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There was a wide divide between being able to personally protect herself from an assailant and protecting herself from an assassin.
“You’ll be safe at OZ.”
She shook her head. “I can’t stay at OZ. I have to get home, get to work.”
“We can arrange protection for you.”
“I can afford my own protection. I’ll be fine.”
The thought of her in harm’s way bothered him immensely. Okay, yeah, he was attracted to her. Had been the moment he’d spotted her in Kosovo. He told himself his protectiveness was normal. That was his job. Had been since the day he’d popped Bobby Bishop in the mouth for saying something off-color in front of his sister.
Aubrey Starr was stubborn, independent, passionate about her work, and beautiful to boot. The fact that he was attracted to her doubled his need to protect her.
He’d talk to Ash, get her the protection she needed. Did she know that that producer’s death was no accident? He hadn’t asked Ash if he’d told her and was frustrated that he didn’t know. She would need the best protection out there. OZ knew some of the finest bodyguards in the world. They would make sure she stayed safe.
“I understand you were once in Syria.”
The question came out of the blue, and he was definitely not in the frame of mind to talk about Syria. “Yeah.” His voice was hard, hopefully deterring any further questions.
“I wanted—”
“Syria is in the past. It’s not something I want to relive or revisit.”
“But I—”
He gave her the hardest look he could give to a non-enemy. “Forget about Syria. Understand?”
“Yes…okay. Sorry.”
Hell, maybe he was the one who should be sorry. She looked as though she’d been slapped.
He couldn’t talk about his missions in Syria. Any of them. They were all still classified. And the one that had changed his life? No way in hell. He could only imagine what a filmmaker would want to do with that story.
Thankfully, giving them both a break, Serena appeared beside them. “Hey, Aubrey, mind if I pick your brain a minute?”
“Sure.” She stood and then turned to Liam. “Thank you for letting me go on this op with your team.”
“Not a problem. Hope you got something out of it.”
She didn’t move for several seconds, just continued to stare at him. Her eyes bore into his, and he could swear she was trying to communicate something to him. What, he had no clue. Finally, she gave a little nod of her head, straightened her shoulders, and walked away.
Serena gave him a disapproving frown and then moved away, too. Yeah, he was batting a thousand today.
Liam turned back to the window and looked out into the darkness again, his thoughts grim once more. Maybe he needed to take some time off. Go see his family back home in Missouri. Go fishing. Climb a mountain. Anything to get away from this gaping hole that used to be his heart.
* * *
Aubrey made it back to her seat with as much dignity as possible. Everything within her felt numb. While she answered Serena’s surprisingly simple questions about where she grew up and her family, her eyes kept veering toward the man in the front row of the plane.
He’d told her to forget about Syria.
Should she have forced the issue? Just come out and asked him? Why hadn’t she? It was either a yes-or-no answer. How hard was that? Impossibly hard, her mind whispered. Because if she asked and he denied it, then he would be lying. Or would he?
Exhaustion weighed on her like a lead blanket. She was running on fumes and those were almost gone too. Her brain felt like mush, and more than anything she wanted to find a private place to cry her eyes out.
“Your bio said you went to the University of Connecticut.”
She shook herself out of her brain fog. “Yes. It’s where I got my undergraduate degree.”