Page 25 of Kissing Kayley
“Play your cards right,” I said, “and I might let you do more than swat my ass.” I tried to stifle my yawn, but there was no holding it back. “Sorry. Do you mind if we grab a shower and go to bed? I wanted to do more tonight but I don’t have the energy.”
“Of course I don’t mind, sweetheart. It’s been a long day.”
He helped me put the leftovers away and we headed to the bathroom. As we stood under the spray for a few minutes and let the hot water sluice over our bodies, I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and tried to draw my focus in tightly so thatthiswas my world, this waseverything—theonlything that existed.
Us, and this place.
Because I didn’t know if, at the other end of it, I’d be left with nothing more than memories.
That meant I wanted them to be good ones.
CHAPTER 11
Victor
Had my best-laid plans come to fruition, we would already be sound asleep after an endless afternoon of making love, followed by a room-service dinner, while the gentle Pacific Ocean breeze caressed our naked bodies in a luxurious and guaranteed comfortable bed with a sheet thread count that apparently meant something to snooty people who weren’t me.
Instead, we took a long shower and didn’t bother putting on clothes before we climbed under the covers.
I didn’t care about the thread count here, either. The bed was comfortable, the sheets clean and softly crisp in a way that meant they weren’t garbage, the pillows acceptable, and the room was supposedly soundproofed so we wouldn’t be serenaded by someone getting railed on the other side of the wall or feel self-conscious if noisy railing happened in our room.
To be honest, I was hoping noisy railing would soon happen in our bed, but my luck thus far on this “vacation” was batting .000.
I thought surely sleep would hit me fast and hard but, even as Kayley’s breathing slowed and evened out next to me, I lay wide awake while unsuccessfully trying to shut down my brain. I’d contacted Maxwell with an update when I went out to get our dinner, but Leo had already spoken with him. Meaning we were all good, and he’d deal with logistics on his end in case an emergency exfil was warranted.
Mentally I traced back every potential source of danger, of whether someone might have followed us first to Cedro’s house and then to Rawhide Ranch, and finally convinced myself we had arrived completely incognito.
What I hadn’t told Kayley was there were agents pre-positioned at the other resort, posing as fellow vacationers, in addition to the resort’s already stringent security. Hell, they regularly shot down drones when paparazzi tried to sneak pics. I don’t know how they finagled that permission with the FAA and law enforcement, but I guess enough money really will buy you anything in today’s world.
I finally couldn’t stand it and carefully untangled myself from Kayley to retrieve my phone where it sat charging on the nightstand. Knowing I’d regret this, I started scrolling through news sites while a sickening mixture of relief and rage rolled through me.
Relief because there were no more attacks. Several were thwarted before they could be fully executed.
Rage because the death toll steadily rose with search and rescue efforts now underway. Not to mention that the negative impacts to our economy and the hardships this would place on countless people were incalculable.
No group had yet claimed responsibility for the attacks, either, which was… disconcertingly weird.
Because something of this scope, this magnitude, should have had someone proudly crowing about being behind it.
Meaning there were plenty of people at a wide variety of alphabet-soup government intelligence agencies on edge that there might be more attacks forthcoming.
Had Kayley been any other protectee I likely would have immediately headed to the nearest military base or FBI office, whatever was closest, and arranged for her to be spirited to an undisclosed location.
Fortunately, even with her teaching career, she usually flew under the public’s radar. It seemed the only times she made it onto the gossip sites were when she met up with Leo, or she happened to be at a location where paparazzi swarmed a celebrity and they recognized Kayley, or the occasionally staged moments when Jordan flew out to spend time with her and pretended to date her.
This was exactly why we’d needed our vacation. Once we publicly announced our relationship, if that’s the path we took, I would have to retire from the Secret Service if I wasn’t already retired. If I didn’t willingly retire, it would likely mean Leo ordering Elliot to put pressure on the Secret Service director to “persuade” me to retire.
Me being in a high-visibility relationship, especially with a protectee, ran counter to me being an effective protective agent. If I refused to retire, I’d likely be assigned to ride a desk until I finally got bored or frustrated enough to retire. I damned sure would hit a wall in terms of advancing up the food chain.
The best-laid plans and all that bullshit, right?
Normally I would never allow a hotel stay in a ground floor room but this was a safe and isolated resort, not a fleabag hotel in the middle of a city’s tourist district. I wanted the private hot tub and patio.
Something else we never got to enjoy.
Something…normal, for a change.
I also wanted the secondary escape route, just in case.
