer heels on the boots she was wearing. And she was curvy, which was why those jeans looked so damn good on her. There was no way she didn’t turn every man’s head when she walked by. It would be hard not to.

      “Drop the ‘mister,’” he said. “It’s just Striker.”

      Margo frowned at the man, wondering why he was so touchy with his name. And why her large kitchen suddenly felt smaller with him standing in it. She was attracted to him but felt that, except for trying to keep her common sense intact, there was nothing she could do about it. When a woman was being protected with a man who had the build of “The Rock,” Dwayne Johnson himself, there wasn’t much hope for her.

      He had removed his jacket and tie, and she saw that a dark brown leather shoulder holster held his gun. The holster had a side compartment she guessed contained extra bullets.

      Of course, she should not have been surprised that he was loaded down with such weaponry. He had been hired to protect her, after all. But still, seeing it was a stark reminder of her predicament. Her uncle had talked to her and she had promised to cooperate with her protector. With Striker. “Okay, Striker. Did my kitchen pass muster?”

      “Not really. That’s a nice view out that window, but you’re going to have to keep the blinds drawn most of the time. I also noticed several troubling areas in your yard.”

      “What?”

      Glancing at his phone, Striker told her what he’d noted.

      “I never had a reason to worry about any of that before.”

      “Now you do. I’ll take care of it.” Striker moved around Margo to go back into her living room and she was right on his heels.

      “So how long have you been a protector?”

      Not long enough, he thought to himself. He didn’t want to think how different his life would be today if years ago he’d been there to protect the one person he should have been safeguarding. He wouldn’t be carrying around all this guilt if he had. “Several years,” he said, tossing the answer over his shoulder. He kept walking to check the front door to inspect the locks. She had an alarm system and that was good. He glanced around the room. Again there were too many windows. And she had stairs. There were also several rooms connected to her living room. He would check them out later after doing a walk-through upstairs.

      “How many is several?”

      He stopped walking long enough to look over at her and wish he hadn’t. She was leaning in the doorway that separated her living room from the kitchen. In that lazy, carefree pose, she looked good. Too good. There was something about her standing there with her hair tossed around her shoulders that made parts of his body ache.

      “About eight years.”

      “And what did you do before that?”

      He could tell her that his past was none of her business. But he had no problem sharing what he did because that time—thanks to Sheppard Granger—had pretty much shaped him into the man he was now. He was alive when he could have been dead. And he was making something out of his life.

      He looked her straight in the eye and said, “I was in jail serving time for manslaughter.”

CHAPTER THREE

      MARGO’S BREATH CAUGHT as she stared at Striker. Had he just admitted to being an ex-con? Was he joking? From the intense expression on his face, she had a feeling he was dead serious. Did Uncle Frazier have any idea that the man he’d hired had a criminal record? For manslaughter?

      “How many rooms are there upstairs?” he asked, picking up his duffel bag and moving in the direction of her stairs.

      She jerked her head around. “Wait!”

      Striker stopped and stared at her. Had hearing that he’d served time freaked her out? It wouldn’t be the first time that someone he had been hired to protect reacted that way to his past. Some saw it as an advantage, thinking that if he had a killer instinct, he had the ability to keep them safe. Then there were others who found it so repulsive they would ask Roland for someone else. Considering Quasar and Stonewall were ex-cons as well, that eliminated Roland’s top three protectors. Hell, that would even eliminate Roland.

      Striker, Quasar and Stonewall had met when they’d served time together. From the first, he and Stonewall had been destined to be enemies. Quasar, the youngest of the three by only a year, had pretty much stayed to himself. It had been rumored Quasar had come from a well-to-do family and had confessed to some white-collar crime to keep a family member from going to jail. The three of them had been released from prison within months of each other and had hooked up with Roland, who had started a security business. Since neither Striker, Stonewall nor Quasar had known a damn thing about security, Roland enrolled the three of them into one of the top tactical training schools in the country. In addition, Roland managed to hook them up for a full year with former Secret Service agent Grayson Prescoli, who had a reputation as being one of the best in the business after serving under three presidents. Although they’d initially lacked in-depth knowledge in security, what the three of them possessed was an ingrained ability to survive and a drive to safeguard and defend anyone left in their care.

      “You want something?” he asked in a tone that came out a little harsher than he’d intended. He was tired of her just standing there and not saying anything.

      “I want to know what happened.”

      Striker continued to stare at her. If she was asking for details, he wouldn’t be giving them to her. Instead he wrapped it up in a sentence that, as far as he was concerned, said it all. “Life happened.” At eighteen he’d been found guilty and sent off to prison. He’d lost people he’d cared about as well as a scholarship to play football at the college of his dreams. And he knew he only had himself to blame.

      Evidently his answer stumped her, if her expression and lack of response were anything to go by. He continued up the stairs and left her standing there.

      Margo watched Striker move up the stairs, momentarily distracted by how well his body fit a pair of pants. He didn’t just have a nice-looking tush; it was sexy and got sexier with his every step. When he was no longer in sight, she shook her head, trying to pull herself together.

      His response to her question meant he had no intentions of telling her why he’d been sent to jail. Knowing it was for manslaughter was bad enough. Who did he kill? Why? She wanted to think it had been self-defense, but if that had been the case, then he wouldn’t have been sent to jail, right? How long had he been confined?

      The key thing was that he was no longer in jail. He had served his time and she had a feeling rejoining society and rebuilding your life after prison couldn’t be easy. But it seemed like he was doing okay, and she wanted to believe he was good at what he did.

      He looked to be in his early thirties, which meant he couldn’t have spent too many years behind bars. But then, how many were too many? How old was he when he’d gone in? When she heard him moving around upstairs, she decided to join him there as well.

      * * *

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