Guarding Grayson (8 page)

Brynne snickered and swiped her damp face. “Good point. Who needs him? We can eat supper without him … and a whole lot more.”

She did not say the words with much conviction, but E’ea had faith—by the end of her counseling session, Brynne would experience a change of heart. E’ea had not reached over one hundred years of age without learning a thing or two about love.

“Except, aren’t you supposed to be protecting him?” Brynne asked, her heart-rate and respiration accelerating, human signs of anxiety. “What if that ugly light comes back?”

E'ea paused, surprised and then saddened. "
You remember the light. I had hoped … but we will discuss that later. Grayson will be fine for a few hours. Our opponent prefers to work in darkness, as your human senses are at such a disadvantage then.”

However, if he was not back by dusk, they would definitely go looking for him. Grayson might be a big boy, but he was
not
allowed out after dark by himself—not with a deadly assassin on this planet.

One who might be even now on Gray’s trail again.

Gray went for a long walk in the southern New Mexico afternoon. The clouds to the south were closer and heavier. They’d have a thunderstorm by dark, but it hadn’t cooled off yet.

By the time he got back, he was hot, thirsty and hungry enough to eat most of whatever Brynne had prepared. And he was no closer to sorting out his feelings about Brynne, her companion, and the chaos that was his life now.

First, he had to deal with Brynne. Had to show her that they couldn’t go back to their old … co-dependence or whatever it had been. It wasn’t healthy for either of them.

He worked on a short speech, and had it straight by the time he jogged up onto his Gran’s front porch.

Brynne was lounging on the sofa when he walked in. He waited for her to give him a sad, accusing look, but she merely continued to read her
Southwest Travel
magazine. Well, okay. That was better than her sitting dejectedly at the kitchen table with her dinner preparations spread around her.

“Hello,” he said, eyeing her.

“Hello.” Her voice was calm, but she didn’t look up from her magazine.

Gray blinked. He raked back his hair, damp with sweat, and left his hand on top of his head.

“Listen, Brynne, we need to talk.”

“Yes, we do,” she agreed, finally looking up. “I’m not sure how much longer we’ll be stuck here together, so we should get a few things straight.”

“Just what I was gonna say.” And what the heck was she doing, switching gears on him? The look in her brown eyes did not say, ‘
Oh, Gray, stay with me, hold me
.’ It said something else entirely. Something he didn’t like, and yeah, that made him a perverse a-hole and he didn't care.

She waited and he held out a hand in elaborate politeness. “Oh, no, you go first.”

“Fine.” She sat up and crossed her legs, giving him a sweet view of the back of her thigh and the curve of her ass in her tight shorts. “First, I’m not having sex with you, so don’t ask. Secondly, I don’t mind cooking one meal a day, but only if you clean up after. And thirdly—"

Gray’s brain was still stuck on number one. He held up his hand. “Wait. Wait a darn minute. Who said anything about me wanting to have sex with you? Wasn’t me. I think I would’ve remembered that.” Probably.

She gave him a pitying look. “Gray, I know you. You always want to have sex.”

“So? I’m a guy—it’s in our makeup. Doesn’t mean I wanna have it with you.”

Whoa, he hadn’t meant to sound that harsh, and anyway, it was a lie. He did want to have sex with her, he just didn’t
want to
want to.

She sat up very straight and glared at him. “Fine. Because I don’t want to have it with you, either. You’re mean, and you live like a—a pig.”

His brows flew up and his head went back.
A pig?
Just because he left the lid off the toothpaste, and didn’t wipe out the sink every single time he shaved, or put away every single dish he used? He wasn’t any messier here than he’d ever been.

Then she swept him with a look and wrinkled her nose, and his cheeks burned as he realized belatedly that he was probably a little ripe from his hot trek.

“Well excuse me, your highness,” he drawled. “I’ll just take my offensive male self out of your way.”

He reached back and rucked his shirt up and off over his head.

Her eyes widened, and then fell to follow his hands as he reached for the fastening of his jeans. Color bloomed in her cheeks. “Wh-what are you doing?”

Gray smiled to himself. She sounded a little breathless there. “Who, me? I’m just gonna go take a shower and head out, maybe find some friendly companionship.”

Her gaze snapped to his, and she gave him a look like he’d suggested sex in church, or something. “You mean you’re going out to look for—for a hookup?”

He shrugged. “You said it, not me. But you know me, always ready for sex.”

He sauntered toward the bathroom, enjoying having had the last word. Until she spoke again.

“Good idea,” she called after him. “I think I’ll do the same.”

Gray froze in the bathroom doorway, his eyes narrowing, jaw clenching.

Oh, no she would not. Not in his lifetime
.

There were plenty of women who were cut out for quick, meaningless sex, but Brynne was not one of them. She should have ‘
commitment
’ inked right above the sweet curls on her mons.

He had to make it a cold shower to quell the arousal brought on by
that
image.

Then he toweled off and eyed himself in the bathroom mirror. He could do with a shave, too. Ten minutes later he was dressed in a fitted, gray-blue shirt and jeans, and his favorite low boots of palomino leather. He combed his hair and slapped on some shaving cologne, shoved his wallet in his back pocket, slid on his heavy silver cuff and ring, and was ready to go.

As he walked down the hall, Brynne brushed past him, headed the other way. He smiled at the sidelong look she gave him. She’d given him the cologne—and the shirt too, come to think of it.

“May as well ride down to the Kokopelli with me,” he told her generously, pausing in the sitting room doorway to roll his shirt sleeves up partway to his elbows. “Gonna be a storm later, you don’t wanna get wet.”

She stopped in the doorway of the bathroom. “Hmm, I guess so. I can always get a ride home with someone else.”

Then she shut the door behind her, and what was left of his good humor evaporated with the snap of the latch.

“Yeah, as long as it’s with another chick, or a guy over seventy,” he muttered.

He stalked into the kitchen to assuage his growling stomach. He ended up eating out of the refrigerator container. Brynne had made tamale casserole, his Gran’s recipe. It was delicious, even cold.

It would taste even better with a beer, but he’d wait until he got to the bar to start drinking. The sheriff looked like he’d hand out DUI’s with pleasure, and if there really was a mysterious assassin after him out there somewhere, Gray would rather have the sheriff on
his
side, not to mention be sober enough to fight.

Not that Gray really thought anyone could find him here … except E’ea had, hadn’t she?

Gray dumped his last bite of casserole back in the container and put the food back in the fridge, his appetite gone. Maybe he and Brynne should stay home this evening, with his loaded gun close by.

Except that staying home meant they’d be in the same rooms together, which would test his resolve not to touch her.

And–he peered out the windows–it was gloomy outside, but that was the approaching thunder-storm, not nightfall. He straightened with a snap and scowled. Anyway, what the hell? Was he a strong, savvy guy in his prime, or a frail, old geezer with impaired faculties and paranoia?

He was going out to a bar if he felt like it. This was Magic, not a big city—hell, not even a small city. Safe as could be, even if nearly everyone in it was weird.

He felt better … until Brynne walked into the sitting room wearing a little dress that looked like a few gauzy white scarves sewn together to flutter around her, the points teasing her elbows and thighs, and baring
way
too much of the inside curves of her breasts. Hell, it was cut down to where the high waistband gathered just below her breasts.

And the way she’d been eating, she’d already put on a few needed pounds, so her curves were more pronounced. Her hair was in a sexy tousle that bared the lobes of her ears and the tender curve of her throat. She looked … lickable. Bitable.

She wore little turquoise gladiator sandals that bared her toes and rose in narrow straps around her ankles, and carried a matching wrap.

“You need to put that on,” he said, gesturing at the wrap.

She scowled at him, her cheeks flushing, and Gray realized it had sounded more like an order. But he set his jaw. He was in the right here. She’d have every man in the Kokopelli drooling down her cleavage, and wanting to get their sweaty hands on her.

“Maybe you should just wear your dark glasses,” she told him, tossing her head. “That way, you won’t have to be offended by my attire—which by the way, is perfectly okay. Bebe Baldwin wore a dress cut lower than this to the awards, and she’s much bigger on top than I am.”

The actress could show up on the red carpet nude for all he cared. “Yeah, well, she’s not you.”

Brynne’s scowl deepened—although she looked just as pretty with that line between her delicate brows. “I know I’m not a movie star, Gray. You don’t have to rub it in.”

“What? No, that’s not what I meant. You look … fine.”

He’d stepped in it now. How did that always happen with women? Brynne didn’t want him thinking about sex with her, so he wasn’t going to tell her she looked edible, that the dress made a man long for it to slide a little more to the side up top, and for the bottom to flip up in a sudden breeze.  Her long legs were just as pretty as ever.

And, even more than her appearance, her back-talk and feisty glare turned him on.

He turned on his heel, jingling his car keys in one hand. “C’mon, if you’re coming with me, let’s go.”

Maybe if he got around other people, he could quell the urge to grab her and show her without words exactly how much he liked the way she looked.

The Kokopelli sat just off Main Street in downtown Magic, between a touristy shop and a coffee bar, both closed in the evening. The street was lined with cars and pickup trucks. The front doors were wide open to the July evening, the beat of a Los Lonely Boys dance tune drifting out, along with voices, laughter and the clack of balls from pool tables.

Gray walked around to open Brynne’s door. She tossed her head, speaking for the first time since they’d walked out to his rental car.

“Don’t feel you need to stay with me,” she said. “If you meet someone, I’m sure I can find a ride home.”

“Great,” he said, rolling his jaw to loosen it. “Good to know I’m free to enjoy myself. Knock yourself out, babe.”

He followed her inside the place, decorated in southwest style with graphics of the
kokopelli
, a hump-backed flute player with what looked like antlers protruding from his head, and some decent prints of local scenery.

Gray watched from the corner of his eye as Brynne sauntered gracefully through the crowded tables to the bar, slipping up onto a stool between a cowboy and a skinny young guy playing with his phone.

Phone dude wouldn’t be a problem, but Gray would keep a close eye on the cowboy, who would not be saddling up any little blondes tonight. Although he might let Brynne learn a bit of a lesson before stepping in—serve her right if the guy breathed cheap beer in her face.

Gray grabbed a stool around the curve of the long bar where he could keep eyes on Brynne and ordered a beer. Then he remembered she wouldn’t have any money on her—and her ID was likely at the bottom of Coeur d'Alene Lake in her car.

“I’m buying for the blonde in the white dress too,” he told the bartender. “Add her to my tab.”

The bartender nodded, handed Gray his beer and went to lean on the bar by Brynne, who had both the cowboy and the geek with the phone—who suddenly didn’t look quite as harmless—eyeing her like happy hour munchies.

The bartender chatted with Brynne, who smiled back in a way that made her pretty face light up, and Gray’s shoulders tighten up and heat rise up his neck. The dude laughed, slapped the bar and went to mix her a drink. A blended margarita—that was her favorite. One of them and she was a happy camper, two and she got amorous. Which meant if she ordered drink number two, he’d be watching her every move. Right. He’d be doing that anyway.

The bartender served her the drink on a napkin and then wandered back in Gray’s direction, helping other customers on his way. “You and those two guys offered to buy for her,” he told Gray with a grin. “You wanna get the first one?”

Gray shoved his hair back, glowered at Brynne and her two admirers, and then shrugged. “Whatever.”

He deliberately turned away, just as a brunette in a tight, low-cut red top and jeans that had apparently been painted on, slid up onto the barstool next to him. She tossed back her long hair and gave Gray a sultry smile.

Gray smiled back, appreciating the show. Had to admire a woman with confidence.

“Hello,” she said in a voice that matched her smile. “I’m Sondra.”

“I’m Gray.”

“I’m new in town,” she told him. “This seems like the place, hmm?”

“It’s the only bar in town,” he agreed, “Unless you count The Stumble In, and I wouldn’t since you’re under sixty and don’t smoke like a chimney.”

She laughed, and the hair on the back of Gray’s neck stood up. Somehow, her husky chuckle reminded him of the way E’ea laughed, although why he was not sure, because no way could that be right. This woman's laugh didn’t sound like a donkey's bray, just … weird.

He shook it off, and signaled the bartender. “Buy you a drink?”

She tossed her hair again. “Sure. I’ll have what you’re having.”