Hurry Up And Wait (Owens Protective Services #24)

22. Isla

22

ISLA

I rushed out of the shower, flinging my towel across the room as I grabbed something sexy out of my dresser. I’d been waiting for this call all day—the one where Kavanaugh would tell me he was only fifteen minutes away. Seeing him on the weekends wasn’t nearly enough for me, but that was life with a protection agent.

Shimmying into my lacy thong, I cringed at the feel of it wedging between my butt cheeks. I didn’t find it at all comfortable, but Kavanaugh liked the look. I was just wiggling into my negligee when I heard her footsteps on the stairs. I tugged it the rest of the way down and rushed to my bedroom door.

“I need you to leave!”

“Well, hello to you too. Nice…boobs.”

I covered my chest and glared at her. “Don’t stare at my boobs.”

“Well, you’re the one walking around with them hanging out.”

“Kavanaugh’s coming home tonight.”

“Ah, well, that explains so much. But I’m not leaving.”

“What? Come on,” I begged. “I haven’t seen him in a week!”

“Oh, you poor, sad woman. Whatever will you do?”

“Don’t make me throat punch you.”

She laughed hysterically at that. “Like you could manage that. ”

I hurried after her, still holding my chest. “I’ll give you a hundred dollars.”

“Yeah, like I need it.”

“I’ll…wash all your clothes!”

She turned, quirking an eyebrow at me. “For how long?”

“A month!”

“Not enough.”

I stomped my foot, wondering how I was going to win this one, but then I thought of it. “I’ll set you up with one of the guys at OPS.”

She slowly turned with an interested look on her face. “I’ve already met them.”

“Not all of them.”

By the intrigued look she shot me, I knew I was winning this one. “Tell me more.”

“There’s one…a lone reed, if you will. He’s handsome, sexy, former military, and…” I waited for it, drawing it out long enough to really hook her. “And he’s a mechanic.”

She stepped back, her eyes wide as she pressed her hand to her chest. “You lie.”

“I would never.”

“But…” She shook her head, still trying to wrap her mind around it. “No, he’s married to Rae.”

“Not him. Bowie. He’s very single right now, just out of a relationship with an older woman, and he’s looking for someone to take away the pain. That could be you.”

“That could definitely be me.”

“And like I said, he’s a mechanic.”

“A mechanic,” she whispered, her eyes drifting off in thought. “I do like a mechanic.”

“Everyone does.”

Her eyes flitted to mine and a smile curved her lips. “I accept your deal. I’ll grab my things and be gone. But…I expect you to pay up. I want a real date. A good date. And if you don’t deliver…”

She didn’t have to say anything else. I knew the threat wasn’t idle, and if I didn’t come through, there would be hell to pay. I thrust out my hand and shook on it, then watched as she hurried to gather up her things. Ten minutes later, I heard the door click and she was gone.

I sighed, checking my phone again, waiting for Kavanaugh to call. While I had the time, I straightened up my room, hanging up my towel and cleaning the bathroom. I worked up a small sweat, but that was nothing compared to the workout I would get later.

By the time I was done and looked at my phone again, I was surprised to see only a half hour had gone by. That just meant there was enough time to get myself thoroughly relaxed with some wine. So, I went to the kitchen and poured myself a glass, then carried the bottle in with me to the living room where I proceeded to sprawl out on the couch, trying to find the best position for Kavanaugh to find me in when he opened the front door.

I leaned back against the arm of the couch with my legs spread and my arm over my head, but even though it seemed provocative, it most definitely was not sexy. Then I went for a pose like Rose from Titanic, but it wasn’t very comfortable and made it rather hard to drink my wine.

I was just about to try another pose when my phone finally rang. Squealing, I grabbed it and took a moment to gather my wits so I didn’t gush as soon as I answered.

Clearing my throat, I tried to sound seductive. “Hello?”

“Isla? Are you alright?”

“Yes, why?”

“I don’t know, you sound all croaky.”

I rolled my eyes. Well, there went my seductive voice. “I was just laying down. So, are you almost here? I have on the sexiest outfit for you, and my sister is nowhere in sight.”

But instead of getting the enthusiastic response I had hoped for, silence filled the line. “I’m not coming home.”

The happiness inside me instantly deflated. He wasn’t coming home, which meant I wouldn’t see him until next weekend. “Oh,” I said, trying not to sound as miserable as I felt. “Well…I’ll see you in a week, right?”

But again, I was met with silence. “I’m not sure when I’ll be home. This job…it’s not going the way I thought. I’m hoping I can end it soon.”

I didn’t know much about security or protection, but the way he phrased that didn’t sound right to me. He was hoping to end it soon…Did that mean he was going to kill someone to put an end to it? I had so many questions, but I kept my mouth shut as I thought them through. I didn’t want to become the girlfriend who constantly questioned her boyfriend.

“It’s fine,” I went with, hoping that didn’t sound like I didn’t care. “I’m sure you’ll be home when you can.”

“I miss you,” he murmured. “More than you know.”

And I really wanted to leave it at that, but my stupid brain just wouldn’t stop wondering about this job. “You know, you never told me about this job. What is it?”

“Why?”

The question caught me off guard. “I was just wondering. You never actually told me what kind of job you were doing that you could come home on the weekends. Are you guarding an heiress or something?”

“Nothing like that.”

But when he didn’t say more, an uneasy feeling spread through my gut. “Okay…is it someone in trouble with the mob or something?”

“Look, I’ll be home when I can. I promise.”

“I didn’t think you wouldn’t be,” I said carefully. “Kavanaugh, is there a reason you don’t want to tell me about this job?”

He huffed out a laugh. “No, I just don’t like to talk about the job when I could be talking to you about more interesting things.”

“And I love that too, but I’m asking.”

“Look, it’s just a job. There’s nothing special about it,” he said irritatedly. “I didn’t realize you didn’t trust me.”

Wow, talk about defensive. Maybe he was just having a bad day. Or maybe he was just pissed because he wasn’t coming home. Either way, pushing to find out more information right now wasn’t the way to end this night.

“I do trust you. I’m sorry, I was just curious. ”

A heavy sigh filtered through the phone. I could imagine him running his fingers through his hair in frustration, messing up that perfect mop of brown hair. “I’m sorry. I’m just pissed. I wanted to be with you, and when you answered the phone and told me you had something special on for me…Fuck, I’m really pissed right now.”

That gnawing feeling in my gut eased significantly at his words. He was frustrated and I was making things worse by picking at something he didn’t want to deal with. “Hey, I’m sorry. I just wish you were home. But we can make the most of it.”

“Yeah?” He didn’t sound too hopeful that I could save this night. So, I was going to have to prove to him that it didn’t matter if he was halfway across the country. We could still enjoy the night together.

“You know, we could always turn this into a video call.”

“What did you have in mind?” he choked out.

“Well, I could show you my negligee, and then you can walk me through exactly what you would do if you were here with me.”

I bit my lip as he groaned over the phone. “Fucking hell, now I’m really pissed I’m not there.”

“I have a bottle of wine and the house to myself for the next twelve hours. That gives us plenty of time to explore all the ways we can make each other come without actually touching each other.”

His tortured groan slid over the line and straight to my clit. “Fuck, I really wish I was there with you.”

“Then show me.”

“I’m going right now. Stop yelling at me!”

Riley sighed over the phone. It had been two hours since my non-date with Kavanaugh ended, and my sister hadn’t stopped bothering me since the moment she returned, wondering when I was going to get this date for her.

“You promised.”

“Yes, and I rolled out of bed and took a shower less than an hour ago. Would you fucking relax? ”

“You promised.”

“You could have come with me.”

“No. I don’t think I could handle meeting him yet. After all, I want to be surprised.”

I snickered. “You just don’t want to see him in his coveralls.”

She made a humming noise at that. “Can you imagine? I might not get any work done the rest of the day.”

“You won’t after I visit him either. I’m going to hear about him for the rest of the day—about how excited you are for your date.”

“If he agrees to go. What if he has no desire to go out with me?” A hint of fear crept into her voice. “What if he says no? Oh crap, I should have come along.”

“Would you like me to turn around and get you?”

“No. Yes! No.”

I pulled to the side of the road and waited. “Which is it?”

“No. Definitely no.”

“Okay, I’m turning around.”

“I’ll be ready in five.”

I hung up and checked traffic in the rearview mirror before turning around, but just as I was about to, I spotted that gray car in my side mirror. He was pulled over too. Waiting. Why the fuck was that car back? Nerves shot through me as I turned around and headed back in the direction of the house. I was about to go right past the car, but as I stared out the window, I realized it was impossible to see who was following me. The windows were tinted, and I hadn’t gotten a good enough look through the windshield.

I slammed on the brakes as I came up on a car too fast, too preoccupied with checking out the vehicle. By the time I calmed down and looked in the rearview mirror, the car was gone and I’d lost my chance to get the plate number.

By the time I got home, I was a wreck, worried that Shawn was somehow following me again. He couldn’t be, though. OPS would have been informed if he had left the state. I laid on the horn as I sat in front of the house. I didn’t want to stay too long for fear that the car would follow me and whoever was inside would blow me up again .

Luckily, Riley came running out seconds later and slid into the seat beside me. “Did you lock the door?”

“Of course I did.”

“And you set the alarm?”

She shot me a sidelong look. “Yeah. What’s going on?”

“I saw the car again.” I let out a long breath and glanced at her before pulling back out onto the road. “When I turned around to get you, it was pulled over on the side of the road behind me.”

Her eyes were wide as she stared at me. “Did you see him?”

I shook my head. “The windows were tinted. And then I nearly got in an accident trying to get his plates. So, I still don’t have anything to tell OPS.”

“Well…we’re going there. We can check on Shawn while we’re visiting the mechanic.”

I nodded, my fingers tightening around the steering wheel. I didn’t want to talk to them if it was nothing, but I couldn’t risk getting blown up again. “Kavanaugh can’t know about this.”

“Because he would put a whole army on the house?”

“And then some. Besides, he’s really stressed with work right now. The last thing I want to do is give him another distraction.”

She shot me a grin. “You never told me how last night was.”

“He didn’t come.”

She snorted. “Well, that means you’re not doing your job.”

“No, I mean, he didn’t come home.”

Her jaw gaped. “You mean I left the house for nothing?”

“Trust me, I wasn’t too happy about it either.” I sighed heavily, not wanting to talk about it, but needing to figure out if I was being too weird about the whole thing. “He didn’t want to talk to me about the job.”

“Well, that’s normal, right? It’s a protection job, which means he probably can’t talk about it.”

“I guess, but…he said something about me not trusting him. I don’t know,” I shook my head. “It felt like he was hiding something from me.”

She was quiet for a moment. “Do you trust him? ”

“Of course,” I huffed. “Why wouldn’t I?”

I didn’t want to think about what her silence meant, but as I pulled down the driveway of OPS, I knew she wasn’t through talking about this. As soon as I put the car in park, she put her hand on mine, stopping me from getting out.

“I think you need to listen to your gut. If something’s off with him, trust your instincts. You waited too long with Shawn. It would be a shame to waste time on someone who’s not being one hundred percent honest with you.”

“Kavanaugh is not Shawn.”

“No, but you guys got together awfully fast after not seeing each other for years. How well do you really know him?”

And that was the problem. I didn’t know him at all. Our years apart had put so much distance between us that the man he was today was a mystery. Looking back on the past few weeks, it was fraught with danger, worry, and sex. We hadn’t really talked about anything other than my relationship with Shawn. And that made things very one-sided, which was never a good thing.

“I’ll talk to him about it when he comes home next.”

She took a deep breath and blew it out. “Good. Then let’s talk to this hunk and get me a date!”

Her enthusiasm was a little too much so early in the morning, but I followed her to the garage and prepared myself for whatever happened next. But when we opened the door and walked through, nothing could prepare me for what I saw.

“Yeah, we’re heading out tomorrow night.”

“Alright, I’ll have it done for you then.” Duke looked up at us, smiling congenially, but it wasn’t him I was looking at.

Red turned to face me, a grin appearing on his face for a brief moment before he understood why I was staring at him slack-jawed. “Hey, Isla.”

“Is Kavanaugh with you?”

“Kavanaugh?” Riley asked. “No, we’re here to see this hottie mechanic.”

“What hottie mechanic?” Duke asked .

“Uh…he didn’t come home,” Red answered, his eyes flicking behind me.

I turned around and saw Eli yanking open the door. He was here too. Confusion swirled inside me as I put the pieces together. “He’s not here, but you are.”

“Obviously,” Riley snorted. “Now that we’ve cleared that up, where’s the mechanic?”

“Who?” Duke asked.

“Bowie,” I said off-handedly. “But why did you come home if he didn’t? You’re a team.”

“The job—” Red cut himself off, running his hand over the back of his neck. “He had to stay behind.”

“Why?”

“We should go,” Eli said from behind me.

I moved as Red did, blocking his path so he couldn’t walk out before I had answers. “What job are you working?”

“Uh—”

“We can’t answer that,” Eli said, cutting off anything Red was going to say.

“Why? Is it classified?”

“Client confidentiality,” Red finally answered.

“Is he with a woman?” I wasn’t sure why these questions were even coming to mind. Yes, I trusted Kavanaugh. The connection between us couldn’t be a lie, but the way he refused to answer my questions made something deep inside me twinge with regret. I should have asked more questions. I should have found out more before blindly trusting him.

Red shuffled uncomfortably, which was really all the confirmation I needed. “Not in the way you’re thinking. You just—You need to talk to him. And trust him.”

His words hit me like a bullet. I wanted to trust him. I really did. I wasn’t one of those women so damaged by past relationships that I couldn’t find it in my heart to put my faith in a man. But when I felt like things were being purposely held back, what was I supposed to do?

“Trust him,” I repeated .

He nodded, but didn’t say anything else. I turned and almost ran right into Eli. The look on his face was identical to Red’s. He was uncomfortable as hell, and that was a red flag. If there was really nothing going on, they wouldn’t be wary of telling me anything. But here they stood, both of them acting guilty as hell.

“Trust is earned,” I said before walking out the door.