One Night with her Bodyguard

One
Night with her Bodyguard

Noelle
Adams

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters,
places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used
fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or
dead, is coincidental.

Copyright © 2013 by Noelle Adams. All rights
reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form
or by any means.

Contents

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Claire Kenyon
was getting a second cup of coffee when Michael barged into her apartment
without knocking.

She’d
finished her first cup in the process of dressing, so she wore nothing but a
black bra and little red cotton panties.

She
choked in surprise at the sight of Michael Lyle where he wasn’t supposed to be.

He
was big—more than six inches taller than her with a broad-shouldered, athletic
build—and he seemed to take up all the room in her small kitchen. He wore his
normal outfit of dark trousers and a dress shirt.

“Hey!
What the hell are you—”

Before
she could finish the outraged exclamation, Michael had pushed her backward into
the pantry.

His
icy blue eyes were dead serious. “Don’t move. Stay here.”

Then
he shut the pantry door in her face.

Michael
had been the head of her father’s personal security team for almost six years.
She hadn’t lived with her father since she was twenty-one, but she was over at
his place a lot, so she’d known Michael for a long time. She’d seen him more
often than usual for the last two months, ever since her father had received a
threat aimed at her and had ordered his team to watch her around the clock.

Being
an extreme introvert, Claire was often tongue-tied around people she didn’t
know, but she hadn’t been shy around Michael for years. In fact, she’d been
known to bark like an obedient dog when he told her to “stay” in that curt way.

She
didn’t this morning. His expression—invariably stoic—was tenser than normal, and
he had a gun in his hand.

Something
was wrong.

Her
pantry was a walk-in, but there wasn’t a lot of extra room. It was also pitch
black, since the light switch was on the outside.

She
didn’t particularly like to be trapped in small, dark places, but fortunately
claustrophobia wasn’t one of her neuroses. She could handle the lack of light
and space. What she couldn’t handle was knowing there was danger somewhere out
there but having no idea what it was.

She
was trembling ten minutes later when Michael finally opened the door.

She
blinked several times as her eyes adjusted to the light. When she could see
clearly, her gaze landed on Michael’s clean-shaven, square-jawed face and his ever-unrevealing
expression.

His
eyes scanned her closely as she squinted up at him.

She
assumed he was just checking her condition, but she was uncomfortably aware
that she was still just wearing her underwear.

He
turned around without speaking and left the kitchen. In someone else, the
abrupt departure might indicate rudeness, but Michael was just being himself.

He
never spoke unless he had something to say.  It was a quality she appreciated
in him.

When
he returned, she snatched for the fuzzy snowflake robe he’d brought her from
the bathroom.

“Remember,
I’m just part of the furniture,” he murmured, avoiding looking at her until
she’d tied the robe closed.

That
was his refrain—whenever she complained to him that a member of the security
team was hovering or that she needed more space. They were part of the
furniture, he always told her, and she should treat them as such.

She
wanted to snarl every time she heard it.

“I
don’t care if you saw me in my underwear,” she said. “Just tell me what’s going
on.”  Her voice was a little wobbly since she hadn’t yet caught her breath.

“Everything
is fine. No emergency.” He poured coffee into the mug she’d left on the counter
earlier, added the cream, and handed it to her.

She
held it with both hands as she took a sip, the liquid warm and comforting as
she swallowed. Then, “Well, what did you
think
was the matter that
caused you to stick me in the pantry?”

He
put a hand on her back and pushed her out of the kitchen and into the dining
area, where he pulled out a chair for her at the table.

She
sat because her knees were a little shaky. Not because he’d bossed her into it.

“Tell
me what the hell is going on,” she demanded as he sat down across from her.

There
had been a time when she’d hated Michael more than anyone else she knew. She’d
believed he was cold, pushy, obnoxious, and utterly heartless.

Now
she just thought he was pushy and sometimes obnoxious. She didn’t hate him
anymore.

“You
work for me,” she insisted when he remained silent. “Tell me.”

“I
work for your father,” he corrected.

“But
I’m not a child. I’m twenty-five years old, and I have the right to know about
something that affects my life—as this clearly does.
Tell
me.”

“There
was someone unauthorized in the building,” he explained, his tone as calm and
impersonal as always.

Michael
wasn’t a mean man, no matter what she’d thought five years ago. In fact, in the
time she’d known him, she’d sometimes noticed him being surprisingly
considerate—like when he’d searched for hours for the lost cat that belonged to
the daughter of one of her father’s housekeeping staff. He hadn’t stopped looking
until he’d found the cat.

She
knew he was a good man in his own detached way, but never once had he been
friendly with her—or even just casually good-natured. No matter his mood, no
matter how she behaved, no matter the situation, he was always, always
professional.

“Who
was it?” she asked. Her hands weren’t shaking quite as much now, and her voice
had returned to normal, much to her relief. She didn’t like feeling weak and
silly with Michael. He was the kind of man who respected strength.

“It
was the ex-boyfriend of a woman on the floor below yours. He’d snuck in to see
her since she wasn’t answering his calls. It had nothing to do with you.”

She
nodded and kept sipping her coffee as Michael checked something on his smart
phone. She assumed he’d gotten a text with further information.

Since
she was feeling better, she got up to pour Michael a cup of coffee as well.
She’d learned not to ask, since he would just say “no” to the offer, but he
would always drink it when she just set it in front of him.

As
she took her seat again, she realized her robe was gaping open, showing a lot
of cleavage and a hint of lacy bra.

Not
that Michael would ever leer at her—he was evidently completely impervious to
any potential feminine charms she possessed—but still… She pulled the robe
closed.

“What’s
your schedule today?” he asked, picking up the coffee she’d given him and
taking a long swallow.

“I’ve
got to be at the Center from nine to noon, since our normal volunteer is on
vacation.”

He
nodded, more to acknowledge that she’d spoken than out of any show of interest.

“Then
I need to restock some supplies. Oh, and stop by the art store on Willow.”

Claire
was the assistant director of an urban community center. She’d started as a
volunteer, teaching art lessons to kids during college as part of a required
community service project in a sociology class, but she was now a paid employee.
She enjoyed the work, but the social interaction had been excruciatingly hard
when she’d first begun, since she was so incredibly shy. A lot of her work was
with children, however. She liked kids a lot and wasn’t as nervous around them
as adults, and now she knew most of the people in the neighborhood anyway.

It
wasn’t well-paying job, and she never would have been able to make a living at
it. She could only afford her nice apartment because her father was the head of
one of the most successful movie studios in Hollywood.

“You’ll
need to stop by your father’s before work,” Michael said, looking up from his
smart phone.

She
blinked. “Excuse me?”

“Your
father needs to talk to you, and he asked for you to stop by first thing.”

She
almost groaned. “Why didn’t he just pick up a phone?”

Michael,
of course, ignored that question.

Thinking
about it, Claire sucked in a sharp breath. Her father only demanded a meeting in
such an indirect way when he had something serious to discuss.

She
suddenly knew the purpose of the meeting today.

Her
father was angry about something he’d found out and wanted to lecture her about
it.

She
gave Michael a narrow-eyed look, wondering if he was somehow to blame for it.

He’d
been known in the past to discover things he shouldn’t discover.

He’d
never actually told anyone about them, though.

Five
years ago, when she’d started secretly dating a member of her father’s security
team, Michael hadn’t told her father about it.

He’d
simply fired Brandon, the bodyguard in question.

Claire
had kept dating Brandon for several months after he’d been let go, until she’d realized
he mostly just wanted a free ride on the coattails of a rich woman.

That
was the year Claire had hated Michael.

Since
then, Michael had never hired another young, good-looking man as part of his
team.

Michael
was fairly young himself—in his early to mid-thirties, she guessed—and he was
good-looking in a big, rugged, dark-haired way.

But
he was completely different from Brandon’s lean, charming, blond gorgeousness.
Plus, Michael’s über-professionalism would make it impossible for him to fall
for a protectee.

Even
if he was remotely attracted to her. Which he obviously wasn’t.

“Will
you be ready to leave in fifteen or twenty minutes?” Michael asked.

Claire
nodded. She was low-maintenance and rarely wore much make-up. Since she’d
already showered and dried her hair, all she had to do was put on clothes.

Then
she glanced at the clock on the mantle in surprise. “What are you doing here
anyway? Where’s Rick?”

“Rick
is no longer on staff.”

“What
happened? I like Rick.”

Michael
just met her eyes levelly, the way he always did when he wasn’t going to answer
her questions.

He
didn’t answer her questions a lot.

“I
liked Rick. And I certainly wasn’t sleeping with him.”

“I
know you weren’t sleeping with him. If you think that’s the only reason I would
let someone go, you’ve seriously underestimated my requirements for the team.”

She
frowned. “He was in good shape and everything.”

Michael
just looked at her.

“He
did his job just fine. And I liked him. He made me laugh.” Claire had liked
Rick, and she also dreaded the idea of trying to get used to someone new.

“I
understand you’re disappointed, Ms. Kenyon, but making you laugh wasn’t part of
his job description.”

Claire
took a deep breath so she wouldn’t snap at him. There was no sense in getting
into an argument with Michael, although she’d tried many, many times before. He
would never argue in a satisfying way. He wouldn’t get upset or angry. He would
try to respond to genuine objections but would otherwise simply ignore her, his
expression as impassive as always.

She’d
never met anyone as frustrating to argue with as him.

She
knew he expected an argument from her now. He never called her Claire, but he
only ever called her Ms. Kenyon when he thought she was annoyed with him.

Managing
to keep her voice level, she said, “But he did fine at all the stuff that
was
in his job description. He was a perfectly good bodyguard for the night shift.
It’s mostly just sitting around, anyway.”

Even
as she said the words, she realized Rick hadn’t exactly fulfilled all of his
required duties. He hadn’t caught her or even noticed when she’d snuck out
every Thursday night for the last six weeks.

But
Michael didn’t know that.

Or
maybe he did.

Her
father, after all, was summoning her to a lecture this morning.

She
dropped her eyes and didn’t speak, closing out her surroundings for a few
seconds to restore her equilibrium. She and her father always called it
“shutting down.” She had done it all the time when she’d been a child—so shy it
was almost debilitating—but she’d gotten better about it as she’d grown older.
She didn’t have to resort to it nearly as often as she used to, and usually a
few seconds was all she needed.

Sometimes
she just couldn’t help it. Social interaction was always stressful for her. She
genuinely liked people, and she enjoyed talking to people she knew well—as long
as it wasn’t in large groups and the interactions didn’t get too intense. When
it did, her instinct was always to withdraw, to hide away where it was safe. Since
she couldn’t always get out of the room, shutting down was the way she was able
to make it through difficult conversations.