6

THE SHIFT FROM IRRITATED to self-satisfied transformed Jay’s face so swiftly that it instilled an inexplicable panic right into Charlie’s rapidly beating heart.

She didn’t trust that look. It…unnerved her.

“It’s peanut butter,” she blurted out, much to her instant consternation.

He blinked, thankfully, and drew back. “What?”

“On the wall,” she said. She bent low and pointed. “It’s only a smear, but that’s what it is.”

He joined her, his shoulder bumping hers as he lowered his considerable frame. She could smell him, too, something warm and musky with woodsy undertones. It did something to her insides, the combination of all that masculinity and scent made her middle feel gooey and her hands shake.

So, so unfortunate.

Him, of all people, inspiring this sort of unprecedented—she struggled to find a good enough word for this feeling and ultimately had to call it what it was—lust. Pure and simple animal attraction. He must have some truly potent pheromones, Charlie decided, barely managing to get her scrabbling thoughts back into order.

“You’re right,” he murmured, looking exceedingly grim that he’d missed it. He glanced along the rest of the wall and inspected the ground directly beneath the smudge. “No bird feeders nearby, so that eliminates that possibility.”

“She was baited,” Charlie said, pushing up once more. She looked from him to the wall then back again. “Give me a boost.”

His distracted gaze swiveled to hers. “What?”

“I want to get a look at the top of the wall.”

He continued to stare at her as though she’d spoken in a foreign language. Charlie exhaled heavily. “Fine. I’ll ask for a ladder.” She turned and started to walk away.

“No,” he said, seemingly coming to his senses. “I was just under the impression that we weren’t going to work together.”

“We’re not,” she said, stepping into his laced fingers. She braced a hand on one brawny shoulder and resisted the urge to bite her fist. “But you’re tall and time is of the essence. In this instance, it only makes sense.”

That logic, she knew, didn’t hold water. If it held true here, then it was going to have to hold true at other times.

But she had something else in mind, so ultimately it didn’t matter.

With a quick jump against his hand, she popped up onto the wall.

“Hey! What are you doing? Get down from there!”

Charlie held on tightly, then swung her legs over to the other side. “Okay,” she said, shooting him a triumphant smile before dropping down to the ground.

“What the fu— Charlie!”

“Thanks, Jay,” she called. “You saved me a long walk.”

A fuming pause, then, “Well, what do you see?”

“Grass, mostly,” she said, walking carefully along the fence line. She glanced from where she stood to the front of the property. There was no fence along the front lawn, so anybody wanting to grab the dog out here would have easy access. Along the sides, there was lots of tree and shrub cover, but there was nothing close enough for anyone to use to easily scale the wall. If someone had baited Truffles with the peanut butter—and she fully believed they had—then how the hell had they gotten her over the wall?

Curious as to what was behind the back fence as well, Charlie decided to head that way first. Strictly speaking, she was trespassing, but under the circumstances she imagined she could talk her way out of it in the event anyone approached her. She slipped behind various bushes and tree limbs, careful to look for disturbed ground or a missed clue. Other than a few scraps of trash she was certain had been neglected by the grounds crew, she came up empty-handed.

Damn.

“That was sneaky,” Jay drawled as he rounded the corner, an impressed smirk tilting his lips. It was insane the things that little grin did to her insides.

“I like efficient better,” she said, trying to suppress a smile.

He snorted. “You would.” His thorough gaze slid from one end of her to the other, lingering along the curve of her hip and the swell of her breasts. “Not injured, I presume?”

Whoa. “From that little jump?” she scoffed. “Hardly.”

“It’s an eight-foot fence.”

“And I’m five feet tall. Do the math, Ranger Boy.”

A single brow lifted. “Ranger Boy?”

“You’re a former Ranger, right?”

“That doesn’t sound like a guess,” he said, studying her more intently. Those keen eyes were capable of being much more direct than she would have liked and, for the first time since she’d met him, she saw evidence of a genuine opponent. He was affable, certainly, and charming, if she were honest…but he was a modern-day warrior, as well.

She’d do well to remember that.

“You work for Ranger Security,” she said, moving around him once more. She wanted to check out the property on the other side of the Betterworth estate as well, just to make sure that she wasn’t missing anything. “It only stands to reason.”

Predictably, he fell into step behind her. “Maybe so, but my bullshit radar tells me that’s not how you knew.”

Perceptive. More so than she’d imagined. Another error in judgment she couldn’t afford. “What does it matter how I knew?”

His voice developed a distinct edge. “Something tells me that’s a key piece of information I need to have.”

She pushed aside a branch and ducked behind another shrub, ignoring the strong impulse to flee. She’d be damned before she’d run from him. “You hear voices?” She tsked under her breath. “That’s a bad sign. Perhaps you should talk to someone about it.”

“You’ve proven that you’re a smart ass,” he said, clearly exasperated. “Now answer the question.”

She picked up her pace, but his longer legs easily made up the distance. “You didn’t ask a question. You stated your suspicions. Technically, I don’t owe you an answer.”

He laughed darkly. “Another purposely evasive answer, which means I’m right, otherwise you wouldn’t be making the effort.”

“Or I simply want to annoy you.” She tossed a wave at Burt as she continued on to the other side of the fence. “Have you thought of that?”

“You have no reason to want to annoy me,” he said. “I don’t know you and, ostensibly, you don’t know me, therefore there’s no past history to interfere with what should be a simple working relationship. That you clearly want to annoy me means that this is personal. And since I don’t know you—have never heard of you until today—it only stands to reason that you do know me. Or at least of me.”

She couldn’t argue with that well-reasoned rationale, so didn’t bother trying. With a huff of resignation, she drew up short and turned around to face him.

Only he wasn’t right behind her as he’d been only seconds ago. He’d stopped several feet back and was inspecting something in his hand. Oh, hell. Now she’d missed something.

She backtracked only to watch him slide the mystery item into his front pocket. He smiled down at her, the wretch.

“What did you have there?” she asked. She’d told him about the peanut butter, dammit. Tit for tat, right?

“How do you know me?”

She blinked innocently at him. “I don’t know you.”

He chewed the inside of his cheek and appeared to be summoning patience from a higher source. Irrationally, she got a perverse sense of pleasure from this.

“How do you know of me?”

He was going to find out soon enough, anyway, Charlie told herself. The instant he called in to Ranger Security to update his bosses on the status of the case he was certain to mention her involvement and the cat would be out of the bag, as it were.

At least this way she could enjoy his reaction. And she wouldn’t have to tell him everything.

“I hacked into their computer system several weeks ago and saw your file,” she said, lifting her chin. “Quite impressive. All-star pitcher at Pennyroyal High, ROTC scholarship to the University of South Carolina, completed Jump School at the top of your class, HALO training.” She reeled off the majority of what she’d read and watched his expression slowly atrophy.

She wasn’t sure if he was more angry or appalled, but his displeasure practically thundered off him like lightning off pavement. He’d gone white around the mouth and, though she knew she must have imagined it, she thought she caught a fleeting glimpse of fear lighting his blistering, mad-as-hell gaze. But that couldn’t have been right. What did he have to be afraid of? What secret was he afraid she’d uncovered?

She’d gone too far, she knew, but was too proud to admit any contrition. In her experience, when she gave a guy an inch, he’d take a mile. And she instinctively knew that any ground she lost with Jay Weatherford was going to be doubly hard to regain. Still, something about his expression—that single look of vulnerability—haunted her, gave her pause.

He glared at her for what felt like an eternity, then turned abruptly on his heel and left without saying another word.

 

 

“DID YOU KNOW?” JAY asked Payne without preamble when his new boss answered the phone.

A significant, telling pause ensued.

Jay swore and sat heavily on his bed.

“You’ve met her already?” Payne asked.

Admittedly, he was new to the job and unfamiliar with the rules, but this was bullshit. Payne was his boss, not his commanding officer, and if the former Ranger expected blind obedience, then clearly he’d hired the wrong man.

She’d read his file.

He didn’t have a fucking clue what was in the damned file, but given the level of expertise Ranger Security was known for, he couldn’t imagine that it was anything less than thorough.

He mentally recoiled at the thought, his anger detonating once more. Since he was likely going to get fired anyhow he saw no reason to hold his tongue. Not that he would have been able to do so, anyway, but…

He flicked a match against his finger, watched the tip ignite. “Look, Payne, I realize that I am low man on the totem pole here and that puts me at the bottom of the pecking order, but sending me over here blind when she was armed with everything in my friggin’ file was not cool. I don’t mind having to work around her—that’s part of the nature of this particular assignment. What I do mind is her knowing everything from where I went to high school to my blood pressure reading on my last health exam and no one warning me about her.” He blew out the flame before it could burn his fingers. “It’s bullshit and bad form and I damned sure don’t appreciate it.”

He should probably quit before they fired him, Jay thought. That would be better than getting sacked, but leaving the military had felt too much like quitting, and the idea of this not panning out as well was damned difficult to stomach.

“You are absolutely right,” Payne said, to his immense surprise. “I take full responsibility. It was my mistake. Guy actually suggested giving you a warning, but I failed to consider that she’d looked at your file when she hacked into our system and I didn’t think that it was strictly necessary. Mea culpa, Jay. I’m terribly sorry.”

While he was still exceedingly annoyed, it was hard to cling to his anger when faced with such a sincere apology. Particularly one issued from the Specialist. “I’m assuming the security breach has been rectified?” he asked.

“It was once she brought it to our attention.”

He processed that, his mind sharpening into better focus. “You didn’t know she’d been in until she told you?”

“No,” Payne admitted. “She was careful.”

Careful, hell. She was damned good. Hacking was one thing—hacking without leaving a discernable trail or evidence was another. That took a very advanced degree of skill. And nerve. “I’m going to want to see that file, Payne. I need to know what she knows.”

“Understandable. I’ll forward it right away.”

Jay passed a weary hand over his face. “Thanks. I’d appreciate it.”

“Listen,” Payne said. “I know that she was disappointed that we hired you instead of her, but ultimately we all agreed that you were the better candidate for the job. She’s impressive, I’ll admit that, but—”

Jay stilled like a hound going on point. “What do you mean ‘hired me instead of her’? You mean she applied for the position that I’ve got?”

“Yes,” Payne said, sounding a bit baffled. “I thought that’s what—”

“Oh,” Jay said, his voice dissolving into a dark laugh. “Oh, oh, ohhh. That’s why it’s personal with her,” he marveled aloud. “That’s why she’s been smirking at me since the moment I arrived.”

Payne chuckled. “I take it when she was divulging the information she’d gleaned from your file she failed to mention that she’d actually applied for a job here?”

“Correct,” he said, smiling, giving his head a shake. “She neglected to share that little tidbit.”

“Well, I’m glad that I was able to enlighten you of that much, anyway.”

“You wouldn’t happen to have a copy of her résumé, would you?”

“I do, along with the background check that we ran on her after she came in.”

Jay considered that. While his initial impulse was to ask for the additional file as well, ultimately…he did not. He didn’t know why he was willing to offer her the privacy she hadn’t afforded him, because, had she been a man, he had every certainty that he wouldn’t have.

But she wasn’t a man.

As he well knew.

And thank God, given his ridiculously insane preoccupation with her. It was unnerving. Every sensation, feeling, inclination was heightened when it came to Charlie. He wasn’t just intrigued with her—he was fascinated. He wasn’t just attracted to her—he was drawn, compelled even. She didn’t just annoy him—she infuriated him.

No doubt that was why he’d wigged out over her looking at his file, at her potentially reviewing the events leading up to his departure from the military. Though he imagined that the gentlemen at Ranger Security were aware of the accident—and that he’d walked away unscathed—he, for reasons that escaped him, didn’t want her to know about it.

It was too personal and his own feelings about what should have been a blessing were too convoluted in his own mind to consider discussing them with anyone else. One question would lead to another and eventually he’d wind up in territory he didn’t want to explore.

“Just send me the résumé,” Jay finally told Payne.

“You’re sure?”

“I don’t need her life story. I just need to know what she’s capable of.”

“Sometimes the two aren’t mutually exclusive.”

That was a good point, but it didn’t change his mind. He merely chuckled. “She’s definitely going to be a thorn in my side.”

“And a perpetual pain in your ass until this is over,” Payne said. Jay frowned. Was that a hint of admiration he heard in his boss’s voice?

“What did you think of her?” Jay asked him, interested in his new boss’s opinion of his newly acquired nemesis.

“I liked her,” Payne said without preamble. “She’s ballsy. She knew before she came in the door that we were going to turn her down, but she tried anyway. That takes guts.”

So did hacking into their system, but he didn’t think it prudent to remind Payne of that.

“You’ll see her résumé. She’s a former detective—a good one, based on reviews and recommendations—and, though she’s small, she’s a fighter. She teaches self-defense classes at several local colleges and battered women’s shelters.”

“Self-defense?”

“She’s got a black belt in Tae Kwon Do,” Payne explained. “Juan Carlos took one of her classes. He owed her a favor and brought her in for the interview.”

Jay felt a line emerge between his brows. “Without your consent?”

An infinitesimal pause, but Jay caught it. “He was reprimanded.”

Left in the dark again, Jay thought, renewed irritation spiking his blood pressure.

“I realize that I’m being purposely vague,” Payne said, “but it’s not my story to tell.”

Ah. Well, at least that explained Juan Carlos’s distinctly chilly welcome this morning. Had it only been this morning? Jay thought, disturbed. It already felt like a lifetime ago. For reasons that escaped him, he imagined that was Charlie Martin’s fault. He knew a moment of bizarre premonition, knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that meeting her had marked a new era in his life, a before and after more significant even than his recent career change.

The thought jarred him, forcing him to dismiss it as melodramatic bullshit. Sheesh. He was losing his damned mind. He’d never been prone to any sort of bullshit, least of all the melodramatic variety.

It was her, Jay concluded. She was doing this to him.

“Why didn’t you hire her?” he asked.

“Because you were better qualified.”

And she wasn’t a Ranger, Jay silently added. As far as he knew, the triumvirate—damn Juan Carlos for sticking that moniker in his head—hadn’t hired anyone for field work other than former Rangers. In many ways he understood that. As Rangers themselves, McCann, Flanagan and Payne were aware of the training, the attention to detail, the skills and the mental agility required to get to that elite level of warrior status. Former Rangers were a known quantity with brotherhood-like bonds, ties that were formed on the battlefield, cemented with same experiences and, more often than not, baptized in some sort of blood.

Granted, Charlie Martin wasn’t a former Ranger, but from what he could see, she would have brought an entirely different set of expertise to the Ranger Security staff. His lips quirked. No doubt her hacking skills would have come in handy. If she’d been made detective, then she’d worked her way up in the police force relatively quickly, seen the darker side of humanity. And, while she was small, those Tae Kwon Do skills meant that she knew how to protect herself. That took discipline. He found himself reluctantly impressed.

As far as he could see, the only thing that had made him better qualified for the job was his military service, and, admittedly, that was by a narrow margin given her other skills. He knew his way around a computer well enough, but slinging code was a whole different skill set. It took a thoroughly organized—and in her case, slightly diabolical—mind.

And given the fact that they’d hired him instead of her, she was highly motivated to defeat him. A thrill of anticipation pushed adrenaline into his system, engaging his battle senses.

All right then, Kitty-Cat, Jay thought. Game on.