Page 2 of Never the Same

“Tell me about the blood.” The demand slipped narrowly between his lips, the words painted in a cool, dark tone. If a voice could be described as a color, his was blue. He had a way of mellowing me out while also making me feel lost at sea with the waters rough and wild.

I kept quiet, trying to ignore my body’s response to his carved and cut one.

“Hollis,” he said like a protest.

“Jason.” I hit him back with the same moody tone, locking my arms over my chest.

“Reed,” he corrected, detesting whenever I used his first name. “The blood. How? Why?”

I closed the gap between us. “I get blood on myself all the time. It’s rarely mine. Why is it a big deal? You know what I do.” I freed my arms from across my chest and poked his pectoral muscle. “I also know you were in Papua New Guinea three days ago getting blood on yourself, too. Tell me about your mission, and I’ll tell you about mine. Fair is fair.”

“My op was classified.” He walked into his room, nearly colliding with Ranger right at his heels. “Was your op local?”

“Close enough, yeah,” I admitted, joining him back in the bedroom.

“Why didn’t you ask for an assist?”

I arched my brow. “What makes you think I needed one?” I knelt alongside Ranger, who rolled over so I could rub his belly. “Fine, fine,” I relented. “It was an easy op. You know, girl meets rich guy who promises her the world. She gets swept off her feet, marries him, only to find out he’s a corrupt and dangerous asshole who makes his fortune smuggling antiquities. Enter me: saves her from the jerk and highly encourages the dick husband to rewrite his will before the Feds show up.”

“Let me guess, he stole one of your family’s rare artifacts?”

I laughed. “You really think someone could ever get into one of our vaults and steal something?” I patted Ranger’s belly twice, then stood. “Anyway, that basically sums up the plot to a romance novel, yeah? So, there you go. Easy in and out.”

He shot me a funny look. “More like a thriller.”

“What do I know?” I shrugged. “I usually don’t have time to read for fun these days. But you like to read, right?”

“How would you know that?” The man nearly brooded me into tomorrow with that tight-eyed look of his.

“What, you don’t think I know about the books you’re hoarding?”

“I’d hardly call keeping a nice collection of hardbacks ‘hoarding.’” He squinted, then tore his hand through his hair. “Wait, they’re all in cabinets, behind closed doors. How do you know they’re in there?”

“You know what they say about doors?” I smirked. “Made to be opened.”

“And breached without an invite, apparently.” He gestured toward the hallway.

Remembering I had blood on me and needed to rinse it off, I walked around his muscular body to get to the sink. The blood may have belonged to that woman’s husband. In my defense, he should have known better than to try to kill me. It didn’t end so well for him.

“I wasn’t done in there, but sure, go ahead . . . help yourself.”

Faucet on, I caught his eyes in the mirror. “I’ll be out of your hair soon so you can get dressed. Well, unless you plan to lounge around naked all day. I’ve been known to do that on occasion at my place in the South of France.”

“Remind me never to barge in on you if I’m ever hanging out on a yacht I’ll never be able to afford in the French Riviera.”

“Mm-hmm.” I splashed some water on the side of my neck and ear and scrubbed the evidence clean. “You and I both know you wouldn’t mind walking in on me.” I turned off the water and dried my hands.

“In . . . your . . . dreams.” He slow-rolled those words before I faced him. “And are you taking your time here because driving me crazy is your favorite pastime, second only to saving strangers in distress?”

“Not trying to get a rise out of you, promise.” I lowered my gaze to his towel, praying for a slight twitch. Something to indicate he didn’t really hate me. At the least, wanted to have sex with me. Not that we’d be doing that, but still.

“No risk of that, don’t worry,” he said in a low, husky voice that was quite the contradiction to his words, right along with his biceps straining as he braced against yet another doorframe like he was trying to will himself not to set me on the counter and have his way with me.

We shouldn’t. The rational side of my brain knew that. My body? Not so much.

“Just keep the gift for me until it’s time for her baby shower, ’K?” I waited for the muscular obstruction to budge. When he didn’t, it took me staring at his tattoo for him to stop playing chicken and move. “I have ten more minutes to spare before I’m due at Audrey’s.” And she only lives down the street, so. “I’ll hang out in your living room until then.”

He turned toward me while readjusting his towel. “You asking for permission or . . . ?”