Jaimie: Fire and Ice (The Wilde Sisters 2)

it? He was self-contained. Or maybe it was that she knew he was withholding some part of himself. Yes. That was it. He was like a handsomely wrapped package, all beautiful paper and gorgeous bows that turned your knees to water even before you knew what it contained.

She’d never been with a man who talked so little about himself.

Men were given to boasting, even if they did it with subtlety. Doctors wanted to be sure you knew that they saved lives. Cops wanted you to know they dealt with bad guys. She’d once dated an archaeologist who worked at the Smithsonian and who’d talked endlessly about a dig in Libya and the ancient curse on it until her eyes had almost crossed and she’d come within a breath of saying, OK, I get it, you’re really Indiana Jones in disguise.

Fast forward to Zacharias, who hadn’t even hinted at his occupation.

He was rich. The car. The condo. Rich, yes, but she couldn’t picture him sitting behind a desk with a dozen phones ringing at the same time.

Which was, she thought, glancing at him from under lashes, about as foolishly biased an assessment as possible.

She had three brothers. They were all big, strong, macho guys, and two of them sat behind desks. So did the third, some of the time.

Strange, how often she looked at Zacharias and thought of Jacob. Or Travis. Or Caleb. Mostly Caleb, who could talk your ears off about the law but go strangely silent about his past.

“You know, you remind me of my brother, Caleb.”

The Prius swerved right, then left.

“What?”

Zacharias was staring at her. Jaimie laughed at the look on his face.

“Sorry. I guess it sounds flaky, you know, telling the man you’re…the man you’re with that he reminds you of your brother. The thing is, he—Caleb, I mean—is an attorney now, but he used to work for the government. Some agency he never talks about…God! I’m making this sound so Machiavellian!”

“Shadow Inc.,” Zach said, speaking pretty much as fast as his pulse was racing. Man, he needed to get Caleb Wilde out of this conversation. “I own a company called Shadow Inc.”

“Shadow Ink? You mean, as in tattoos?”

There was nothing like a little laughter to provide diversion.

“As in high-tech security.”

“Got it. Men in Black.”

He reached for her hand and brought it to his lips.

“Sorry to disappoint you, but last time I looked, we didn’t have any space aliens on the payroll.”

“Ah. Well, into each life—”

“A little rain must fall, except this isn’t rain anymore; it isn’t even sleet. I forget. What do you call that white stuff in these parts? Could it be snow?”

“This is the South. It never snows in the South.”

“This is not the South. And you get blizzards in wherever this is.”

“The stuff isn’t even sticking. And you’re changing the subject. What do you do at Shadow Inc.?”

So much for diversion.

“We protect corporations and people.”

“From?”

“From whatever they need protecting from.”

Jaimie gave a soft laugh. “My brother, Jacob, would tell you that you shouldn’t end a sentence with a preposition.”