Page 14 of Bad Guys Need Love Too

All the details were there. Her name, a current photo that looked like it’d been taken from outside the flower shop, her age, address, driver’s license info…it was all there.

Along with an offer of $100,000 to whoever killed her.

Her eyes shifted over the data, her expression growing more horrified with each word she read. “This is…all my information. It includes my work schedule, the route I take to work, where I buy my morning coffee, what kind of car I drive…Jesus, who could possibly know this much about me?”

Well, I do. “It’s easier than you might think,” he admitted. “This kind of information comes from the most basic of surveillance.”

She sat up straighter. “Did you know that someone was trying to kill me when you came to my house?”

He nodded. “No one had accepted the hit yet. But I knew someone had posted the job.”

“How?”

“I monitor the dark web regularly.”

He braced himself for a freak out. This was when she was going to call him a creepy stalker and stab him with his own knife. The sad part? He deserved it. Hewasa creepy stalker. His best of intentions didn’t matter in this case.

She glanced at his bank of monitors, then back at him. “You’re, like—what?—a security expert?”

He hesitated. Would it be misleading to say yes? He didn’t work for a security firm or anything. But he technicallywasa security expert. The fact that he worked for her without her even knowing it didn’t change his skill level or expertise. “I am,” he eventually said.

Her eyes narrowed slightly. She knew he was full of shit. But in the end, she had two choices. She could stab him and make a run for it. Take what she knew to the police and pray they put her in protective custody. They’d fail, but it was still an option that was open to her. Or she could put her faith in the creepy stalker who had zero trouble breaking every law known to man to keep her safe.

She swallowed hard. “And do you have a plan to keep me safe?”

Did destroy anyone who ever evenconsideredhurting her count as a plan? “I think that given a little bit of time, I can figure out who put the hit on you. Once I know that, I can…convincethem to call off their hitman.”

“And when you say convince, you mean…”

He would not mislead her on this point. “I’ll dowhateverit takes to keep you safe.”

Her eyes searched his. He had no idea what she was looking for. A reason to trust him, maybe? There wasn’t one. He wasnotahero. But sometimes, it took a bad guy to know one. And she needed to realize that.

He reached out and laid one of his cuffed hands on hers. She flinched at the contact, but didn’t pull away. “The police can’t keep you safe. They have too many rules. I don’t have any of those. I can help you. I need you to trust me, though. I know I haven’t done anything to earn your trust yet, but I’m asking for it anyway. Can you give me that?”

Her gaze moved from his hand on hers, to his face, back to the laptop screen, then back to his face again. After what felt like an eternity (especially since he was holding his breath), she finally whispered, “OK.”

The relief that washed over Ren was damn near overwhelming. If he’d been standing, he was sure it would’ve driven him to his knees. “Thank you. You won’t regret it.”

A long, strangely companionable silence that was only punctuated by the noisy snuffle of Dammit George’s breathing as he gazed up at Lark adoringly followed. And he hated to ruin that…but also… “So…think you’d be willing to uncuff me now?”

The snort she let out startled Dammit George. “Let’s play it by ear for a while longer, yeah?”

He nodded solemnly. “Fair enough.”

CHAPTER 9

Against her better judgement, Lark did agree to uncuff Ren twenty minutes later. After all, if he was going to hurt her, he’d had roughly seven hundred opportunities to do it. So, she figured she was safe with him for now.

The fact that he looked like he could break out of those cuffs with little to no effort but chose to remain restrained for her comfort helped, too.

Then there was the complete, naked, open sincerity he had in his eyes when he told her he’d doanythingto protect her.

She was willing to bet there wasn’t a woman alive who wouldn’t be swayed by that kind of sentiment coming from a man who looked and sounded like Ren. And she was only human, for fuck’s sake!

Plus, she was exhausted. She was halfway convinced she could fall asleep right here on the couch. Which brought to mind yet another question…

“If I’m going to be here for a while, can I go home and grab a few things?”

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