Bodyguard/Husband Read Online Free

She was a little too tall, a little too physical for him. He’d never been one for serious relationships, but when he dated, he generally gravitated toward petite blondes. Women who looked like they needed protection.
    Still, no matter how capable and strong Holly looked, she was also human, fragile, female, and being victimized by a stalker.
    A flight attendant held out a bag of peanuts, and he reached without thinking. A painful twinge in his right shoulder made him groan. He took the peanuts with his left hand.
    “Did you just groan?” Holly asked.
    “No.” Damn it. He was dead tired and he’d been lying in ditches, driving, and flying in planes for the past twenty-four hours. His shoulder was stiff and sore.
    She touched his arm. “Yes, you did. What’s wrong with your shoulder?”
    Jack shrugged off her touch. He didn’t need sympathy. Just sleep. Being even marginally handicapped by injury pissed him off. “Slight on-the-job injury.”
    “Oh.”
    Another wide-eyed “oh.” He shifted his gaze away, uncomfortably sure that she’d picked up on what he hadn’t said. The on-the-job injury was a bullet wound.
    Why did he get the feeling it wasn’t going to be easy to pretend to be married to her? He’d be happierif she weren’t quite so attractive or so determined to take care of herself. That combination called up a primal urge in him—the urge to protect.
    Who was he kidding? The urge to procreate. He clamped his jaw and swept those thoughts from his head. His lack of sleep was eating into his usual detachment.
    This was a job, he told himself, a job like any other.
    Even as he thought it, he knew it wasn’t completely true. Sure, he was the Division’s expert on stalkings and kidnappings, the logical choice to handle this case. But the reason he was here was because he owed Danny Barbour. When Danny called four months ago, Jack had been in the middle of another case, the case that had gotten him shot.
    By the time he’d recovered enough to respond to Danny’s call, it was too late—Danny was dead. He’d let his best friend down, and now he was here to make it up to him.
    It hadn’t been easy to convince his boss that he was ready to be back on the job. Special Agent in Charge Mitch Decker made it his business to worry about everyone under his command, whether they needed worrying about or not. And he had made it very clear what he thought of Jack’s determination to take this case.
    “I’m impressed that you requalified in firearms so soon,” Decker had said. “But I won’t have a vendetta. Detective Barbour was your friend. You won’t be able to maintain the detachment you need to find this killer.”
    Jack had calmly reminded Decker that he hadn’t given Jack the nickname the Ice Man for nothing. Jackwas known for keeping his cool, no matter what the situation.
    What he didn’t tell Decker was that he’d made a promise to himself the day he’d watched his mother die at the hands of her ex-husband, his stepfather. Even though he’d been only thirteen, he’d known from that moment what he wanted to do. He’d devoted his life to stopping violence against women wherever and however he could.
    He flexed his stiff shoulder, then pulled a tin of aspirin from his jacket pocket. He dumped three into his hand, tossed them into his mouth and swallowed them. Not easy without water.
    “I can’t believe you just did that,” Holly said, digging into her voluminous purse. “Were those aspirin? They’ll eat right through your stomach.”
    She handed him a half-empty bottle of water. “Drink all of it.”
    Jack took the water and drank gratefully, a little disconcerted by her attention and concern. He looked at her sidelong and found her watching to be sure he finished the water. He’d like to say it was annoying, but the truth was, he could get used to it. He’d never really had anybody to worry about him. Even his mother had been too busy working or going out to concern herself with a