Page 7 of Splintered Security (Aspen & Evergreen #2)

twenty-four hours

Ren

“Go silence that shit.” I give her a squeeze and let her go. “Better yet, act like everything is normal. Do whatever you would normally do with him. Don’t give him a reason to find you today or tomorrow.”

She slides off the bed, and I avoid watching her go. I’m fighting morning wood. My dick is like the old phone company, reaching out to touch someone this morning, and that someone is not myself.

I roll to my back and hiss. Bad idea, Gallo. Less than twelve hours, and my back feels every last bit of it. I sit up and turn for the edge, listening as she answers the phone.

“Hello. No, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I didn’t feel well last night and put my phone on do not disturb and forgot to take it off. I’m sorry, Heath. No, of course not. Yeah, I’ll be there. You know that…. Okay.”

The pauses between her words are filled with either silence or shouting. Both make my blood boil. I tamp down my rage and walk to stand facing her .

She turns her body to the side as if the confrontation on two sides is two too many. I slide my arms around her, supporting her weight. Touching her is getting easier. Way too easy, actually.

When she fidgets, I kiss the top of her head and release her, heading to the laundry room to toss her clothes into the dryer. I return to the bedroom to get dressed and exit the closet to see her set her phone on the counter.

She lifts both hands to her face and scrubs away tears.

“Come here.” I don’t mean for my tone to be so harsh, especially after what I’m sure was a confrontational call. She does as I ask, but I can tell it’s out of obligation—the distance between us, the way she stands, her eyes avoiding mine.

She looks small and folds in on herself. Her hands are clasped in front of her, her fingers twisted and rolling through each other. Her shoulders hunch and roll in as if she could hollow out her body.

I wait and wait, not pressing, not pressuring, letting her seek me out with her eyes. I need her to be brave in this moment. Need her to regain some of what he took.

When her eyes meet mine, I lift my hands to her waist, wrapping her up. “I need twenty-four hours. Give me that?”

She nods.

“Twenty-four hours to get him out of your life for good.”

She sags into me and tears stain my shirt as she nods again.

“Anything I need to know from that conversation? ”

“Just the usual. I’m a stupid bitch who needs to do as I’m told. He’d—and I quote, ‘hate to hurt me’ end quote—but he will if I keep asking for it.”

My body is ramrod still, and I know she feels it. “That’s the usual?”

Another nod.

“I’ll kill him myself, just so you never have to hear his voice again. Remember this moment, Anni. Remember how you feel. Remember my words. I vow it. He will not harm you. I will protect you. And I will end him for ever making you cry.”

She looks up at me. With no warning, no preamble, she lifts on her toes, tugs my face down to hers, and kisses me like her life depends on it.

It takes two seconds for my shock to wear off and for me to take over. I thrust my tongue into her mouth, claiming, tasting. She moans, and that’s all I need.

My hands go to her ass and lift. Her legs wrap around me. The pain of them on my raw back isn’t enough to make me stop. The promise of her in my arms is enough to make even that disappear.

Lifting a hand to the back of her head, I tilt her face, deepening the kiss. I groan into her mouth, only stopping when my cock swells and I’m desperate to push it into the heat at her core.

Instead, I break the kiss and trail kisses down her cheek to her ear. “Fuck, Sunshine. That was the best first kiss I’ve ever had. ”

Gently, I lift her off me and set her on her own feet, knowing that’s the last first kiss she’ll ever have.

I place a kiss to the top of her head and walk toward the door, tossing over my shoulder, “How do you take your coffee?”

I’m halfway down the hall, adjusting my cock in my pants, when she calls back. “Splash of cream.”

Girls have a lot of shit. I didn’t expect “girly shit” would mean it looking like Target and Ulta threw up in my house.

I didn’t go to college, but it’s what I picture in the movies when a posse of the opposite sex invades a dorm room, transforming gray walls and beige carpet into hanging lights and a riot of color.

When there’s no trace of what was before when they’re done.

I smooth a hand down my face, my fingers enjoying the prickle of stubble since I didn’t shave this morning before our errands. The bristles crackle under my palm as I survey the bags blanketing the floor of my bedroom. “The basics,” she’d said. “Just what I need.”

This isn’t counting the dress and all that goes with it for tomorrow. She’s said she doesn’t need it. It doesn’t matter if she doesn’t—or didn’t—she’s not going without it.

I insisted.

After all, it’s my wedding too. And as beautiful as Anni is, a dusty sweatshirt and jeans isn’t what either of us needs tomorrow .

She refused to show me what she got. It’s the only time we split up today. She wanted a few minutes to “surprise me.” I hated every minute she was alone and vulnerable, but the light in her eyes eclipsed the stress of the time apart.

Newsflash… Twenty-four hours ago, I was going to work. My boring job was mentally snooze-worthy and emotionally coma-inducing. Security at a club means watching camera screens and preserving my will to live.

I’m a man of action, not a man of monitoring, and since that’s been my life for nearly a year, I’ve most certainly been bored.

Surprise was watching as she walked through my club.

My eyes trailed her every move through the monitors.

It was the first time seeing her since… Well, I’d have to think on that.

Since I left for the Army, maybe. I was in Pakistan when Aug died.

There was no bereavement leave for your childhood best friend from that far away.

So, maybe it’s like she said, more than a dozen years since I laid eyes on her.

And I knew the moment she sashayed onto the screen that it was Annika Garver—only grown up, filled out, and on a mission.

The bomb threat—or rather, notification—came moments later. I told the team to do what I should’ve done, and instead, headed straight for the last place I saw her. Protecting her was my only thought—more than self-preservation, more than crumbling walls and collapsing ceilings.

She’d said all of two words to me, and I threw my body on hers, curving what I could around her, taking the brunt of everything.

On my back.

On my shoulders .

Just like always. Regardless of what had come between—basic, a tour in the Middle East, losing her brother, moving back stateside, starting a life—my only instinct was to protect her.

Come to think of it, the timing is beyond coincidental. So, yeah, surprising me might be underwhelming at this juncture.

But since I had something I needed to take care of, I took off for my errand and made sure she had my credit card and enough time.

Now, both of us back at home, I can smell her in my room, hear her in my house, and sense her getting under my skin. In less than twenty-four hours, she’s wiggled her way back into my very orderly life. And the evidence of her invasion is all over my home.