Page 25 of Lethal Game

He grunted. “Could it have been the moron I chased off that first night?”

“I don’t know,” she burst out. “I thought I could read people better than that, but when he put his hands on me and tried to kiss me...” She sucked in a breath. “I didn’t see it coming.” All the air went out of her. “I’m an idiot.”

Con struggled with himself for a moment. She’d come to him at 0500 with her fear. Not Max or anyone else,him. He could play it safe and call in a female therapist, or he could ask Max to talk her through why the phone call had bothered her so much. Alternatively, he could offer her the support she was looking for himself. She’d already put herself out there by coming to him first. Could he turn her away?

“No, you just weren’t prepared for the calculated tactic of a hunter.”

“If you hadn’t come along, I’d have been a victim.” She glanced at him and blushed. “Um, maybe I should go.”

He’d let her, but her hands were fisted in her lap so hard her knuckles were white. “How about you just relax for a few minutes?”

“I might be able to if you put some clothes on,” she muttered as she waved her hand around in front of him. “All this nakedness isn’t helping.”

As much as he appreciated the comment—he did, he was a guy—he couldn’t believe she’d just say it so baldly. “You’re not flirting with me, are you?”

“What?” she squawked. “No. I hate that shit.” She frowned and huffed. “Why can’t people just say what they’re thinking? Why do they have to play mind games?”

She really didn’t know? With her weird history, maybe she didn’t. “People play games to protect themselves,” he explained after a moment. “In order to connect with someone you have to step out of your comfort zone and put your heart on the line. It can be scary.” His heart had been torn apart by that IED despite the fact that it kept beating. The deaths of his teammates, hisbattle buddies, men he could trust with his life, were open, bleeding wounds in a tired heart that longed for rest. He wouldn’t survive another loss, he knew it, but he had to survive long enough to put his dead to rest. Heowedthem that.

“I guess that’s the part I don’t get,” she replied on a sigh. “Sticking my emotional neck out doesn’t scare me at all. It’s looking back and realizing I missed an opportunity to do something important or be with someone important to me that’s scary. I don’t have time to play stupid games.”

Wow. That was all kinds of smart, and nothing he could aspire to.Wait a second.“You mean, you didn’t have time when you were a teen to...fool around?”

“Right.” She gave herself a shake. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be. Your teammates are there for you to rely on. Whether it’s something like this or any other problem. They’ve got your back and you’ve got theirs.” He nudged her elbow. “Eugene and Max have an enormous amount of respect for you.

“I’m going to make your self-defense lessons a priority,” he continued. “I want you capable of dealing with morons.”

“He’s the only one who—”

Con cut her off. “There are plenty of others thinking the same thing. The Army has just as many predators in it as the general population, sometimes more.”

“What do you mean, others thinking the same thing?”

“Less than fourteen percent of soldiers in the Army are female. What do you think happens in a man’s head after he’s been out on a mission, been shot at, and hasn’t seen a woman in weeks?”

“I understandthat,” she said with another eye roll. “What I don’t get is...” She stopped talking to suck in a breath, then stayed silent.

What the hell just went through her head? “What?”

She turned away. “Nothing. I need to think.”

He could continue questioning her or he could give her some time to do that thinking. He knew which one of those options was more likely to work. “Do you want to go back to your room or wait here?”

She glanced at him, her eyes unfocused. “Oh. Would it bother you if I waited here?”

It would, but not in the way she meant. “Be my guest.”

He set the water in the shower to lukewarm and got in. Sophia was mixing him all up inside and what made it worse, she had no idea she was doing it. She was so damned honest it hurt. She also seemed to hate the normal flirtation that most men and women engaged in. No, hate was wrong. She didn’t know what the fuck to do with it, so she ignored it.

That didn’t make it go away.

Ignoring it was dangerous, because she might not recognize another vulture like the one he interrupted the night he met her.

He was going to have to take a page out of her book, and explain with naked honesty, her situation and the dangers he saw in it.

As his partner, she deserved nothing less. This was something hecoulddo for her.

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