Page 46 of Her Delta Force Protector

“No, thanks, I’ll just have water. I don’t drink when on an operation.” He speared her with a look, what she thought of as his game face. “And make no mistake, we are on an operation.”

“Gotcha.” She wouldn’t have thought anything of it if he had a beer. He really did take his responsibilities seriously, and her respect for him grew. She got his water and a bottle of green tea for herself, something else he’d remembered. He grabbed a bag of chips, and loaded up, they headed for the porch.

“No, Duke, stay,” he said when Duke tried to slip out the door with them. “If he goes out, he’ll head right back to the lake, and it’s getting dark. I don’t like not being able to see him.”

It hurt a little that he knew her dog better than she, but it was another reason to leave Duke with him when she left. Plus, Everly would hate her if she took Duke away, and even though Harper would never see the little girl again after that, she couldn’t bear to think of Everly hating her.

They settled in the two rocking chairs on his porch. Although night had fallen, a big full moon had risen over the mountain peaks, outlining them in a deep purple and casting yellow ribbons of moonlight dancing on the lake. “I see why you can find peace here.”

“This place speaks to me.”

She was happy for him that he had somewhere like this, but she’d never had a place that spoke to her, and suddenly she wanted one. Somewhere like this where she could sit on her porch at night and be mesmerized by yellow ribbons frolicking on the lake and not think about men trying to kill her or a man she wanted as more than a best friend.

They’d finished eating, and he still hadn’t said a word about what she said that she knew damn well he’d heard. Fine. His loss. She stood. “It’s been a long day. I’m going to shower and then call it a night.”

He wrapped his hand around her wrist when she tried to step around him to go inside. “Stay. Please.”

“Why?”

“Because I want you to.” He let go of her wrist. “But only stay because you want to.”

There was something in his voice she’d never heard before. Vulnerability maybe? Kade Church was never vulnerable, so she must have imagined it. She sat back down. And because she had to know... “Why do you want me to stay?”

He didn’t answer for a good minute, then, “When I come to the cabin, I always sit out here most of the night.” He rested his head on the back of the chair and then turned his face to her. “I’ve always been good with being alone on those nights, prefer it actually. Not sure why, but you make me want to be with someone. Come to think of it, not just any someone. You.”

There was that vulnerability again. Kade Church was lonely, and he didn’t even know it. Or wouldn’t admit it to himself. Or she was seeing things that weren’t there. She decided to address his hearing what she’d said. “I know you heard what I said, and I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable.”

“Ah, she’s going straight for the elephant in the room. Hard to miss that big old thing.”

“We can pretend I never said that.”

“Or I can tell you how tempting your offer is.”

“But?”

He reached across the small table between them and wrapped his hand around hers. “The but is this. As hard as I’ll try hard not to, I’ll find a way to hurt you. Then you won’t want to be my best friend, and that’s the last thing I want to happen.”

“How will you hurt me? I’m not wedding dress shopping. I have things to do, places to go.” Well, she used to.

“Does that mean you’re still planning to join the Peace Corps?”

“No, that’s not for me anymore. I really wanted to, but now...” How did she explain the fear that shadowed her because of that man?

“Now you’re thinking of the bad things that could happen.”

“Yeah.”

He squeezed her hand. “That risk was always there, Harper. You just never thought of anything bad happening to you, but now you know it can.”

“I’m so angry about that. I want my courage back.”

“The first special ops mission I went on, a sniper shot at me. Fortunately, he wasn’t all that good because he missed. But it was close. I heard the bullet as it passed by my ear. Scared the shit out of me, and when we got back to base, I went to my team leader and told him I wasn’t cut out for special ops. He was a big John Wayne fan and was always quoting the man and could mimic Wayne’s voice perfectly. In John Wayne’s voice, he said, ‘Courage is being scared to death...and saddling up anyway.’ Then he poked me in the chest. ‘So grow a pair, son, and saddle the fuck up.’”

“So you’re saying I need to grow a pair?”

“Hell no. That would just be too weird.” He chuckled at his own joke. “Symbolically, though, yeah. It’s good advice.”

“Did it work?”

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