“So it’s just some kid screwing around,” I say, relief sweeping through me.
“Probably,” Renly says. “To be sure, we’ll pull the video footage.” He glances at our office building and the others nearby. “I’m not sure any of the security cameras have a street view, but it’s worth checking. I’ll ask Ryan to put someone on it.”
“Perfect,” Damien says as I do yet another mental reset.
“Wait,” I say to Renly. “Ryan? Does that mean you’re…” I trail off, looking from him to Damien and then back to Renly again. “Holy crap, that’s why you were with Nikki? You’re working at Stark Security?”
“Renly’s the second newest member of the team,” Damien adds. “He joined right before Winston went off to Texas to find out how his dead wife had come back to life.”
I grimace. I don’t work at Stark Security, the agency founded by Damien after the kidnapping of his youngest daughter. But I hear stories from Nikki, and the one about Winston Starr learning that the wife he’d believed dead from a car bomb was actually an assassin who’d faked her death was the kind of story that could be a movie. Fake blood and all.
But it’s not Winston and Linda’s story that’s making my head spin, and I twirl my finger as I focus on Renly. “Let’s rewind, shall we?” I look between the three of them. “You’re working at Stark Security? I thought you were off in the Middle East doing SEAL stuff.”
“You knew that?” His brows go up, and it’s clear he’s surprised.
I lift my shoulders in a shrug. “I ask my mom about you every once in a while. She doesn’t know much, but she hears things from your mom. They’ve stayed in touch. A little, anyway.”
“Well, she’s behind the times. I didn’t re-up. And I’ve been in LA for almost two years now. I thought you’d gone up north to MIT after doing time at UCLA.”
“And after graduation, I came back here and I ended up—” I cut myself off. “You know what? I think we have a lot of catching up to do. I’ve got a place not that far away. Do you want to come over? Have some wine and swap stories?”
I glance at Nikki and Damien. “You two are welcome, too, of course. I am so grateful that you came to my rescue, and I’m so sorry that it was a false alarm.” I make a face. “And I really need to run through a car wash before that stuff destroys my paint.”
Nikki laughs. “Do not be sorry that it was a false alarm, and thank you for the invite. But I think we’ll go back to the party and let everyone know you’re fine.”
“You’re sure? I mean, shouldn’t Renly be there?”
“I don’t think Linda or Winston will mind,” Renly says.
“They won’t,” Damien says. “And although this whole thing is probably going to turn out to be just a few prank calls, I’m going to call it right now and say that Renly’s officially assigned to keep you safe. Okay by you, Cooper?”
“Hell yes,” Renly says.
“But—” I begin but am cut off by his hand in the air.
“It’s my job. And I wanted to make sure you got home safe, anyway. And,” he adds with that same smile that turned me to goo during The Renly Crush years, “we really do have a whole lot of catching up to do.”
Chapter Four
I head toward a self-serve car wash not far from my place, and he follows me there on his bike. I keep sneaking looks at him in the rearview mirror as we drive, still not completely able to believe that Renly’s back in my life.
The thought brings me up short, and I wonder if he really is. Back, I mean. After all, while our few moments on the street were full of excitement and adrenaline, it may turn out that we don’t have a single thing in common. He may end up at my house, and all we’ll have between us is some horrible, lingering silence.
Dear God, I hope not. Because right now, I’m buzzing with happiness from seeing him again. And I really don’t want that feeling to end.
I turn into the car wash lot, then pull into one of the little stalls. I take a deep breath before I kill the engine to center myself. No matter what happens, it’s good to reconnect with him. And so long as I keep reminding myself of that, everything will be fine. It’s all about managing expectations, after all, and I do that every single day with clients.
In the rearview mirror, I watch as he gets off the bike, then walks toward me across the lot. I get out and meet him at the rear of the car.
“I haven’t got a single quarter,” he says. “Do you?”
I laugh. “Not a one. But I do have a credit card.” I’m about to walk over to that side and start the system running, but he gets there first, sliding in his card and then grinning at me as the machinery starts rumbling.
This particular car wash has a hose on each side of the stall. I’ve always assumed that was so that you don’t have to drag a dirty hose over your newly cleaned half in order to wash the other side. Now I consider another purpose.
Renly apparently has the same thought, because I see the gleam in his eyes as he goes to the far side, then grabs the coiled hose, his hand poised on the nozzle.
“Don’t you even think about it,” I say, going for my own hose.
His eyes widen, all innocent and guileless. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
I burst out laughing. Then, still laughing, I pull the trigger on my own hose and spray him, accidentally getting him full-on in the crotch.
“Seriously?” he says. “Sweetheart, you are so going to pay for that.”
“Phhbbt.” I dance away from the spray he aims at me. “I would have thought someone in the military would have a faster reaction time.”
He aims again, and this time manages to completely soak the T-shirt I’d worn to work this morning. “Hey!” I protest. “This is a genuine discount bin Old Navy T-shirt. How dare you defile it?”
“Well, it fits you very nicely,” he says, letting his eyes skim over me in what I know is an exaggerated leer.
I glance down, realizing that since I knew I was going to be the only one in the office today, I hadn’t bothered to wear a bra. That’s something I can usually get away with, but in a wet T-shirt, even my barely-B-cup breasts look pretty perky.
I roll my eyes. “Perv.”
“I apologize for nothing.”
“Behave,” I order, then point to the Fiat’s hood. “And clean.”
He does, this time aiming the spray so that it doesn’t splash goo on me. I join in from my side, and soon enough we’ve not only eradicated the fake blood but have thoroughly cleaned the entire car.
He steps back, looking it over like a foreman on an assembly line before meeting my eyes over the roof. “Do you remember all those times we’d run around in your backyard, me with the hose from the back of the house, and you with the one from the side?”
“I nailed you almost every time,” I say.
“Like hell you did. I let you get away with it. I’m a year older than you, remember? I had to watch over you. Be careful not to bruise that fragile child’s confidence.”