Her Sworn Protector

He looked at her sharply. She would have drawn back if she hadn’t been belted in. “And Bobby wasn’t?”

That wasn’t what she’d meant. Kady sighed, shaking her head. “You’re a hard man to cheer up, Byron.”

“There’s a solution for that,” he replied crisply. “Don’t try.”

Too late, she thought. It was obvious that Byron wanted her to stop talking, to slip into silence and pretend that nothing had been said. She was willing to drop the subject of his brother, but not to spend the rest of this trip in silence. What she’d witnessed was still too much with her, too raw. For now, she needed to be distracted and he was her only resource.

“What’s your name?” she asked suddenly.

Caught off guard, Byron looked at her as if she’d lapsed into baby talk. “Did that gunman hit you in the head?”

“No, he never even saw me,” she reminded him, incredibly grateful for that.

He frowned to himself as he went down a one-way street four miles over the posted speed limit. “Then why are you asking me what my name is? You know what it is. It’s Byron.”

She shifted in her seat, the belt digging into her hip as she turned to look at him. “Yes, I know, but is Byron your first name? Your last? Is it some nickname they pinned to you in elementary school?”

Maybe that getting-hit-in-the-head theory wasn’t as far-fetched as it sounded. The woman was babbling, he thought. “What kind of nickname is Byron?”

She shrugged. It was possible. “Maybe your mother liked the romantic poets and saw a little of Lord Byron in you.” Because, she added silently, if Byron had been taller and believed in working out, she would have said that the man beside her was a dead ringer for the tragic poet.

“Never knew my mother,” Byron answered curtly, hoping this would be the end of it. “She died after Bobby was born.”

It seemed as if she couldn’t win for losing. She hadn’t meant to open any more old wounds. “Oh, I’m sorry.”

Byron made no comment. Instead he continued to stare straight ahead at the road, his hands wrapped around the wheel.

Finally, after several minutes had passed, he shrugged. “It happens.”

More often than he probably realized, she thought. That didn’t take the sting away. “But it’s still rough, growing up without a parent.”

He slanted a look at her. Was she about to build on some common thread? “You?”

She felt almost guilty at having had the kind of childhood she’d had. Loving parents and sisters who would have done anything for her, would always be there for her if she needed them.

“No,” she replied quietly. “Both of mine are still alive.”

And probably doted on her, Byron guessed. She had that look about her. Hardest thing she probably had to deal with is finding a pair of shoes that went with the outfit she’d chosen.

“Then how would you know?” It almost sounded like an accusation.

The smile on her lips unsettled him. It was completely disarming. “I have a vivid imagination.”

Byron laughed shortly. “I can believe that.”

“So?” she asked, her tone light again as she attempted to get back to her original question.

Byron’s eyebrows drew together, knotting in totally confusion as he glanced at her before switching lanes. “‘So’ what?”

Kady sighed. The man could bob and weave with the best of them. She wondered if he’d been a handful, growing up. And if he’d missed his mother, or at least the idea of a mother. Her heart ached a little, knowing how she would have felt without hers. Completely lost.

“Is Byron your first or last name?” she pressed.

It really was like dealing with a junkyard dog. “First,” he ground out grudgingly.

Talk about baby steps. The man was not willing to meet her halfway, or even a quarter of the way. “Do you have a last name?” she finally asked when he volunteered nothing beyond the single word.

“Yeah.”

Okay, he was doing this on purpose, she decided. “And is it a government secret?”

His voice was mild. If he didn’t know better, he would have said he was even enjoying himself. “Not that I know of.”

Byron paused, playing the moment out for his own amusement. He had no idea why the doctor’s questioning amused more than annoyed him. Maybe it was because this pint-size doctor stood out from the rest of all the people he’d encountered since he’d come to work for the late shipping magnate. In a sea of interchangeable people, she was unique, like the color red in a box of beige crayons.