CHAPTER NINE
Kelsey stumbled to her feet, bruised and sore but wide-eyed and unable to look away from what was happening in front of her.
Blood spurted from Julian’s mouth, and his head jerked from one side to the other as Hunt slammed his fist into Julian’s bruised and swollen face again and again.
Her heart shot into her throat. Yes, she hated Julian for what he’d just done to her. Yes, she wanted him to suffer. But not like this. And not at the hands of someone who was supposed to be one of the good guys but who at the moment looked to be more of a threat than her ex-husband.
Hunt drew his fist back once more, and Kelsey stumbled forward, wrapping her hand around his wrist and yanking hard so he couldn’t land another blow. “Hunter, stop!”
The sound of her voice gave him pause. Or maybe it was her fierce hold on his arm. Whatever the cause, he swiveled toward her, and for a split second there was no recognition in his familiar brown irises. A new sort of panic ripped through her chest. But before instinct sent her staggering back from him, his eyes widened, and he lurched to his feet.
He grasped her face with his bloody hand. “Are you all right?”
She flinched out of his reach, not wanting to be touched by him right now. She’d known he was in the military. She’d assumed he was more than capable of providing protection to his clients. But in all the times she’s been around him, she’d never thought him violent. What she’d just witnessed made her think otherwise. Made her wonder if he was more like Julian than she’d realized. And the fact he could shift gears so quickly brought her right back to the fact she knew very little about the man she’d foolishly thrown herself at last night.
“I’m fine.” She stepped to the side and rubbed at her aching arms as she fought the nausea swirling in her stomach. “But you’re not. Look at him. Y-you could have killed him.”
He glanced once at Julian, who was moaning on the ground and making no move to get up. But in his expression Kelsey didn’t see regret for what he’d done. She saw nothing but disgust. And that sent her back from him another step.
Hunt’s gaze lifted to her, but this time when their eyes met, something hardened in his gaze. Something she hadn’t known had been soft until just now. “You’re defending him? After what he just did to you?”
Her stomach swirled faster. She wasn’t defending Julian, but she didn’t completely trust Hunt right now either. And even though common sense told her he wasn’t the threat, her flight response was pushing her to get away from both men before something worse happened.
“I-I’m calling the police.” She wobbled through the doorway that led to the stairs and her loft above.
“Shit,” Hunt muttered at her back. “Kelsey, wait. The cops are already on their way.”
She wasn’t sure how that was possible, but she didn’t wait around to discover the answer. Gripping the banister, she pulled herself up the stairs as quickly as she could, wanting only to put as much space between her and what had happened downstairs as possible, focusing on taking deep breaths to keep the panic at bay.
Every inch of her body hurt, but it was her heart that hurt the most. That and her pride. Because once again, reality had proved her judgment was shit. Julian wasn’t the man she’d thought, and neither was Hunt. And that meant she didn’t have a clue whom she could trust.
Herself included.
As the cops finished taking his statement, Hunt glanced over the handful of rubberneckers on the street and searched for Kelsey.
She was no longer with the paramedics. He’d been relieved to learn she hadn’t needed medical treatment beyond an ice pack and a few bandages. Somehow, in the midst of Benedict’s rage, she’d managed to keep him from doing any serious harm. Hunt was awed by that fact. Awed by everything she’d been through in the last few days and survived. And more than a little worried about the way she’d jerked back from his touch and raced for the stairs.
He hadn’t missed the look of horror on her face. As the paramedic finished wrapping his split knuckle, his mind flashed to the way Kelsey had stumbled back from him at the blast site when he’d dropped Benedict to the ground. He’d bet his left arm this wasn’t the first time Benedict had hurt her. She reacted to violence the way a beaten dog would. And that didn’t just fire him up and make him want to slam his fist into Benedict’s jaw all over again, it sent off a swirling sickness in his gut because he had a sinking feeling she now thought he was the same kind of shit as her ex-husband.
“We’re taking off,” Callahan said, moving up on his right. “Got everything we need from Kelsey. Benedict won’t be bugging her for a nice long while. You good here?”
“Thanks,” Hunt mumbled to the paramedic. Then to Callahan, “Yeah. Fine.”
But the news Benedict would be preoccupied for a while didn’t ease his stress any. His stomach pitched with the need to talk to Kelsey and set things right—on multiple fronts. Problem was, he had no fucking clue where to start.
He turned to look toward Kelsey’s door where the last two officers were filing out. “Any news on that number trace from California?”
“Not yet. I’ll let you know when I hear.” Callahan moved around his car and reached for the door handle. “She’s still rattled by what happened but moving quickly toward pissed. Watch your back when you go in there. I got the distinct impression she wasn’t happy with you.”
Hunt’s stomach swirled stronger as he rubbed his thumb over the bandage on his hand. “Thanks for the warning.”
Callahan grinned and slid into his vehicle.
Hunt watched the cars pull away. He should be relieved Kelsey was okay. That he’d gotten here in time. But all he could think about was the sound of her screams when Benedict had been holding her down. And all he could see when he closed his eyes was the terror in her features when she’d stopped him from beating the shit out of Benedict and stared up at him as if he were the real monster.
“Fuck.” Scrubbing a hand through his hair, he stepped up onto the sidewalk and moved toward Kelsey’s door. He had no experience with battered women. Didn’t have a whole lot of experience with women’s reactions, period. He’d purposely steered clear of relationships and emotional entanglements most of his life, never wanting to get close to any one person for too long. Life was safer that way. And he knew life would be a whole lot safer now if he just backed off and stood guard outside her door like the security professional he was. But he couldn’t do that. Because the thought Kelsey had lumped him in with her ex, that she could even fathom he’d do anything to hurt her, made him nauseous and gave him the itch to fix every single thing he’d fucked up.
He moved into the warehouse and flipped the lock on the door at his back. Her studio was still in shambles, and blood spots stained the concrete. Forcing back the bile, he headed for the doorway that led to her loft, reminding himself Benedict couldn’t get to her now. As he hit the stairs, he thought back to what Callahan had shared earlier about the text they’d traced.
It was still possible Benedict had orchestrated the bombing. He could have had someone in California send that text so it couldn’t be traced back to him. God knew, he’d just proved he was violent and unpredictable. But Hunt wasn’t convinced Benedict had the patience to orchestrate and follow through with that kind of plan. And if he wanted her dead so badly, why not use a gun or a knife, or hell, even a car? There was no rational reason Benedict would turn to a bomb.
Which meant someone else wanted that building to come down. Someone who may or may not be linked to Kelsey. Someone neither he nor her family had considered.
The shower was running when he reached her loft. Images of her bare skin, wet and pink from the steam, flashed in his mind, but he quickly shut down the thoughts. He’d already screwed things up enough by crossing from professional to personal. He needed to focus on getting things back on track. He needed to apologize for what happened at his apartment and reassure her he was focused on nothing but her safety, then go back to being what he’d been to her before the last two days had ever happened—nothing more than her brother’s friend.
For some reason, the thought of being an acquaintance again—not even her friend—shot his mood right into the basement. But he knew it was the safest plan. The smartest plan. And at the end of the day, he had a sinking feeling it was probably the only plan she’d go for.
Not wanting her to see him when she came out of the bathroom, he went back downstairs and spent the next twenty minutes putting her storefront back together and cleaning up the mess he’d helped create. He didn’t have a clue how she’d folded some of the sweaters on the big square shelves—there was only one on each wide shelf that he could see, which seemed like a huge waste of space—but he did the best he could. When the place looked pretty good and enough time had passed for her to have gotten dressed, he turned toward the stairs again, intent on going up and talking to her, but something sparkly in the smoke detector above caught his attention.
His brow wrinkled as he moved closer and stared up at the round plastic device. Whatever had caught the light was now gone, but a shimmer like that made him think of glass. And he couldn’t think of a single reason for there to be glass in the smoke alarm of her shop.
A tingle ran over his nape. Telling himself he was being overprotective, he moved into the production facility behind the storefront and searched for a ladder. He’d probably just seen the light reflecting off the battery casing. After locating a fifteen-foot ladder, he hauled it back into the storefront and set it up beneath the smoke alarm, then climbed up and dislodged the cover.
“Holy shit.” Disbelief churned inside him as he stared at the mini surveillance camera on the end of a flexible wire casing. He followed the casing back and discovered the camera was plugged into the outlet along with the smoke alarm.
He jerked the camera out of the outlet and climbed down the ladder, that tingle turning to full-on warning vibrations. In the production facility, he found another camera hidden in one of the light fixtures. And upstairs in the living area of Kelsey’s loft apartment, which she’d managed to make homey and even cozy since moving in only a few months back, he discovered another hiding in a speaker beside her flat-screen TV.
“Son of a bitch.” He stared down at the three cameras in the palm of his hand. Something in his gut told him Kelsey hadn’t placed these herself to keep an eye on her employees.
His gaze lifted and swept over the small loft. She’d set up a living area adjacent to the small galley kitchen. Her design desk and a couple of tables were pushed up against a far wall. Natural light shone in from skylights above, and through an open doorway he could just see into a back room that looked like a bedroom.
He didn’t want to scare the crap out of her, so he cleared his throat and closed his hand around the cameras, deciding he’d save them for later. Before he showed her what he’d just found, he needed to get their relationship back on solid ground so she could trust him again. And that meant eating crow, proving he wasn’t the shit she thought he was.
Seconds passed in silence—seconds that only increased his pulse because he knew she knew he was out here—then she appeared in the doorway wearing slim jeans and a baggy OSU sweatshirt, her damp hair twisted into a messy bun on the top of her head, her adorable feet completely bare on the old wood floor.
Just the sight of her freshly showered with morning light shining down from above hit him like a swift punch to the gut. Her skin was devoid of makeup, but bruises had already formed along her jaw where Benedict had held her down. Internally, Hunt cringed, only he didn’t let the reaction show because he knew it wouldn’t help his cause. He also didn’t want her to think she looked bad, because to him she never could. She, on the other hand, didn’t have the slightest trouble letting her honest reaction to him show. The scowl that settled across her pretty face told him loud and clear he was the last person she wanted to see.
“Yes?” she asked, as if she couldn’t wait to get rid of him.
“Cops left.”
“Good.” She moved out of the bedroom, swept past him, and headed into the small kitchen. “You can follow them out. I don’t need you hovering over me anymore.”
The citrusy scent of grapefruit hung in the air as she moved, and he instantly wondered if it was her shampoo or lotion or just the natural scent of her silky soft skin. Even though the professional side of his brain screamed that’s not any of your concern!
Pushing the thought aside, he turned to look after her and stuffed his hands in the front pockets of his worn jeans, hoping he looked nonthreatening. “I’m not leaving. We need to talk about earlier.”
She pushed to her bare toes and pulled coffee filters out of the cupboard above her head, the movement accentuating her ass in those form-fitting jeans. “Trust me, we don’t.”
He blinked and focused on the back of her head so his mind wouldn’t wander. “I wouldn’t hurt you. I’m not like Benedict.”
“I am not talking about this.” She dropped back to her heels and reached for the carafe from the coffeemaker.
“Not all guys get off hurting women. I know what you saw me do downstairs freaked you out, but I would never use my hands to hurt you or another woman like he did. I was trying to protec—”
She slammed her palm against the counter. “I said stop talking about it. I do not want to talk about this with you. Ever.”
The quiver to her voice, the way her shoulders shook, the fact she wouldn’t turn to face him all swirled together and hit Hunt like a swift punch to the gut.
She was ashamed. Because Benedict had attacked her? Because she hadn’t gotten away on her own? Or because Hunt had witnessed it? He wasn’t sure. But the nausea swirling in his stomach told him it could very well be from all three.
“Kels.” He softened his voice and cautiously stepped toward her. “What happened wasn’t your fault.”
“I know it wasn’t my fault,” she snapped, jerking toward the sink to flip on the water and fill the carafe. “And you can spare me the psychobabble bullshit. I don’t need you trying to make me feel better. If you want to make someone feel better, go find your girlfriend.”
Something else hit Hunt hard. The reality that she wasn’t just ashamed of what had happened downstairs, but that she was still smarting from what had pushed her out of his apartment in the first place.
“Gen is not my girlfriend. I don’t have a girlfriend. I don’t have girlfriends, period. What you saw was—”
“I’m not talking about this either.” She flipped the water off and moved back to the coffee maker. “So drop the subject right now, or I’ll call the cops back and have them drop it for you.”
Hunt’s mouth slid closed, and he watched her tense shoulders and jerky movements as she finished making the coffee, feeling like an even bigger shit than he already did. He’d hurt her. More than he’d thought he had the power to hurt her. And every second he stood here trying to fix his mistakes, he was only making things worse.
“Look,” he said softly, wishing she’d just turn and look at him. Once. “I know you want me to take a hike right now, but your family’s not back yet, and they asked me to look after you.”
“No, my family hired you because of Julian. Who, thanks to you, is in the hospital now. So you can stop with the fake concern. We both know I don’t need a babysitter anymore.”
Frustration welled inside him. “It’s not fake, Kels.”
“Uh-huh.” She reached for a cup from the cupboard. “Coulda fooled me.”
He clenched his jaw, fighting for patience. Part of him wanted to grab her and shake some sense into her. Another part wanted to kiss her until she realized he was serious. Since neither would help his cause, he said, “I’m not going to apologize for hitting Benedict. I’d do it again in a heartbeat if he came after you.”
“Good thing we don’t have to worry about that.” She moved to the fridge and grabbed a carton of half-and-half.
“No, we don’t. But that doesn’t mean you’re not still in danger.”
She poured a generous dollop of creamer in her cup. “My ex-husband will be in jail for at least the next few weeks. Callahan already confirmed that. And my brothers will be back before a judge even sets his bail, so I’d say I’m safe.”
“Benedict isn’t the one I’m worried about.”
Her hand stilled against the carton, and her shoulders tensed all over again, but she still wouldn’t turn to look at him. “What does that mean?”
“It means I’m not convinced Benedict’s the one who sent you that threatening text message. And neither are the cops.”
She finally glanced his way, and he didn’t miss the fear in her pretty brown eyes. The same kind of fear he’d seen when she’d grabbed his arm downstairs. “What do you mean?”
He didn’t like scaring her, but he didn’t want to hold anything back from her either. He relayed what Callahan had told him about the text being traced to California. “I’m also not sure Benedict could come up with or execute the kind of planning it would take to set off a bomb. After seeing the short temper he displayed today, I don’t think he has the patience.”
“Wait a minute. You think someone else targeted me?”
“Maybe not. Maybe that text wasn’t related to the bombing at all. On the other hand, you’re a public figure now.”
She reached for the carafe of freshly brewed coffee and poured the steaming liquid into her mug. “I’m a nobody.”
“You’re not a nobody. Not after your big debut in New York. I ran a search while you were getting your scrapes bandaged. That actress friend of yours has worn several of your designs on the red carpet. And in interviews, she’s shared your name. You’re on peoples’ radars even if you don’t think you are.”
Rolling her eyes, Kelsey lifted her cup from the counter and moved past him into the living room. “I don’t have time for this. I have a business to run.”
“You’re going to have to make time.” He held out his hand as she passed. “I found these all over in here.”
She slowed her steps and stared down at the thin tubular objects in his hands. “What are those?”
“Surveillance cameras.” When her wide-eyed gaze shot up to his, he added, “And judging from your reaction, you didn’t know they were there.”
Shock and a good dose of holy shit ran across her features, telling him, yep, she’d had zero clue they’d been there. “How . . . ?” She swallowed hard, looking down at the cameras, then back up at his face. “Where? How did they get here?”
“Two I found downstairs, one up here. I’m guessing there’s more. And as for how they got here? You don’t have a security system. It’d be easy for someone to jimmy that lock downstairs, slip in and plant them, then slip right out again without you ever knowing.”
A sick look passed over her features. “Someone’s been watching me? How long?”
“I don’t know.”
“If they’re cameras, they have to be relaying images somewhere. How do they work? Were they hooked to some kind of computer?”
“No. These send a wireless signal.” He glanced around her loft. “My guess is whoever planted them also hooked up a remote server of some kind. We just need to find it.”
“Like a router?”
“Technically, yeah, they could hook these to a wireless router. But only if the network is unsecured.”
When she didn’t respond, a warning tingle ran down his spine. He tipped his head. “You don’t even have a secure router, do you?”
“No, I do.”
He breathed easier.
“But my password’s on the side of the box.”
Of course it was. He forced himself to take a calming breath and made a mental note to hit each of her brothers upside the head for not talking to her about basic security measures. “Show me.”
She moved across the room. “Over here. In the cabinet under the TV.”
Just as she’d said, he found her secure password on the side of her router, hidden in plain sight for anyone who looked. He was absolutely sure whoever had set the cameras in her warehouse was using her own router to send the images.
He tugged the phone from his back pocket and dialed his office. Taren Davies answered on the first ring. “Hey, boss. Didn’t expect to hear from you so early, especially after yesterday. What’s up?”
Hunt had talked to Davies last night after he’d called his dad, so the guy knew all about the bombing and that Hunt was still with a client. “I need you to get Monica on the line and set up a complete security overhaul on a warehouse in East Portland.”
“Sure thing. But I think Mon said we were scheduling out at least three weeks on new jobs.”
“This one gets bumped to the front of the line. I want it done ASAP.”
“That’ll piss some clients off.”
“I don’t give a shit. I also have a router here I want you to check out. See if you can trace any connected devices and figure out where they’re relaying images.”
“That’s not going to be easy to do. Especially if it’s a basic router.”
“It is.”
“If the person using the device is at all tech savvy and set up a hidden IP address, you’re SOL.”
Hunt knew that. “Just see what you can find.”
“Will do. You coming into the office today, or you still with the McClane client?”
Hunt glanced toward Kelsey, who was watching him with wariness and a sea of nerves as she sipped her coffee. “Not coming in. I’ll call you in a bit with an update and the address for the warehouse.”
“Gotcha.”
Hunt hit “End” and slipped the phone in his pocket. After unhooking Kelsey’s router, he pulled the device from the cabinet and pushed to his feet. “You can’t stay here.”
She gripped the mug in both hands, no longer looking angry, just way-the-fuck freaked out. “There’s still a chance Julian is the one who set these cameras. And he’s in jail now.”
“Yeah. There is. But until we know for sure, it’s not safe here.”
She looked down at her bare feet, and in the silence, Hunt knew scaring and bullying her would never get her to see reason. So he opted for the only choice he had. He opted for honesty.
“Look, I know you’re mad at me, Kelsey. You have every right to be mad at me for last night. I crossed a line I never should have gone near. But this isn’t about me. This is about you and your safety. You shouldn’t be alone right now. Not until the cops figure out what’s going on and if it has anything to do with you. I promised your family I’d keep you safe, and I promise you that’s all I’m interested in doing. But if you don’t trust me enough to do that, then at least let me call someone who can.”
“What do you mean?”
He didn’t like leaving her safety in the hands of anyone else, but at this point it was better than the alternative. “I’ve got several guys working for me who are completely capable of keeping you safe. And if you can’t trust someone from my company, then I know a few guys in town at other firms who are just as good. I can call one of them to take you back to your parents’ place or wherever else you want to go.”
“You’d do that?”
“Absolutely.”
“My family hired you, though. Wouldn’t you lose out on your fee if you handed me over to some other firm?”
“You think I give a shit about the money? I didn’t agree to watch over you because I thought I could make a quick buck. I did it to make sure nothing bad happened to you.”
When she didn’t answer, only blinked and stared at him, he told himself he was letting his emotions get the best of him. But, man, it really grated on him that she thought he was only here for the money. “Sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. I meant—”
“Where?”
“Where what?”
“You said I should go somewhere safe, but you didn’t say where.” She stared at something on his shirt, not meeting his eyes. “I really don’t want to go back to your apartment.”
Was she saying . . . ?
“You wouldn’t have to,” he said before the thought could even circle in his head.
“If this—person—turns out not to be Julian, and they really are targeting me for some reason, I don’t want to do anything to lead them to the rest of my family.”
“You wouldn’t. I can take you to my place on the coast.”
Her gaze lifted to his. “You have a house at the beach?”
“Technically it’s on a cliff overlooking a beach. It’s highly private and has the same security setup as my apartment. No one will find you there. And you can stay as long as you want.”
“I don’t want to stay very long.”
He tried not to be disappointed by that comment. “Then you can stay as long as it takes the authorities to confirm it was Benedict who sent that text and planted these cameras or figure out who did.”
She chewed on the inside of her lip. Seemed to be debating her options. And in the silence, he told himself the only thing that mattered was her safety. He didn’t care who made that happen, only that she listened to reason.
“Fine.” She dropped her arms and turned away. “I’ll pack a bag and meet you out here in ten minutes.”
His chest tightened. “Does that mean—”
“I’ll go with you to your beach house,” she said from the doorway of her bedroom. “For now. Just don’t make me regret it.”
When she was gone, he drew what felt like his first full breath since she’d walked into his bedroom last night. He’d absolutely make sure she wouldn’t regret it. He, on the other hand, was pretty sure he might.
Because having her in his house—close but not close enough to touch—was going to be nothing but pure torture for him.