Page 15 of The Biker's Brother

“In the car. The radio said rain is coming and I heard you say, ‘Good’.”

He took in a deep breath and willed himself calm.

“Everything has two sides. It makes travel slower, but it also makes it difficult to either find or follow you.” She didn’t seem to have anything else to say on the matter. “Sandwiches in the kitchen.” He smiled. “Along with a few non-packaged items. It will be a few days before tofu will be readily available again.”

She sniffed as he turned away. When she thought he wasn’t watching, she took her time leisurely appreciating the way his broad shoulders tapered to his waist like the shape of the letter V. The way his muscles rippled under the Henley he wore was fascinating enough that she wanted to ask him to repeat certain movements.

The fact was inescapable, especially when he seemed to take up most of the space in a tiny little house. He was an extremely hot guy. But Cami wasn’t a one night stand kind of woman. Even if she was, she suspected he regarded her as all business. Like he said, she was a box of widgets. Besides that, she couldn’t imagine having anything in common with Brandon.

She’d been raised with money, gone to the best schools, and had even been to an Inaugural Ball. What could she have to talk about with a bodyguard from Texas? She knew practically nothing about him, but what she did know she didn’t like.

He’d covered himself with tattoos. At least part of himself. He was okay with eating poison food like he was immortal, and had awful taste in music. Worse, he was imperious in the most heavy-handed and distasteful way possible.

She ate a turkey sandwich in the kitchen while reading her book. When she was ready for bed, she opened one of her bags and rifled through it. She took her toiletries and her night clothes into the little bathroom to change and emerged twenty minutes later wearing Gucci tartan pajama bottoms and a hoodie.

“It’s freezing in here.”

Brand looked up from doing whatever he was doing with his assortment of firearms that he’d carefully laid out on the coffee table. He appeared to have been oblivious to the temperature. He spotted the thermostat on the wall by the hallway.

After fiddling with it for a couple minutes, he said, “Nothing.”

“It’s not working?!?”

“That’s what ‘nothing’ means. It’s not going to be that cold tonight. Bundle up.”

She made a show of exasperation, stomped over to her bags, and proceeded to put on a sweater, a knit hat, and a pair of thick socks while intermittently glaring at Brandon like it was his fault.

He smirked. “Overreact much? It’s September!”

“I don’t care if it’s July. I’m cold!”

“Okay.”

He shrugged and went back to what he was doing, appearing to have lost interest in the drama.

After she was outfitted for sleeping outdoors in the Arctic, she sank down on the mattress, pulled the quilt around her and, to her surprise, went to sleep.

The sounds of furniture moving woke her some time later. She opened the bedroom door.

“What’s going on now?”

“Nothing,” Brand said. “Go back to sleep.”

He was moving the coffee table armory so that it was easily accessible. When he was satisfied with where it sat, he switched off the lamp, laid down, and pulled the quilt over his body.

“Are you done?” she said.

When he didn’t reply, she closed the door a little too hard, for punctuation, and settled into bed again.

The next time she woke it was to the sound of raindrops on the roof. She lay awake for several minutes listening to the rain and feeling remarkably safe with the armoire in front of the windows and Brandon situated just on the other side of the door. She pulled the quilt under her chin, sighed, and was asleep before she could examine that thought too closely.

The next time she woke it was because a pillow had been thrown at her head.

With as much outrage as she could muster when she was drowsy, she said, “What the fuck?”

“Get up. We’re going. You’ve got five minutes to get in the car.”

She looked around. “It’s dark.”

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