Page 26 of Hiding out with a Royal Billionaire

“I guess I’ll just have to be surprised. I can’t imagine where this might be.”

“And that’s why we call it a safe house.”

She laughed. “Excellent.”

They landed and exited the plane, pouring into cars. Not limos, unmarked sedans, of different makes and models. “So, no royal parade?”

“Were going in as under the radar as possible. We’ll arrive in scattered time slots.”

“Impressive.” She was sure even more was going on behind the scenes that she wasn’t aware of, and she felt safe. She always felt safe with Brooks. Perhaps she’d known for a long time that he was a protection in her life, that with him, she would always be safe. And now she understood partly why. He was trained to be. She looked at him with new eyes.

His kiss still steamed through her. How had she dared to do such a thing in her bedroom. At night. How easy it would have been to fall into his arms on the comfort of her bed and lose herself to wherever that took them. But how grateful today she was that she had not let things go in that direction. This was Brooks. Whatever happened between them would be important. And it would last. For good or bad. Losing Brooks in her life would be tragic, so she must tread carefully. Rushing into things could be disastrous.

He sat close to her in the back of their car and she enjoyed the strength of his arm across her back, of his solid chest up against her side. She felt a certain amount of pride that this man wanted her, that such a person would be considering pursuing her outside of their friendship. When she thought of him standing guard, fighting, rescuing, a part of her thrilled in excitement that he was such a man and a part of her wanted to cower in dread that he placed himself in harm’s way. “How often are you out doing your work?”

“Our missions?” His gaze shot to the driver then returned to her.

Oh no, had she revealed something?

But he grinned. “Tony up there and I have been on a few, haven’t we?”

“Yes, sir.”

“There isn’t a frequency. It’s not a clock in kind of thing. Just if there’s a need…”

“Do you plan ahead? Or are they more last minute kinds of things?”

“We have missions planned all the time, and then there are the ones where a team is needed stat.”

She swallowed. “I can’t decide if I like knowing this about you or not.”

His eyes lit. “I didn’t think I wanted you to know but I’m happy you do.”

“Someone to keep the home fires burning, miss you while you’re gone?” She teased, but his eyes turned serious and held her gaze captive with their intensity.

“Exactly.”

She searched his face, enjoying the obvious caring, the sincerity until the car slowed and his gaze shot to the front.

“They aren’t letting cars up.”

Brooks picked up his phone. “We’re here.” Then he pocketed it. Their car joined the long line of cars waiting at what looked like a check point to go up the mountain. Each one to their front turned around and headed back down the lower portion of the mountain until Skye’s car. Their driver, Tony, showed him a code on his phone and the driver nodded, opening the electronic gate so they could pass.

“Did we just make that happen?”

“Shh.”

Skye bit her tongue, feeling very much like a juvenile. “Sorry.”

Brooks reached for her hand, but Skye could tell his thoughts were not with her, nor his attention, not really. His brain was far away, but she was pleased knowing that he was actively working on getting them into safety. Could they really be in danger? Right now? She doubted it. But the fewer people who knew about the safe house the better, of course. They went through the gate. Skye turned around.

“I’m listening to the comm link. The others will come up later.”

“I’m not worried.”

He nodded, his eyes sharp.

Interesting, so this was the Brooks on job. Gone was his relaxing joking attention, replaced by this impressive strong powerful man. His muscles rippled next to her. His stance in the car was rigid. He missed nothing, and as he shifted to see behind them, his thighs pressed into hers and a thrill went straight up her center. Her heart rate picked up and she tried to act unaffected. She shifted her hand so that it rested between them, mostly on his thigh.

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