Page 15 of Bad Boy Billionaire Protector

She let go of me and took a step back, her shoulders drooped as if all the strength seemed to leave her body. “The ring belonged to my boyfriend, Adam.”

I froze.

“He died last year. He killed himself. Or, that’s what they want me to think.”

“Oh shit. I’m so sorry Amber.”

I had to make a decision. Amber was opening up to me about Adam, and this is what I needed for my investigation. But I desperately wanted to kill this topic since we were seconds away from making love. I sighed.Who are you fooling, Mason? Any chance of making her yours tonight is over. Why did you have to bring up the fucking ring?

I sat down on the couch, wiping my wet hand on my shirt.

“Sit down, baby. Talk to me. Who’sthey?”

Amber sat down next to me, and I bent over to grab a clean T shirt from my gym bag next to the couch. I helped her put it on.

“I don’t know. Whoever is responsible for his death. He was part of some kind of secret society, The Order, or something like that. It’s a badly kept secret organization for the elite of the school. They all wear rings like this one.”

“I noticed your friends all had the rings on, too. The ones I met tonight.”

“Yeah. They’re part of the society too. I’m convinced they all know more about Adam’s death than they’re telling me. Or, at least, someone from the secret society does. I’m determined to find out what really happened. Something was going on, something bad. Adam left me a voicemail that said he was worried about something he had found out about the society. I want to get to the bottom of it.”

I was struck by how much Amber clearly still held Adam close to her heart, literally wearing his ring around her neck. I felt sick. Here she was making out with me with her dead boyfriend’s ring around her neck. I bent my head, rubbed my face with my hands, and tried to make sense of what I was feeling. Did I have any right to be jealous of a dead man? I couldn’t recall ever feeling jealous over a girl so this was a strange feeling for me.

I looked up at her. “I can understand your desire to find out what happened to him but why do you still wear the ring around your neck. I mean…we’ve been making out here, and…” I stopped speaking, lost for words.

She looked down at her hands for a few seconds, and then looked up at me with sad eyes. When she spoke the torment in her voice was obvious.

“I know. I’m so sorry, Christos. I should have told you about Adam before letting us go so far. This is all my fault. I guess I was being selfish.” She shook her head and closed her eyes briefly.

Taking a deep breath, her hazel eyes luminescent with a plea for understanding, she continued, “I realized tonight when we were sitting next to each other at the Spoken Word, just talking and being together that I felt such a rush of happiness being with you. I was suddenly overcome with wanting you so badly. It’s as if I was dead and I suddenly got zapped to life. All I know is that I suddenly wanted to be with you. As in,be with you, if you know what I mean.” She looked at me from under her lashes, as if afraid of my reaction.

I smiled at her and reached over to hold her hand. I wanted her to know I wasn’t mad at her.

She smiled at me and squeezed my hand hard. “I suddenly felt like I was ready to let him go and start moving into the land of the living again. I’ve just spent so long over the last year mourning him, being stuck in my memories of him. We were so happy together. I wasn’t ready to let him go. I wasn’t ready to let myself care about someone again. I wasn’t ready to think about opening myself to love again.” She blushed and laughed self-consciously. “I’m not saying I’m in love. Please don’t be scared that I’m going to chase after you like a crazy fan girl.”

I smiled gently at her, overwhelmed by her courage to reveal herself to me with such honesty and vulnerability. She captured my heart in that moment.

“Anyway, I’m a mess Christos. That’s why I never called you like you asked me to. You don’t want to have to deal with a girl like me. I’m a bit too broken at the moment. This isn’t who I am, but it’s who I’ve become since Adam died. You don’t need to deal with my hang-ups.”

She bent her head down, and looked at her hands that were clasped so tightly that her knuckles were white.

I didn’t answer. I didn’t know what to say that wouldn’t make her more upset than she already was. She’s right. She was a mess. Of course, I knew she was still sad about Adam’s death based on the fact that she didn’t feel comfortable talking about it at our first meeting. But I assumed she had moved past his death enough to move forward when she kissed me so passionately the night I walked her back to her dorm. Seeing how much she still grieved for him, I felt ashamed that I was lying to her about his death. Brushing my hand through my hair I told myself to get a grip and concentrate on my job. It was the easier thing to deal with compared to the chaotic feelings rising inside of me.

Thinking about what she had been able to tell me about the secret society, I was shocked that she knew so much about it. I’d been working on the assumption that she knew very little. Adam had obviously shared more with her than members of The Order probably knew.

Looking at her now, I could see she was in a very vulnerable place emotionally. Despite her explanation that she felt ready to let Adam go, I wasn’t so sure she would feel that way when she had time to be by herself. Since that feeling had only struck her in the past couple hours and it still generated a turmoil of mixed emotions, it was clear she needed more time. That should have been enough to stop me from pursuing her. It was already unprofessional that things had gotten physical. I had never gotten involved with anyone who was part of an assignment. That line was always something I vowed to never cross. But there was just something irresistible about her. Not to mention, she was just so fucking beautiful, and I wanted her with every fiber of my being.

It wasn’t right. All these thoughts in my head were wrong. I worked for the FBI, for fuck’s sake, and I was in the middle of an investigation, yet here I was making out with the girlfriend of one of the victims. I needed to get my head in the game and being mixed up with Amber was just the wrong thing to do. I was so conflicted. After all, she could be a great source of information and a good help in the investigation, but I didn’t want to hurt her any more than she had already been hurt.

She looked at me, her eyes filled with sadness. “I’m sorry…”

I caressed her cheek, wanting nothing more than to take her in my arms and whisk her away from all this pain. “Don’t apologize. You have nothing to be sorry for.”

“I guess I should go back to my dorm.”

I nodded. “I’ll walk you back.”

She smiled at me gratefully. “You’re so understanding about this. Thank you.”

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