“Okay, well, I’m just trying to decide if that’s the stupidest thing you ever said to me or the second stupidest. I’m weighing it out.”
“Ian—”
“No!” he exploded, drilling a finger into my collarbone. “The only place I want to be is with you, and getting between you and Hartley is my entire plan.”
“I don’t want you to get hurt!” I yelled back.
“Then don’t do anything stupid and make sure you fuckin’ protect me,” he growled. “There’s no way I get hurt with you watching my back.”
We both went silent, eyes locked on one another.
He had such faith, and I realized it was the same I had in him. “I’m—” I took a breath. “I’m scared, is all.”
“I know,” he said, stepping into me, into my space, hands on my sides, over my ribs as I wrapped my arms around his neck. “But it’s gonna be okay. I’m not gonna leave you.”
“That’s very comforting, marshal,” I said before I kissed him.
His arms slid around my back as he leaned into the kiss, his tongue seeking entrance that I happily conceded.
The doorbell ringing was the only thing that kept us vertical. It bothered me that, on the way down the stairs, Ian drew his gun and called through the door instead of just opening it. I hated that we had to be on guard in our neighborhood, in our home.
“It’s clear,” Ian let me know as he opened the door. “Finish packing.”
I did as I was told, and minutes later Ian thumped up the stairs, chuckling.
“What’s funny?”
He lifted his head to look at me, and I was struck by the sight of my beautiful man and his crinkly-eyed smile. Sometimes he simply took my breath away.
“Your alias,” he said, laughing, holding up the ID for me.
“Smith?” I read indignantly.
“Because you’re Jones now!” He broke into raucous laughter, finding the whole thing much funnier than it was.
“Who has the small brain?” I asked pointedly.
He would have responded, but his phone rang. I went back to packing while he answered, realizing it was a bit more difficult than I’d thought it would be. After a second I caught a scrap of the conversation.
“I’m sorry. Would you repeat that, sir?”
Kage.
Shit.
I swallowed quickly and then turned to Ian. Even from across the room, I could see him staring daggers at me.
Fuck.
“I understand, sir,” he said as his free hand balled into a fist.
I really wouldn’t have to worry about Hartley anymore, because Ian was going to be the one to kill me. He pivoted to face the wall and drove his fist into it like a sledgehammer. It rattled the armoire beside it.
Slowly, as to not arouse suspicion because I didn’t want him to run after me, I started backing out of the room. As I heard him wrapping up, I quickened my pace.
“Miro!” he roared the second the call ended.
It was not a “run for cover” yell or in any way cautionary. He was pissed.
I decided the better part of valor was to lock myself in the bathroom and was actually impressed that the door held when he kicked it. Although all the doors in our place were solid wood, so I should have had a bit more faith.
“Open this fuckin’ door!” he demanded, kicking it again for emphasis.
“Why’re you mad?”
“Because you talked to Kage and asked him to make me stay here!”
“As I said,” I replied softly, hoping that if I sounded calm, he would become so. “All I was thinking of was you getting hurt, and it kills me even to think about.”
He banged the door. “The only time I don’t wanna be around you is when I’m deployed, yeah? Otherwise, asshole, I wanna be with you.”
“I feel the same,” I said, loud enough so he could hear me from where he was on the other side.
“Well, then,” he coughed, “stop trying to ditch me.”
“But that’s not what we’re talking about,” I qualified. “I cannot, will not, have you hurt, and I don’t see how you expect me to change that.”
It got quiet, so much so that I would have thought he’d walked away if I didn’t know better.
“Miro.”
Even through the barrier between us, I heard the change in his voice. He wasn’t mad anymore. The emotion was gone, replaced by something else altogether.
“Love, open the door.”
Love.
It was crazy. Every drop of air should not have left my body just because Ian Doyle called me something that wasn’t some part of my name.
And mean it—love—because he did.
I heard it in his tone; it was gentle and possessive and I knew I was being oversentimental and vulnerable because a psychopath was after me, but still… Ian called me his love, and it was dear and sexy and very, very hot.
It was a wonder I didn’t combust.
Love.
God, who knew I was such a sap?
“Please.”
The growl with just a hint of delicious, seductive evil, the languorous timbre of curling smoke and slow-poured whiskey made me whimper in spite of myself.