To Kiss a King (Kings of California #11)(21)
Author: Maureen Child

Seven

The King Security company building was quiet. Halls were dark, phones silent and Garrett appreciated the peace. The light on his desk shone like a beam of sunlight in the darkness as he added his signature to a stack of papers Griffin had already signed in his absence.

The puddle of light from his desk lamp was bright and golden and threw the rest of the room into deep shadow. But Garrett didn’t need light to find his way around. This place had pretty much been his life for the past ten years. He and Griffin had adjoining offices with a shared bathroom complete with shower separating them. There were plenty of times they had to leave fast for a job and having a shower and a change of clothes around came in damn handy.

There were bookcases on two of the walls and floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the ocean on another. Family photographs and paintings hung on the remaining wall, and plush leather furniture completed the room. There was a fireplace, wet bar and a long couch comfortable enough to have served as Garrett’s bed more than once.

This was the company he and Griffin had built with a lot of hard work, tenacity and the strength of their reputation. He was proud of it and until recently, hadn’t so much as taken a day off. Garrett King lived and breathed the job. At least he had, until Alex came into his life.

And just like that, she was at the forefront of his thoughts again.

Instantly, his mind turned back to the afternoon on Decker’s boat. His body reached for the sense memory of Alex trembling against him, but his brain went somewhere else. To the child falling into the water and nearly drowning. To Garrett’s split-second decision to leave Alex alone and unprotected while he saved the child.

He couldn’t have done it differently and he knew that, but still the decision haunted him. She had been alone. What if it had all been a setup? Some cleverly disguised assassination or kidnapping attempt on a crown princess? Sure, chances were slim, but they were there. The boy could have been a champion swimmer, doing exactly what he had been paid to do.

Absurd? he asked himself. Maybe. Paranoid? Absolutely. But stranger things had happened, and he’d been around to see a lot of them. Gritting his teeth, Garrett silently fumed at his complete lack of professionalism. He’d saved the boy but risked Alex and that was not acceptable.

He could still feel the slide of her skin beneath his fingers. Hear her whispered cries and the catch in her breath as her cl**ax took her. His body went hard and tight as stone and he told himself the pain was only what he deserved.

Never should have let any of it happen, he told himself. Hell, he knew better. Years ago, he’d learned the hard way that putting your own wants before the job was a dangerous practice that could end up costing lives.

Garrett threw the pen and swiped one arm across his desk, sending the stack of papers flying like a swarm of paper airplanes. Releasing his temper hadn’t helped, though, and he pushed back from his desk, swiping one hand across his face. His eyeballs felt like sand-crusted rocks. He couldn’t sleep for dreams of Alex.

That was why he was here, in the middle of the night. He had hoped that focusing his mind on work would keep thoughts of Alex at bay. So far he’d been there for two hours and it wasn’t working.

Instead his brain insisted on replaying that scene in the boat over and over again. Those few, stolen, amazing moments that even now, he couldn’t really regret. How the hell could he?

He had tried to tell himself that Alex was no different than any other celebrity or royal needing protection. That being with her didn’t really mean a damn thing. But then she would laugh and his calm reason flew out the window.

The woman had a hell of a laugh.

It was just part of what he’d noticed about Alex at Disneyland. What set her apart from every other female Garrett had ever known.

She threw herself into life—she held nothing back. Even there in his arms, she had been open and vulnerable, offering him everything. It was damn sexy to watch, and every minute with her was a kind of enjoyable misery. His body was so tight and hard, he could hardly walk. He felt like a damn teenager again. No woman had ever affected him like this. Which was a big problem. She wasn’t his. Not even temporarily.

She was a damn princess, and he was lying to her every minute he was around her. She thought she was free and on her own, and he was being paid by her father to look out for her.

How much deeper was this hole he was in going to get?

Shaking his head, Garrett bent to scoop up the fallen papers and shuffle them back into some kind of order. Griffin had been right when he had ragged on Garrett for being practically monklike for months. Garrett had long ago burned out on women who were more interested in what being seen with a King could do for them than they were in him. And frankly, the women he knew were all the damn same. They all talked about the same things, thought the same way and, in general, bored the hell out of him.

Not Alex.

Nothing about her was ordinary. Or boring.

He never should have called the king. Never should have agreed to this bodyguard gig. Hell, he never should have gone to Disneyland.

Yeah, he told himself wryly. It was all Jackson’s fault. If he’d never gone with his cousin and his family, if he’d never met Alex at all…he didn’t like the thought of that, either.

“Son of a bitch.” He tossed the papers to his desktop and glared at them hard enough to start a fire.

“Problem?”

Garrett snapped a look at the open doorway where his twin stood, one shoulder braced against the doorjamb. The shadows were so thick, he couldn’t see Griffin’s face, but the voice was unmistakable.

“What’re you doing here in the middle of the night?” Garrett leaned back in his black leather chair and folded his hands atop his flat abdomen.

“Funny,” Griffin said, pushing away from the doorway to wander into his brother’s office, “I was going to ask you the same thing.” He dropped into one of the visitor’s chairs opposite Garrett. “Was headed home from Amber’s place and imagine my surprise when I spotted a single light on in the office. I figured it was either you or a really stupid burglar.”

Garrett looked at his twin. His tuxedo was wrinkled, the collar of his shirt opened halfway down his chest and the undone bow tie was hanging down on both sides of his neck. Apparently at least one of them had had a good night.

“How is Amber?”

Griffin snorted and shoved one hand through his hair. “Still talking about getting that modeling job in Paris. I heard all about her packing tips, what she’ll be wearing in the runway show and what kind of exfoliant will leave her skin—and I quote here—‘shimmery.’”