Safe by Rachel Hanna Read Free Book Online

you?” Aidan asked with a wink.
     
    “Very funny… This place is boring.”
     
    “Why don’t you read a book or something?” he asked.
     
    “I guess I will have to. Can I sit outside?” she asked.
     
    “No way.”
     
    “Aidan, I need some air. Seriously. You can sit with me.”
     
    “No.”
     
    “Please? What about the terrace off my bedroom? We will be high up and facing the mountainside. No one can get to me that way.” She put her hands in front of her face like she was pleading and got down on her knees in front of him. “Please, kind sir,” she said with a smile.
     
    “Very funny. Get up, you nut. I guess that would be okay. Let me make us some coffee first.”
     
    Carly watched as Aidan made a pot of coffee. He had always been tall and lanky, but now he had broad shoulders and muscular arms. His buns weren’t too bad either. Wearing a pair of form-fitting jeans, a long-sleeve black Henley t-shirt and cowboy boots, Aidan had turned into a sexy man over the last decade.
     
    “Are you ogling me?” Aidan asked as he turned around and caught Carly staring at him.
     
    “Of course not,” she stammered as she walked up the stairs in front of him. “Don’t flatter yourself.”
     
    Aidan and Carly walked into her bedroom. It was pretty stark compared to her room at home with all of her personal belongings. She missed having her own stuff around, but her house also reminded her of her murdering husband.
     
    Walking out onto the terrace and feeling the crisp breeze of the mountains in November, Carly felt peace envelop her. She had only been cooped up for one day, but it felt like a lifetime. She didn’t know how she would manage staying inside so much. She was used to doing her own thing - coming and going as she pleased.
     
    “It’s getting cold out here,” she said as she wrapped her arms around herself.
     
    “I love this time of year,” Aidan said.
     
    “I know. I remember that about you. We would always go up to the Harvest Festival around this time,” Carly said smiling at the memory.
     
    “Remember when Lucas Oliver fell into the apple bobbing station?” Aidan said with a laugh.
     
    “Oh, yes. He was such an idiot. Wonder whatever happened to him?”
     
    “I think he ran off to join the circus,” Aidan said chuckling. “Probably being shot out of a cannon about right now.”
     
    Aidan’s cell phone rang. “I have to take this. It’s my supervisor. Maybe he has news,” he said as he walked into her bedroom and down the hallway. Being nosy, as usual, Carly sneaked around the corner to listen in on his call.
     
    “Bill, we have to find this guy. Well, who’s working on it? We need more guys working on it, then. I care because I am protecting her. It’s my job, you know.”
     
    Carly could feel the intensity in his voice. He was obviously aggravated at his co-workers for not finding the hitman, but it had only been one day. Maybe he didn’t want to spend so much time with her. Maybe she should let him know that he could have the downstairs and she would stay upstairs.
     
    “Keep me posted. I want to hear anything as soon as it comes up. We have to find this guy, okay?” Aidan said. Carly quickly ran back out to the terrace.
     
    “Everything okay?” she asked nonchalantly as he reappeared outside.
     
    “No word yet. They are still trying to track the guy. They are going to make contact with his aunt in South Georgia.”
     
    “Good. I still can’t believe it could be Marcus. He was my friend… or so I thought,” she said looking off into the distance.
     
    “Well, sometimes we think someone is our friend, but they end up hurting us,” Aidan didn’t mean to say it out loud, but his mouth was working faster than his brain.
     
    “You’re talking about me, aren’t you?” Carly asked as she looked up at him. There was a pain on his face, even after a decade, and she wasn’t expecting it.
     
    “Maybe… a little,” he said squaring up his