Page 85 of Wilde Secrets

Harper nodded. “Probably a good idea.”

She was looking up at the ceiling, lips turned inwards. Logan’s lips twitched. He’d spent enough time in locker rooms to not have any hangups about being naked around other people.

He tossed the towel back to Harper who caught it with a gasp, gave her a wink and slowly sauntered back up the stairs as if they had all the time in the world.

Sometimes a man needed to make a point.

A short while later Logan made his way into the kitchen for the second time that morning, though this time he was dressed in his usual jeans and a flannel shirt. He paused just out of sight before entering the room, and took a deep breath, forcing a neutral expression onto his face. The one that Rowan said made him look grouchy, but felt the most natural to Logan.

He couldn’t be anyone but himself. He knew that Harper liked him—hell, he’d hoped she had feelings a little stronger than ‘like’ for him—but he would be damned if he’d try to trap her here.

He wouldn’t make it harder for her to go, either. So he pushed aside anything that he wanted, any dreams he’d had, and walked into the kitchen as if the only person there who knew what he looked like naked was Harper.

Warm brown eyes turned to him, and she smiled. “Let’s try this again,” she said, lips twitching. “Logan, this is my sister, Isla, and King, her…bodyguard?” She looked to Isla who rolled her eyes and turned her back on the brooding man next to her.

King grunted. “Yes, Isla. Remember me?”

Isla huffed. As interesting as that little display was, Logan couldn’t care less. He was much more concerned with Harper’s state of mind. He held his hand out first to Isla then to King, shaking them both in way of introduction. He nodded and then turned his full attention back to Harper.

“So,” he said.

“So,” she said, licking her bottom lip and fiddling with the hem of her top. Today’s was jade green, oversized and made out of a slinky material that shone a little in the light. It clung to the tops of her breasts and drifted lazily around her as she tugged the fabric back and forth.

“Everything ok?” Logan asked softly.

She darted a look to Isla, and then down at her feet, not answering.

“Hey, Logan?” Isla asked. “Is there anything around here that The Bear here would like to look at?” She jerked her head toward King, who glared at her and ground his teeth together.

“Harper?” He wasn’t going anywhere if she needed him.

“That’s a good idea. I need to talk to Isla.” She nodded and then swallowed. “Alone.”

He didn’t like it, but if that was what she wanted, he’d do it. He nodded, gesturing for King to follow him. The bodyguard was like a thundercloud, his presence looming and dark.

“I wish she wouldn’t call me that,” he muttered under his breath, boots thumping on the wood of the deck as Logan led him outside.

They walked down to the jetty together, neither talking.

“You served with Mason?” Logan asked finally, not wanting Harper to get a report that he had been rude. Not that it really mattered when he was unlikely to see her again after today.

He frowned. Why did he care?

Oh yeah, because he was in love with her.

“West? Yeah. He was my Sergeant when I discharged, helped me figure things out when I needed help.”

Logan’s eyebrows quirked in surprise. The Mason he knew barely talked to anyone, was surly and argumentative more often than not, and didn’t appear to like anyone or anything. He hadn’t always been like that, and Logan wondered if there was a small part of his brother that was the same man he’d been before…well, everything that had happened.

“And you’re Isla’s bodyguard?”

King snorted, rubbing a hand over the short dark hair at the back of his neck. “Who knows what the fuck I am?”

That sentiment was something so viscerally familiar to Logan that he grimaced in sympathy.

“Oh man, not you too?”

King was far too perceptive, Logan decided as he sighed. “Don’t tell her.”

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