Undercover Protector
His mouth quirked up again. “I’ll work on that.”
Fighting a huff—she already felt enough like a petulant teenager—Nadine focused her gaze out the windshield. But as she saw where they were, she realized they were going in the wrong direction.
“You’ve gone past the turnoff for my place,” she said.
“We’re not going to your place. If Garibaldi’s feeling bold enough to come after you at the care facility, I don’t think he’d hesitate to send someone to your home, too.”
In her need to tell Anderson to stop being so nice, the immediate threat had slipped to the back of her mind. Now she wondered how that was even possible.
“Is that what you were saying before?” she asked. “About someone else seeing Garibaldi?”
Anderson’s hands tightened in the wheel. “A patient reported a masked man in the hall on the third floor.”
“My floor.”
“’Fraid so. Not much of a consolation, but I doubt it was the man himself. More likely one of his thugs.”
“The same person in the car?”
“Or working with him.”
She made herself straighten her shoulders and speak in a strong voice. “So what’s the plan, then?”
“I’ve got a room at the Whispering Woods Lodge. We’ll go there, I’ll contact my partners and we’ll decide from there what to do.”
“You know that Garibaldi owns the lodge, right?”
“I do.”
“So you don’t think going there might be a little counterproductive?”
“That’s the whole point. He won’t be looking under his own nose.”
Nadine shook her head. “But if he’s looking for you now, too, he’ll probably figure out pretty quickly that we’re there.”
“My room’s booked under a pseudonym, and there’s a conference of some kind at the hotel, so plenty of random names on the books.”
“Were you also wearing a disguise when you checked in? Because if Garibaldi was casing the hospital, his guys’ll know what you look like and it won’t matter what name you used or how many people are staying there.”
“Trust me,” he said. “I’ve covered my bases.”
“What does that mean?”
“Just that I’ve got a valid excuse for hanging around.”
“What does that—You know what? Never mind. I don’t think I want to know.”
“Probably not.”
But something about the way he said it doubled her curiosity. She couldn’t quite pinpoint his tone. A little amused and a little...something...that made her want to blush again for no good reason. And of course the idea of blushing made her feel prickly yet again.
Fighting yet another sigh, she looked down at her hands. She could swear that just a short time ago, she’d been a happy, well-adjusted person. A favorite teacher. Now she was on edge, pretty much 24/7. It almost made her pity the big, blond cop who sat beside her now. He was definitely not receiving the best of her.
Why does it even matter whether or not he gets nice me or not-so-nice me? I’m his case. He just said so.
But for some reason it did matter. Especially now that she’d thought consciously about it.
She stole a glance at him from the corner of her eye, trying to figure out why she suddenly cared what he thought. He looked the same as he had for the last week. Blond hair, a little too long and several shades darker than her own. Strong jaw, dusted with a few days’ worth of scruff. He had nice, even features. The kind that were deceptively ordinary. But Nadine knew better. The moment he turned on that warm, genuine smile and flashed those drown-in-me eyes of his, he became anything but ordinary.
“Oh!” The word popped out before she could stop it—an exclamation of understanding.
The eyes in question flicked her way. “You all right?”
She forced herself to nod. “Fine.”
“You sure?”
“Yes!” she snapped.
“Whoa.” He shook his head and turned his focus to the road, then added in a mutter, “Just checking.”
She bit back an urge to apologize. At least her short temper served a purpose at that moment. It was the perfect cover for the realization she’d just made. Whether she liked it or not, the reason she cared what her wannabe bodyguard thought about her was the fact that she found him stupidly attractive.
* * *
Anderson kept his gaze fixed straight ahead. He sensed some kind of internal struggle going on with the pretty little schoolteacher.
Oh, she’s pretty now, huh?
He acknowledged the silent, self-directed question with a mental wave of his hand. Yeah, she was pretty. It wasn’t really much of a debate. Just because he hadn’t taken the time to think about it much before now didn’t make it untrue.
Her petite, almost waiflike frame contrasted sharply with the fierceness in her eyes in a way Anderson liked. Her dramatic hairstyle hinted at the fact that under her sharp edges, she might actually have a fun side. He couldn’t deny being curious about it.
And her scar...
He had to hold his head rigid to keep from swiveling to look at it. Of all her features, maybe he liked the nongenetic one best. The puckered marking that sliced across her jawline screamed of a will to survive. Nadine Stuart had been through literal fire and come out alive. Prickly or not, that one thing made her a hell of a lot more than pretty in Anderson’s eyes. It infused him with sympathy, too.
A decade earlier, she probably thought she’d been through the worst. Then came the last couple of weeks. Witnessing her brother get shot. Being dragged into the Garibaldi investigation. Dragged in again, if he was being accurate. Now this. She was stuck under his watchful eye against her will.
“I’ll only keep you here as long as I have to,” he said as he flicked on his turn signal and guided the truck onto the last road before the turnoff that led to the lodge.
Her head jerked his way, and for a second, he actually saw a bit of softness in her chocolate-colored stare. Then she spoke, and her fierceness overtook her features.
“Don’t start worrying about my comfort now.”
He fought yet another stab of impatience. “I’m irritatingly nice. I can’t help but worry about it.”
A spot of color darkened each of her cheeks. “I thought you were working on that.”
“I am.”
“Good.”
“But in the meantime...” He trailed off, unsure what he wanted to suggest.
“In the meantime, what?” she pushed.
Impulsively, he veered off the road, put the truck into Park under the cover of a decent-sized patch of bushes and turned to face her. “I dunno. But we’re stuck together for the time being, Nadine. So we need to do something that’s going to make the bit of time we have to spend together less...confrontational.”
He expected her to argue. To point out the relatively nice way he put things. Instead, she nodded slowly.
“Okay,” she said. “What do you suggest?”
“Let’s start over.”
“Start over?”
“Pretend that we’re meeting for the first time and that it’s because we want to.”
“Are you sure that’s—”
“Worth a shot? Yes.”
She sighed. “Fine. Introduce yourself.”
He felt a smile building. “I’m Anderson Somers. Thirty years old. Single. I’ve been a full-fledged detective with the Freemont City PD for about four years. Before that, I was a patrolman.”
“Do you like being a detective?”
“Most of the time,” he said honestly.
“Really? Only most of the time?”
“That surprises you?”
“I just kind of assumed that all cops were gung ho or whatever. And it also surprises me that you’d be honest about it.”
“One of those nice-guy faults.”
“Must make it harder to be a cop.”
“Being honest?” He felt his mouth tip up even more. “Shouldn’t that make me a better cop?”
“Don’t you sometimes have to manipulate people?” she wanted to know.
“I prefer not to.”
“And it works not to?”
“I think I’m pretty damned good at it.”
“So then...when don’t you like it?”
“I didn’t say I don’t like it.”
“You said you like it most of the time. That means that sometimes you don’t.”
“Ha. Busted. The truth is, I really like the investigative end of things. It always fascinated me as a kid, to see how my dad got from point A to point B. But if I’m being really honest, until my dad was killed, I always thought I’d take after my uncle and become a firefighter.”
Sympathy softened her voice as she asked, “Why didn’t you?”
“You already know my story.”
She shook her head. “Nope. I don’t. We just met, remember?”
“Right. I forgot.”
“So. Tell me.”
“Not gonna let it go?”
“No.” She said it softly enough that he thought she might, if he pressed it.
He decided not to. She did know already anyway—she’d heard it from his partner, Brayden, during their previous run-in with Jesse Garibaldi—and sometimes it just felt good to say things aloud.
“Fifteen years ago, my father—a detective like me—was killed. Murdered via pipe bomb. Along with two other men. Those men’s sons, myself included, vowed to find out why, and we vowed to do it by the book.”
He didn’t realize he’d closed his eyes until he felt Nadine’s warm grip on his forearm. “So you became a cop.”
He lifted his lids. “I did. We did.”
“What else?”
“Does there need to be more?” It wasn’t a bitter question, just a serious one.
“I guess there doesn’t have to be,” she conceded. “You’ve already said a lot for having just met me.”
“That’s way truer than you know.”
“What do you mean?”
“The guys and I don’t typically share any of that info. Only a handful of people know about the case.”
“Well, then, I’m glad I inspire that kind of trust after knowing each other for five minutes.” She flashed him a smile that, if he didn’t know better, Anderson might’ve called saucy.
He fought a chuckle at the unexpected expression. “All right. It’s your turn.”
“Ready?”
“As I’ll ever be.”
“Okay. Well. I’m Nadine Elise Stuart. Twenty-six. I like dogs.”
“Dogs?”
“Yes. And sunsets.”
“Okay...”
“Oh. And long walks on the beach, and—”
He cut her off with a groan. “Really?”
She blinked innocently at him. “What?”
“That’s the angle you’re going to take?”
“We just met. So I don’t want to give away too much too soon.”
The chuckle wouldn’t stay down this time. Anderson let it take over, rolling through his chest, up his throat, then out into the truck. It felt good. And it felt even better when Nadine joined in, her musical laugh mixing pleasantly with his, making it easy to forget the pressing issues at hand. As his mirth tapered off, though, his gaze slipped out the window just in time to catch sight of a navy sedan as it whipped by. Maybe it was the same one that had tried to run her down, maybe not. Either way, it was a sobering reminder that in spite of the light conversation, they were far from safe.
Chapter 4
The slightly buoyant feeling in Nadine’s chest faded as they neared Whispering Woods Lodge. It was nestled into a man-made valley, its peaked, full log roof visible from the top of the very long block that led down to its enormous outdoor parking lot. And, usually, just that first glimpse of the rustically styled hotel made her want to go inside. Or it always had when she was a kid, anyway. She remembered how quickly it had been built. How everyone in town heralded Jesse Garibaldi as some kind of miracle worker. The man was still new in town then, his investments in tourism and infrastructure still a novelty. At ten years old, the awe of the town reinforced what Nadine already believed. Garibaldi’s power was endless. Then, it had impressed her. Now, it made her shiver.
“You all right?” Anderson’s warm voice cut through her worry.
“I’m okay,” she replied. “Just thinking about when this place opened fifteen years ago. My dad worked for Garibaldi, so we got a front-row seat. It was amazing. Inspiring and hopeful and...” She shrugged. “I was ten. So it was pretty cool.”
“It’s still pretty cool.”
“Except knowing what I do about Garibaldi makes it harder to enjoy it. Like it’s got a taint. Does that sound funny?”
Anderson’s mouth set into a line before he answered. “The man’s a murderer, Nadine. Everything he touches—or has touched—does have a taint.”
Does that include me?
The question sprang to mind unexpectedly, and she wasn’t able to dismiss it as easily as it had come. After all, Garibaldi had touched her life. He’d paid for her and her mother’s move from Whispering Woods to Freemont. He’d covered her many hospital expenses and the costs of her father’s funeral. Then he’d paid for her entire education. If the man’s taint extended to people, she was probably at the top of the list.
She opened her mouth—maybe to say something about it, maybe not, she wasn’t sure—but stopped as she realized Anderson had bypassed the main lot and was headed for the underground one.
“I don’t think we can park in there,” she said. “Staff and VIP guests only. Unless they’ve changed that.”
He turned a rueful smile her way. “Open the glove box.”
She did as he said, and when she flicked down the door, a laminated parking pass fell straight into her hands.
“Is it fake?”
“No.”
Anderson lifted up the pass and placed it on the windshield, then offered the attendant in the parking booth a wave as they drove through.
“See?” he said. “Perfectly legitimate.”
“Well, then...which one are you?” she asked.
“Which one?”
“Staff? Or suite?”
“Not staff,” he replied, his voice matching his still-rueful expression.
“You’re in a suite?”
“Trust me,” Anderson said as he pulled into a spot, “I didn’t book it that way. It was an accident.”
“Seriously? How does that happen accidentally?” She couldn’t keep the surprise from her response, and she realized she’d been expecting him to say that he’d acquired the pass through some twisty, undercover police deception.
“I guess they were overbooked,” Anderson said. “C’mon.”
Nadine frowned as she let herself out of the truck. It was well-known that as the only real hotel in Whispering Woods, the lodge offered a good-sized chunk of reasonably priced rooms and an even bigger set of moderately priced ones. But it was just as well-known that their block of suites were luxuriously equipped and had a cost to match that luxury. She had a hard time believing that the lodge would just give him an upgrade. Especially by accident.
“What did you tell them?” she asked.
“Tell who?” he replied innocently, moving around to her side of the truck and gesturing for her to start walking.
She planted her feet and narrowed her eyes. “Why?”
“Why what?”
“Stop that. Why did they give you an upgrade, Anderson?”
He sighed and ran a hand over his shaggy locks. “Look. It just kind of happened.”
“What did?”
“I was checking in, and the girl behind the counter was friendly. Chatty. You know those dolls where you pull a string to make them talk?”
“Yes.”
“She was like that. Only her string got stuck and she just kept going.”
Nadine fought a laugh. “That’s not very nice.”
He shook his head. “I didn’t say it was a bad thing. It was just a very full five minutes. She told me all about her life and the guy she was marrying. Her high school sweetheart. And she wanted to hear about me. So I told her my cover story, which is that I’m here visiting a friend at the care center.”
“Me.”
“Yes.”
“What does that have to do with the room?”
“When I said friend, the girl at the counter took that to mean something more.”
“And you didn’t correct her?”
“It didn’t seem important. And actually...”
“Actually what?”
“Let’s get to the elevator first.”
Nadine started to argue, then caught the obvious embarrassment on his face and relented temporarily. “Fine.”
“We should take the service elevator. We’ll run into fewer people, and if someone from the staff questions us, we’ll plead error.”
“Are we really that conspicuous?”
“I’m not.” He cast a pointed look toward her legs.
She looked down and spotted her hospital-issue pajama pants. “Oh.”
“I did offer to get you some clothes a few days ago.”
“Don’t rub it in.”
“I wouldn’t dare. Let’s go.”
She let him lead her across the cement. They moved past a set of slick faux-wood doors that led to the main elevators, then around a corner and up to another, far more utilitarian setup—plain gray metal. Anderson tugged on the handle, then stepped back to allow her to pass through first.
“What, no further criticism of my politeness?” he joked as she stepped across the threshold.
“I’ve temporarily suspended my aversion to it.”
“Glad to hear it.”
“Don’t be. I might change my mind once I hear what you have to say about what you told the girl at the front desk.”
His expression turned sheepish, and he didn’t speak until they were in the elevator and on the way up.
“Once the check-in girl had put the idea out there,” he said, “it seemed like a better option. Being your boyfriend instead of your friend gave me a better excuse for my vigil outside your room.”
Nadine had to push off yet another need to blush and instead asked, “But if you were my boyfriend, why would you be staying at the lodge in the first place? Why wouldn’t you stay at my place?”
Anderson cleared his throat. “Exactly what she wanted to know.”
“And what did you tell her?”
“The first thing that came to mind. That you and I had a fight.”
“About what?”
“You want to know what our fictional fight was about?”
“I think I have a right to know.”
“What makes you even think I told the check-in girl what it was about?”
“Because you got a suite, and you didn’t get it just because you lied about being my boyfriend. And speaking of lying...” Nadine crossed her arms. “I thought you were Mr. Honesty.”
“Mr. Nice Guy,” he corrected. “And aside from the fake name—which was a necessity—and the fake fight—which was a knee-jerk-reaction kind of excuse—the girl filled in the rest on her own. I mentioned she was chatty, didn’t I?”
She rolled her eyes. “And what did she fill in?”
“That I was getting ready to propose, and you ran off to Whispering Woods to avoid me.”
“Well, that’s a hell of a leap.”
Anderson chuckled. “You have no idea. One second I was single guy, checking into a hotel for a few days, and the next, I was chasing after a woman who refused to marry me.”
“I’m afraid to ask how that led to the suite,” she said.
“Well. When you see which suite it is, you might be able to fill in a few things on your own.”
“Can’t wait.”
“I’m sure.”
The elevator pinged then and came to a smooth stop. But as the doors slid open and Anderson pressed an arm against one of them so she could go by, Nadine had a sudden urge to run. To shove the thick-shouldered man aside and run straight down the hall without looking back. And it wasn’t fear that fueled the need. It wasn’t even some unspecific kind of apprehension. It was anticipation. An unexpected tingle that licked warmly up her feet and hands, moved inward, then settled somewhere in her gut. It was a heady feeling. Dangerous. Unexpected. And directly related to her attraction to Anderson and the fact that she was about to be very, very alone with him.
Well, that...and the gold-plated sign that hung on the wall just in view.
Honeymoon Suite.
And it got worse. As Nadine forced her feet to move her out into the hall, a girl who couldn’t be more than twenty or so bounced into sight, her ponytail wagging and eyes sparkling at the two of them. Even without an introduction, there was no doubt about who she was—the chatty storyteller who was trying to seal Nadine and Anderson into a fake engagement.
* * *
Anderson stifled a groan. In his mind, it was already awkward enough that he’d been forced to confess to having gone along with the assumptions made by the check-in girl. Now he was going to have to own it, too. Taking a breath, he forced a smile onto his face. Then he slung his arm over Nadine’s shoulders as casually as he could manage and bent a little to whisper, “Can’t say I didn’t warn you.”
“It worked!” the check-in girl squealed as she approached. “I told you it would!”
“You sure did,” Anderson agreed.
She turned her eyes to Nadine. “How did he do it? What part convinced you? Tell me the room had something to do with it! It was the room, wasn’t it? Wait—why aren’t you wearing the ring?”
“The ring?” Nadine repeated, her voice almost faint.
“You don’t have it? It’s still stuck down that sink?” Her eyes flicked between them. “Wait. You haven’t even asked her yet, have you? Oh! I let the cat out of the bag?”
“Little bit,” Anderson managed to say.
The girl’s smile only faltered for a second. “Well. It’s a good thing I came up to change the flowers in the nook. Ask her now.”
“Now?”
“She’s obviously not going to say no. Otherwise she wouldn’t have come to the suite. Or the hotel at all. Besides that, I’m the perfect witness. Not so much of a crowd that she feels like she has to say yes, but the perfect person to capture the moment if she says yes. Give me your phone.”
“My phone?”
“How else am I going to record it for you?”
Anderson eased away from Nadine, dug the slim device from his pocket and handed it over. The girl’s grin just about split her face.
“Okay,” she said. “Don’t forget to get down on one knee. You want it to be good.”
Anderson shrugged helplessly at Nadine. Her eyes were wide, her bottom lip tugged in. She looked nervous bordering on terrified, and Anderson wondered how that was going to translate in the recording.
He leaned toward her ear again. “You’re going to have to fake it a little better than that, honey. Even Little Miss Chatterbox won’t be fooled if you look like I’m trying to push you off a cliff.”
Her lips turned up in an almost passable smile. “I might be fighting an urge to strangle you right now.”
“Just a few moments and one proposal and you can strangle away.” He winked, then dropped to his knee and shot a genuine smile up at her. “Nadine Elise Stuart. For as long as I’ve known you, you’ve sparked something special in me. I can honestly say you know more about me than most people. I feel like it only took five minutes to get to that point. Literally. So between that and the fact I’ve never seen anyone look quite so sexy in a pair of hospital pajamas, I was wondering if you’d do me the honor of marrying me?”
Nadine’s mouth worked silently for a second. Her gaze was a little soft, a little amused and a little something else that he couldn’t quite pinpoint. Finally, she nodded, and Anderson tipped his head toward the check-in girl.
“Good enough?” he asked.
She lowered the camera phone. “Close.”
“Close?”
“You need the kiss.”
Crap.
“We’re not really into PDAs,” he said.
The girl shook her head. “This isn’t public. This is just the two of you, plus your own personal videographer. Posterity.”
“Still not really—”
“It’s fine.” Nadine’s hand landed on his shoulder.
He looked up again. “What?”
“It’s fine,” she repeated.
Anderson pushed to his feet. It was hard to stop his gaze from flicking down to her lips before shifting up to her eyes. Although it hadn’t been directly on his mind before, to say he had zero interest in kissing her—now that it had been put in his head—would be a lie. But to say that he wanted to force her into doing it was an even bigger untruth. In fact, the idea made his gut twist and ache.
“Nadine?” His voice came out a little hoarse.
She smiled, and he couldn’t help but note that now her eyes moved briefly to his lips. “Let’s just not make it something we wouldn’t want our kids to see, okay?”
