Page 1

Chapter 1

Cate

I was having a shitty day and knew if I didn’t clear my head and focus I’d have an even shittier night. Tonight was the monthly Sheppard the guys at SSI were good-hearted. But today, I was in a mood.

When I walked into the office, the receptionist/human resource rep/executive assistant to the owners, and Jack’s wife, Meg, greeted me with a smile.

“Hey Max.” Her eyes rounded as her mother-to-be instincts kicked in. She stood up and rushed over. “Are you okay? Who do we need to kill?”

I laughed. “I’m fine.” I almost admitted to not moving fast enough while training, but didn’t want to risk one of the guys overhearing and thinking I’d be an easy target. Because of the physical, and occasionally dangerous, demands of our jobs, we met once a month to spar. It kept us in fighting shape and was a good team building exercise.

Or maybe I do . It was always fun to beat down guys who underestimated me. At fove-foot-seven, I was at the tall end of average, but hours spent training in the gym meant I was anything but average in build or skill.

Meg’s eyes roamed up and down, making sure I was indeed fine. Apparently, the guys had a history of downplaying their injuries so she insisted on verifying.

“It’s from training,” I admitted, in a whisper .

“Don’t let the guys hear that.” She looked around the spacious, well lit reception room. “They’ll start betting against you.”

The guys always placed side bets on who’d win. No one bet on me the first time, and I doubt they would anytime soon. Because of assignments, this would only be my second time attending.

I held my own against Jamie and Jack, the eldest Sheppard sons. But AJ and Doug, the two non-Sheppard full-timers, were both significantly bigger and better trained. They’d kicked my ass without much effort.

It wasn’t unexpected, but I still didn’t like it. Refusing to suffer a repeat, I’d hired a personal trainer. I might still lose, but it won’t be nearly as embarrassing.

I hadn’t seen Jaden fight yet, so I had no idea what to expect from him. Like AJ and Doug, Jaden was built like a brick house. He was three inches shorter than Doug, who at six-four was the tallest guy at SSI. Thanks to Meg, I wasn’t the shortest person in the office, but I was the shortest person required to train.

“I don’t think they’ll ever bet on me,” I said, keeping my tone light and friendly. Someday, I’d bet on me and if I was lucky, I’d win.

“No, but someday you’ll show them what a badass you are and kick all their asses.”

If I didn’t know any better, I’d think she wanted me to do just that.

“I just hope I’m there to see it,” she added with a laugh.

“Likewise.” The phone rang, ending our talk .

When I walked into the office I shared with Jaden, he glance up just long enough to verify it was me before saying. “Hey.”

“Hey.” I mimicked his bored tone.

The clicking of our keyboards was the only sound as we worked. At five-forty, I went to the bathroom to change into leggings, a padded sports bra, and my well-worn, fitted marine t-shirt.

As expected, the guys all asked about the black eye, except John, who just raised an eyebrow and observed. Since it hadn’t happened on assignment, they started wondering, loudly, what kind of things I did for fun.

Like I’d ever tell. They didn’t need to know my life was boring compared to theirs.

Jaden was the last to arrive.

John looked at his watch. No words were needed.

“What, I’m on time.” Jaden defended himself.

“Barely,” Jack said, taking a dig at his younger brother. “Didn’t the Marines teach you that on time is late?”

“They did.” I answered, drawing Jaden’s attention.

He did a double take when he noticed my black eye.

“What tbe hell happened to you?”

I didn’t have time to answer before AJ asked, “Dude, you share an office. How the hell didn’t you notice before now?”

Jaden cringed at the question. “I was busy working.”

What he didn’t say was, in an attempt to avoid conflict, we ignored each other as much as possible when we were in our office. It irritated me to no end that he couldn’t act like a professional, instead he acted like a brat mumbling comments about my organized desk, lunch habits, and work methods.

Just yesterday he’d given me shit for thinking.

“Must you do that?” His voice thick with irritation.

“Do what?”

“Tap your pen like that?”

Tap my pen, on my chin? How much noise could I be making? “How does this,” I tapped my pen on my chin, “annoy you?”

He turned, giving me a dirty look as he answered. “The tap tap tap is annoying.” He accented each tap with a slap on his desk.

“Fine. I’ll stop.”

“Good.”

“Good.”

I hadn’t realized how often I tap my pen against my chin while thinking until he called me out for doing it again. He huffed and walked out, saying, “I can’t work like this.”

Back in the present, Doug said, “Apparently, the Marine Corp doesn’t teach their spec ops guys to be aware of their surroundings.” As the only Air Force veteran, he took advantage of the few opportunities he had to make fun of the other branches.

“Watch it, Sharpe,” John said, defending the Marines. The branch he, Jaden, and I had in common.

“Even we learned that, and we were Army infantry,” Jack said while fist bumping AJ, celebrating their shared time in the trenches.

“Let’s get to work,” John said in his fun-killing tone .

Protocol was for us to work out for thirty minutes to warm up before sparring.

I snagged one of the two treadmills, grateful Jaden’s entry had taken the focus off me and my black eye.

AJ grabbed the other one. “You ready for another ass kicking?” he asked.

Unlike the stick-up-their-ass dickheads I’d worked with at the FBI, AJ’s energy was more frat boy, military brotherhood than corporate sexism.

I held onto the anger that always surfaced when I thought about my former co-workers, knowing it’d serve me well on the mat.

When it was time to face off, John pulled Jaden’s name from the hat. When no one volunteered to be his first challenger John picked a second name.

Mine.

Not for the first time, I noticed the tattoos covering Jaden’s arms. The short sleeves of his tight t-shirt showed off more of his inked up, muscled arms than I normally saw. Giving me an eye full of art to appreciate. The only color, at least that I could see, was the American flag on his right upper arm. It was a reversed, or fighting forward, flag military personnel wore on the right arm of their uniforms. Among the black and white art on his left bicep was the Marine Ranger insignia .

I put my guard in my mouth and strapped on my headgear. Focus . Tonight wasn’t just the first time Jaden and I would spar, it was the first time any of us would see him on the mat. No one doubted he’d be hard to beat, having just returned from the Special Forces and still in a fighting mindset. Not to mention, full of piss and vinegar.

My anger didn’t serve me as well as I would’ve liked. It might have against his brothers, but not Jaden.

He was all speed and fury.

Unlike the others, he didn’t wait for me to make the first move—he charged.

I braced myself too late for the impact and we stumbled back. When I fell back, he landed on top of me, catching himself on his hands before flattening me like a pancake. I managed to buck my hips and throw him off, but that small victory was short-lived.

I rolled and sprung to my feet but he was already up and ready. He feigned a punch before sweeping my legs and dropping me back to the mat—pinning me in the blink of an eye.

John counted down as I struggled against Jaden’s hold. As soon as John reached one, Jaden jumped up.

In complete contradiction to how I felt, I held my head high as I stood and walked to the edge of the mat.

“Looks like the Raiders taught me a thing or two you can’t learn in a classroom.” He shot me a dirty look I didn’t think I deserved. It wasn’t my fault I had an advanced college degree or law enforcement experience, and he didn’t. He seemed determined to blame me nonetheless.