Page 12 of Velvet and Valor (Platinum Security: Shadows of LA #4)

JUNE

“Yeah, I’m not waiting here.”

I rush out the front door and jog up the driveway after Axel. His face creases into a frown at my unexpected arrival.

“Is there something else you want me to get?” Axel asks.

“No, I’m coming with you.”

Axel sucks in air through his nostrils, his face studiously blank. Then he lets his breath out slowly, deflating slightly as he goes.

“Okay,” he says with particular and deliberate calm. “We don’t really have time to go into the grocery list of reasons that would be a very bad idea.”

I meet his gaze and nod.

“I know that there are a ton of reasons it’s a terrible idea. But I still want to come.”

Axel rubs the bridge of his nose and closes his eyes.

“It’s just not safe,” Axel says. “There’s a very, very good chance that Moorcrock and/or the triad people have figured out who you really are. Especially since you have a, um, let’s say strong social media presence. They’re going to be watching your place.”

“Maybe, but I don’t want to say here.” I look back at his beach house. “All alone.”

Axel opens his mouth to argue, but nothing comes out. He studies me for a long moment, then nods.

“All right. But you need to stay in the car.”

“Okay,” I say, relieved I don’t have to be by myself. I would probably be fine. But my bubble of safety got completely shattered today. The idea of being alone and unprotected just doesn’t sit well with me.

“And you need to keep the engine running,” he says. “If you see anything that looks the slightest bit off, I want you to drive like Hell to the Platinum Security office.”

“I can’t drive a stick shift,” I reply.

Axel scowls.

“Well, shit. All right, but you’re still going to keep the engine running. I’d rather have you tear the hell out of my gearbox than be killed.”

“I’m so glad to know I rate higher than your gearbox.”

Axel’s expression softens.

“I’m worried about you.”

“Don’t worry, I won’t let you screw up your first day on the job,” I reply. “I intend to live to see another day.”

“I couldn't care less about the job,” Axel says. “I don’t want you getting hurt.”

I wait for the inevitable quip or cocksure comment. It never comes. Sincerity is such a strange look on Axel I’m utterly discombobulated by it.

I don’t know what to say, so I just nod and get in the car. He rumbles the powerful engine to life and pulls out onto the road.

We leave the beach house behind. I wish I could have left my mind as well, because my thoughts won’t leave me alone. Everything’s been happening so fast, I’ve barely had a chance to breathe, let alone think.

Axel remains quiet on the drive to my place. I believe he’s giving me space in which to think and decompress. Or maybe he’s just thinking about what one-liner he’s going to try out on me next.

No, that’s not fair. I look over at him, his strong jaw set hard, eyes fixed on the road ahead. Axel has acted immature at times, but he did save my life. And now he’s taking a big risk for my sake again, making this extra trip.

My emotions are all over the place right up until we pull into my neighborhood. I start crying before we even see my house through the windshield.

“Hey, what’s wrong?” Axel asks with a look of concern etched onto his face.

“I don’t know,” I manage to choke out between sobs. “I guess I just want to go home. I want this all to be over so I can go home and live my life.”

“I’m sorry,” Axel says. “I’m so sorry, June. Hey, it’s not all bad. Maybe you could make this experience into a movie? I have a guy in mind for the starring role. He has zero acting experience, but he’s a sexy beast and works dirt cheap.”

It’s stupid. So stupid, and it shouldn’t be funny…but a laugh springs out of me without hesitation. For a moment I’m caught in a maelstrom of sobbing and laughter, until the chuckles win out.

“I’m sorry for being a wimp,” I say, searching my purse for a Kleenex or something to clean my face with.

“Here,” Axel says, handing me a handkerchief.

“Thanks.” I wipe my face and sigh. “It must really irk you to hear me complain.”

“What?” His brow furrows up. “Why would you say that?”

“You’re a former soldier, you probably dealt with horrid things happening on the battlefield, and I can’t take a glorified sleepover in a perfectly good beach house.”

Axel takes a long, deep breath. His expression changes, and I see a depth in his gaze that I’ve only detected once before during the limo chase.

“If there’s one thing I learned from war, it’s that everyone has their own battles to face. You can’t judge how something’s going to affect someone else,” he says. “Or, you know, a tree isn’t going to seem smart if you tell a fish to climb…um. I mean, if you tell a tree to climb a fish--”

“A fish will seem stupid if you tell it to climb a tree,” I say, half laughing but still with tears rolling down my cheeks. “God, what am I going to do with you?”

He chuckles, but then his smile fades.

“I can think of a few things…” he says.

I roll my eyes. “Oh my god, don’t make this a thing–”

“I’m just saying, I’m pretty handsome. It’s only natural.”

“Oh my god.” He has me laughing again. Have I ever had as much fun as I’m having right now?

“I’m glad to finally have an appreciative audience. You know what you do in the army more than anything?”

“Fight?” I ask.

“I almost wish that were the case,” he replies with a grin. “No, most of all, we wait. Hurry up and wait. There’s so much time to kill, especially on sentry duty, that I guess I come up with quippy things to say to fight the boredom. Or I did, when I was still an enlisted man.”

We’ve been driving a while since we got to my neighborhood. I look out the window and realize we’ve gone several blocks too far.

“I think you missed my house,” I say.

“No, I didn’t. I’m going to pull up on the other side of the block and cut through your back yard. Most likely they’ll only be watching the front, if they’re watching at all.”

“Oh. I guess that makes sense.” I give him a long look. “Do you miss being in the Army?”

“I just got out,” he says with a chuckle. “I haven’t had time to think about it yet.”

I cock an eyebrow at him.

“Mr. Axel, I do believe you are being evasive.”

“Maybe I am.” He sighs, and the smile fades. Cracks in his jokester facade start to show. “I do miss it, at least some things about it. I mean, I don’t miss waking up at the crack of dawn, or sleeping in mud. But the camaraderie, the sense of purpose…sure, I miss that.”

“Then why didn’t you stay?”

“Did you not hear the part about sleeping in the mud?” He waits until our chuckles subside to speak again. “Man, I don’t know.”

His eyes widen, and I can see that he’s trying to work this out in real time.

“I guess, I’d hit the glass ceiling. I had two options ahead of me–try for a promotion and work my way up the ranks or take a position training the next generation of soldiers.

” He shrugs, eyes scanning the road ahead of us.

“I don’t really want to be an officer. And teaching doesn’t appeal to me, either.

So, I’m doing the private security thing for now. ”

“It seems like moving up the ranks would let you have more control over your life,” I say. “Give you the chance to really make a difference in the world.”

His smile twists into a sneer so dark it looks foreign on his face. I have to do a double take to realize I’m looking at the same man.

“Ha!” His bark of laughter is tinged with bitterness and an acerbic edge. “Make the world a better place? Not possible.”

“Why do you think that?” I ask, somewhat taken aback by his sudden change in attitude.

“Because there’s too much greed,” he sneers. “Too many people pointing fingers and saying, ‘we don’t want THEIR kind around here.’ Too many people who disagree about which god is right, which economic system is right, which talking head is right…”

He seems to realize he’s kind of gone off on a rant. Axel closes his mouth and looks at me sheepishly.

“Guess maybe I should switch to decaf, huh?”

“I’ve yet to see you take a sip of coffee, and don’t worry about it. You’re allowed to have strong opinions, Axel.”

He sighs and stares at me for a long moment before putting his eyes back on the road.

“Yeah, but you’re not exactly thrilled with what I said, are you? I can tell.”

“It’s not about being thrilled. It’s…I’m worried about you.” I shoot him a grin. “But I also believe in you.” I inwardly cringe at my choice of words, but I can’t find it in me to regret them.

Axel’s face goes through a whole spectrum of expressions.

At first, he scoffs, as if utterly incredulous that he would need to be worried over.

Then comes a wide grin, and a bark of laughter.

Axel’s eyes flash up to meet my gaze. He can tell I’m still worried.

So, next comes an eye roll and an edge of anger.

“Are you done?” I ask.

Axel deflates, and sighs.

“Yeah, I’m done. It feels weird to have someone worried about me, I guess.”

Axel pulls the car to a halt near a flood control trench which snakes through my neighborhood. Now I understand his plan. He’s going to use the trench to get to my yard.

“Axel,” I say as he opens the door, “There’s a ten-foot privacy fence.”

“Only ten feet? I’ll be up and over in about five seconds,” Axel says with a wink.

“No, I mean, there’s a gate and I can tell you the code—” and he’s off, rushing toward the guardrail protecting the trench. “Don’t forget the drive is in the bottom right drawer!”

I close the doors and lock the car, crossing my arms over my chest and sighing. I’m prepared to be patient.

To a point.

I wait a full ten minutes before I allow myself to worry. Another fifteen before I start to consider going after him.

I force myself to do some mindless scrolling instead of going after Axel, but the words blur together, and I can’t read the page. Besides, there’s a bunch of stuff in my feed about the big car chase on the freeway. It’s like I can’t get away from my problems no matter what I do.

When Axel’s been gone for a solid twenty-five minutes, I can’t take it anymore. I try his trick of using the concrete-lined flood sluice.

Axel made climbing over the guardrail and dropping down to the trench below look easy.

I grunt with exertion scissoring my legs over the guardrail, and then it looks a lot further down than I thought it would.

I awkwardly inch my way along until I can climb down the side of the trench instead of jumping.

When I get down into the sluice, it doesn’t look all that high after all, but it’s too late to worry about it now. I pad as quietly as I can toward my house, which isn’t all that quiet. The concrete walls seem to magnify and echo the slightest sound.

Not to mention the fact I’m not used to seeing my neighborhood from this angle. Even when I use my back gate, which is rare, it’s not like I go down in the flood trench.

But I do recognize my house, mostly due to the obnoxiously huge gazebo my neighbor has in her backyard. I come up to the fence and scowl at the muddy footprint adhered to the side. He just couldn’t wait, could he?

I input the code and get through the back gate. My grass glistens in the starlight, damp from the recent sprinkler cycle. With some corner of my mind not scared out of its wits, I notice that my rose bush is looking ragged.

The sliding glass door leading from the patio into my kitchen is partly open. I guess he came in this way. I make my way inside, afraid to switch on the lights.

“Axel?” I call out softly. No response, but I think I hear footsteps down the hall. I follow the sound and step around the corner of my bedroom.

Axel kneels on the floor in front of my dresser, desperately fumbling with my translucent, silicone ‘sleeping aid’ in a vain attempt to turn off its vigorous vibration. That idiot. I told him which drawer to open!

Axel looks up at me, his face a mask of terror.

“I…I…”

“Axel! What the hell!”

I grab the nearest weapon at hand, which turns out to be the bougie cushion on my vanity chair. The little tassels hanging off the corner make for a great handle as I whip the mass into his skull.

I want to point out that the cushion is quite old, and I’ve compressed it with my tush for years. The impact turns his head halfway around, and he drops the vibrator onto the floor, where it rolls and bounces about with a horrific rattling noise.

“I got my left and my right confused,” Axel sputters, holding his jaw.

I lower my makeshift weapon and frown.

“Sorry I hit you,” I say, forcing myself to be calm. “I sent you up here, after all—”

The urgent smash of broken glass from down the hall stops me dead in my tracks.

“That was the living room,” Axel says, drawing his gun. All silliness is gone in a heartbeat and he’s transformed into the Terminator. “Stay low, stay quiet, and let me handle this.”