Page 41 of Stone
Simon shifted, then frowned, pulling her mind away from thoughts of her family.
“Can’t sleep?” she asked.
His frown deepened. “Someone is breaking in.”
She shot up and crowded into his side to see better. Sure enough, his phone displayed two images, one of the empty back patio and the other of a man dressed in black testing the window into the garage.
“What should we do? Will the alarm go off?” she asked, calculating how long it would take her to get her jeans, bra, and shoes on.
“I turned the alarm in the garage off,” he said.
That gave her pause. “Why?”
“I want to see what he’s going to do.”
She didn’t mean to doubt him, but… “Are you sure that’s wise?”
Simon glanced over and smiled at her before dropping a kiss on her temple. “It’s good. I’m armed, and I won’t let him enter the house, just the garage.”
“What happens if he tries?” Her gaze slid back to the phone. The man in black had managed to pry the window open two inches.
“The alarm will go off,” he replied. “I’m almost certain I know what he’s going to do, and I want to let him do it.”
“Can I ask you more questions or are you concentrating?”
He flashed her another smile. “You can ask me anything, any time.”
She arched a brow at his insinuation but leaned up and kissed his cheek. “What do you think he’s going to do?”
“Put a tracker on my truck,” he said. “They obviously found the connection to this house through the club, which means they know about the Falcons, but they may not know who I am or where I live. They’ll back off for a bit now, though, because they’ll know that after this evening, we’re on alert.”
“So they’ll let the tracker show them where we go, even where you live, and then come after you—us—again when we might not be so on guard,” she finished as the man slid through the window and into the garage.
“Exactly,” Simon said. They both fell silent as a skinny man of average height assessed the truck. Two seconds later, he pulled something from his pocket, took three strides to the fender, then knelt and slipped his hand underneath it.
“Predictable little fuck, isn’t he?” Simon muttered.
Less than a minute later, the man was back out the window, closing it behind him. A minute after that, he vaulted over the eight-foot fence into the alley behind the house.
“You have to admit, he might be predictable to someone like you, but those acrobatics were impressive,” she said, certain that if she tried, she’d end up straining a hamstring and breaking her nose.
“It’s all about leverage and timing,” he said, closing the camera views and typing in a code that she assumed would reset the alarm.
“Says the former Delta Force dude,” she mumbled. He chuckled, then set his phone on the bedside table.
“I could teach you,” he said, wrapping an arm around her and pulling them both down on the bed. They lay face-to-face, his arm draped over her hip, his fingers brushing her lower back.
“I’ll pass, thanks. I have no desire to humiliate either you or me.” She paused, tracing the lines of the tattoo on his right biceps. “You are so calm about someone breaking into your house. You have a plan.” It wasn’t a question.
“I do,” he replied. “A simple one. But it will distract them long enough for us to get back to Mystery Lake.”
“Are you going to tell me?” she asked as his fingers dipped under her shirt and grazed her skin. A heated chill raced through her body.
“It’s not a secret, but I’d rather do other things with my mouth right now,” he said, tipping his lips to touch hers.
She leaned into the kiss as much as their positions allowed. His hand flattened on her back, the searing heat a stark contrast to the shiver that rippled across her skin, raising goose bumps along her arms and waking her nipples.
“I can wait,” she said, pressing into her pillow to better angle her head.
