Bear Claw Bodyguard by Jessica Andersen Read Free Book Online Page A

to hell his patches would hold. He and Tori exchanged a few words now and then on the practicalities, and once they were out of the Forgotten, she set aside the pistol, turned up the heat and sagged against her door, her eyes still moving, watching for trouble even in the moonlit darkness.
    They both knew that if there was going to be a problem at this point, they likely wouldn’t see it coming. The SUV’s headlights lit the night with an “aim the RPG here” sign in neon, but it wasn’t like he could turn them off. He was having a devil of a time staying on the trail as it was. So he drove, wincing with every bounce and bang, imagining his patches loosening up and the hoses teetering on the brink of separation.
    He was strung out, his eyes burning, his body caught in a surreal state of exhausted terror that had him hallucinating as he tried his damnedest to see the track. That had to be a hallucination, because there was no way—
    Tori jolted and straightened. “It’s the tower! We made it!”
    He blinked hard, then had to blink again to clear his burning eyes, but the lights didn’t disappear along with the gritty fog shrouding his vision. They stayed true—small, amber pinpricks that expanded to glows and then became the solar floodlights that topped the observatory.
    Station Fourteen had never looked so good.
    “We could walk it from here,” he rasped, feeling the tension draining away, leaving him nearly limp with relief.
    “Let’s not and say we did,” she said drily. Then she flashed him a grin, her eyes gleaming with the same mad joy that was suddenly pumping through him.
    He snorted, guffawed, cracked up. And they rolled into the parking lot laughing like a pair of idiots.
    The second he took his foot off the gas and hit the brake, though, the engine thudded and died. Kaput. Done.
    He choked off the tension-relieving laughter, letting it bleed away in a long sigh. “Holy crap, Tori. We made it.”
    She reached across and gripped his wrist as she had done before, only this time she let her hand linger. “We only made it because of you. Thank you, Jack. I…” She shook her head. “Thank you.”
    The old “just doing my job” got stuck in his throat, locked there by the flare of heat that kindled at the point where she was touching him and rolled up his arm to fill his chest. He just shook his head, not even sure what he was denying anymore as he turned his grip inside hers to thread their fingers together and tug her closer.
    She could have pretended not to understand, could’ve pulled away. She didn’t do either of those things, though. Instead, as the breath backed up in his lungs and the warmth turned to a gnawing ache mixed with flames, she leaned toward him in the darkness. He lifted his other hand and drew his fingers along the side of her face and back to brush her hair behind one ear, giving her one last chance to retreat. She didn’t, though.
    And so, in a broken-down SUV that had died in the back of beyond, he broke the rules he’d spent most of his adult life figuring out—three dates to a kiss, at least tento take it further, everything slow and methodical, and designed to test the compatibility and long-term potential of each match. This wasn’t the third date, wasn’t even a date, but he didn’t care. All he cared about was kissing Tori.

Chapter Five
    As Jack’s lips touched hers, Tori decided that she didn’t care that he was a cop and a local; she only cared that he was solid and warm against her. His mouth was firm, his grip demanding even though she knew he would let her go if she pulled away.
    She crowded closer instead, and parted her lips to taste him.
    A groan rumbled in his chest as their tongues touched and slid, and her soft moan echoed beneath the sound, coming from the sharp, masculine flavor and the heat that seared through her, surrounded her. He was there, he was real, and that was a shock to the senses in the wake of the last few hours, which felt suddenly