Shane stared across the room at the door to Lacey’s room. She’d come out long enough to eat and then retreated. He didn’t like the haunted look in her eyes or the way she’d only picked at her food. Lacey was...larger than life, full of joy. He’d only known her a few days. Not long enough to become an expert on what made her tick. And yet, it was as though he could feel her distress through the walls.

“You want to head down to the hotel bar in ten?” Felix laid his phone down and turned his head. The hulking Viking had stretched out on the sofa, leaving no room for anyone else.

The right thing to do would be to say yes and to give Lacey space.

There was also no way to go to her, or even check on her, without an audience. He wanted to check on her, to hold her if she needed it, to be something to her, and yet she’d been very clear what she wanted. Still didn’t matter. He’d lost enough people to fill a stadium. He knew what it was like. She didn’t.

“Nah.” Shane scrubbed a hand across his freshly-shaven jaw and turned to study the front doors.

“Not even for an hour?” Felix asked.

“What’s the pool at?” Shane asked.

“Everyone bet fifty.”

“Shit.”

“If you wait an hour, I’ll be two hundred dollars richer.” Felix grinned. The ass.

“If I wait? What the hell kind of bet is this?”

“Kyle said you’d stare at her door all night. Adam thinks you’ll be in bed half an hour after shift. Isaac said you wouldn’t go at all, unless she calls you.” Felix shrugged and picked up his phone again.

Three of the guys thought he’d stay away. The ones who knew him best had him pegged. His head even told him that giving her space was the right move. It wasn’t his place to shoulder into her room, even if he thought it was what she needed.

Then why had Isaac left a box of condoms on Shane’s bed earlier? Some sort of joke?

The ass.

Shane should go to bed.

It was the right thing to do.

Then why did his insides seem to rebel at the idea of putting any distance between himself and Lacey?

Even the ten or so feet between him and her door now felt like too much.

“Why’d you say an hour?” Shane asked.

“Because of the way you look at her.” Felix glanced at him. “It’s the same way Zain looks at his wife. It’s the same way Ian looks at Taylor. I figured you’d walk away, or try to, then come back.”

Shane rolled that around in his head.

Ian was one of Aegis Group’s investigators and a straight-shooter. Shane was one of many who’d been surprised at how fast he’d moved when it came to his fiancé. The same with Zain. He’d been the most level-headed, deliberate guy Shane had ever met, and in the blink of an eye he was all but married. Their ladies weren’t like Lacey, though.

It didn’t mean she needed someone in her corner any less.

“That look. That one right there.” Felix wagged his finger at him.

“Fuck you.” Shane flipped the new guy the bird.

“Time’s almost up. Adam and Isaac should be here any minute.” Felix sat up. “You want to go have a drink?”

“No.” Shane pushed to his feet.

The suite doors beeped and Isaac stepped in, Adam crowding in behind him.

“About damn time,” Felix said.

“You guys ready to turn in?” Isaac grinned and rubbed his palms together.

“Yeah, fuck you.” Shane still wanted to deck Isaac, but when did he not?

“Bed’s all warm and waiting for you. Who is taking next shift with Kyle?” Isaac moseyed across the room while Adam headed for the kitchenette and the coffee pot.

“Me,” Felix said.

“Oh, I see. Then it’ll be us later. You better get some beauty sleep.” Isaac’s grin widened, still glancing at Shane every few steps.

Great. More time with Isaac.

His gut still said to go to Lacey. That she might need company or a shoulder.

The guys were all staring at him, waiting for him to act.

“You know, fuck all of you.” Shane shoved to his feet.

“You told him?” Isaac gaped at Felix, who howled in laughter.

“Stop making so much racket.” Adam tossed a throw pillow at Felix.

Someone died today, and these idiots wanted to fuss over a bet. They were alive. It was time to take advantage of that and stop second-guessing his gut.

Shane stalked across to the bedroom door.

He tapped twice and then pushed it open, Felix’s laughter following him.

Shane shut the door and pressed his back to the cool wood. Most of the guys’ noise was blocked out, a minor blessing.

Lacey sat in a leather armchair, her knees pulled up to her chest, and a terrycloth robe wrapped around her. She stared at him over her shoulder, eyes large and lips parted.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hey.”

“Sorry about them.” He thumbed over his shoulder.

“I...didn’t notice.” She lifted her hand, fingers fluttering around her face as though she weren’t sure what she was doing.

“How you doing?” He straightened and took a step farther into the room.

“Okay, I guess. Alive?”

“Sometimes, that’s the part that sucks the most.”

Lacey sniffled.

Shit.

Shane circled the bed to her side and went to a knee.

Fresh tears welled up in her eyes and she pressed a tissue to her nose.

“How do you do it? Keep going? I...I don’t know what to do. It should have been me, not Josh. It’s not fair.” Her voice rose in pitch, breaking with grief.

Shane opened and closed his mouth.

He didn’t have an answer for that, least not a good one.

He wrestled with the words, not knowing what to say. Where did he begin?

“Most days, I kept going because I had to. Because if I didn’t, someone else might die. It was my job to keep going. I guess...that’s what I’ve learned to do.” If he kept going far enough, the pain of losing another friend eventually lessened. It didn’t mean he’d dealt with the grief or loss, he simply survived it.

“I don’t know if I can do that.” Lacey turned her head, staring out the window at the twinkling lights of the city.

Even when he’d first seen her, wide-eyed and full of surprise at the Jamaican compound, she’d been poised to do something. Bigger than life. The person curled up in the chair in front of him was visibly shrinking from moment to moment.

How could he help her deal with the loss when he’d never really examined his own?

“Come here. Come on.” He slid his hand down her hunched back.

Lacey leaned toward him.

He slid one arm under her legs and his other around her waist until he could lift her out of the chair. She didn’t squawk a protest or acknowledge his touch.

Shane sat on the chair and cradled Lacey to his chest.

Somehow, she seemed to have shrunk to half her size.

He wrapped his arms around her, tucking her head under his chin, and wracked his brain for something to say that might help her. His way of dealing with death was to keep going. Every day, he did things that made him think of a friend or brother in arms who hadn’t made it.

The world was sometimes a dark and terrible place.

It needed people like Lacey to be better. To remind people like him that there was wonder to be had.

“This is all my fault,” she whispered.

How many times had he said that? Blamed himself for not being there, for not covering a friend better, for not seeing the threat in time? Too many to count.

Shane closed his eyes and breathed in a deep breath.

The scent of coconut and rum was gone from Lacey’s hair. Instead she smelled of the hotel soap and sunshine.

“You’re going to think that for a long time,” he said.

Lacey spread her hand out over his heart, but otherwise didn’t acknowledge his words.

“I can’t tell you the name of everyone who has died on my watch, but I know a lot of them. I ask myself all the time, what could I have done to prevent this? Could I have stopped it? It always seems like, somehow, it was my fault.”

“But—that’s different. You’re a soldier. You’re following orders.”

“Is it different? Really?”

“Yes...?”

“I’m not always sure it is that simple. I mean, we were doing our job. So was your friend.”

“But Josh’s job wasn’t dangerous.”

“Not inherently, no. Anything can kill you, though. Crossing the street could kill you.”

“That’s an accident. What happened to Josh—because of me—wasn’t an accident.”

“Did you kill him?”

“What? No.” Lacey picked her head up off his shoulder and glared at him.

“Look, I am possibly the worst person to tell you how to deal with this, but what I can tell you is that you can’t take responsibility for what someone else did. What would your friend want you to do now? Would he be angry with you? Would he want you to do something about it? What?” Shane stared at her, willing her to understand. He carried enough guilt over the shit that might have been his fault not to also take responsibility for the deaths he had no control over.

Lacey drew circles on his shoulder, her red-rimmed eyes bloodshot and full of sorrow. This wasn’t something she’d get over in a day or a week. Her friend’s murder would stick with her for years, but it didn’t have to be a dark raincloud. Least, that’s what people told him.

“He’d say, make it count.” Her voice broke and he heard the heralding, watery notes of impending tears. “It was like, his catch phrase. If I did something crazy or stupid or...whatever. He’d tell me to make it count. Get the shot, go for broke—he was an all or nothing kind of person.”

Shane stroked her back. Whatever decision she came to, however she wanted to handle it, she’d have to do it herself. Survivor’s guilt wasn’t something anyone could help with. He’d talked to all the head doctors he’d been forced to go to, and none of them had a magic pill that would make that gnawing demon leave him alone.

“He’d want me to make sure Marcos and his team paid for what they did.” She sniffled and sat up a little straighter. “That’s what Josh would want. But what if that puts more people at risk? What about you? Aanya? The others? I don’t know if I can make that call, Shane. I’ve only ever had to worry about myself...”

“The FBI will be here tomorrow. They will take it from there. Simple as that. You don’t have to do anything. Just tell them what happened, and get them a copy of the video.”

Lacey relaxed against him, her boneless body draped over his.

“How do you do it?” She tilted her head, looking up at him.

“Not very well.” There was no use in pretending he had a handle on how to deal with losing his friends.

“Then how do you keep going on? Doing this?”

“I don’t know how to do anything else.” He lifted a shoulder. “I’d have stayed in, but with the cutbacks, it wasn’t an option. Maybe I don’t know how to do anything else?”

Shane stared at the bedspread. He’d gone into the Navy out of a desire to protect. It had become his identity, what made him tick. Without it, who was he?

“Do you want to do something else?” she asked.

He didn’t want to talk about himself, but right now Lacey needed to get her mind off her friend. In her place, he’d drink himself stupid and after a four-day hangover, he’d at least have dulled the pain of loss enough to function. After one encounter with a tipsy Lacey, he wasn’t keen on sending her down that path.

“I don’t know what else I’d do, honestly. This is all I’m good at.” It was a shameful truth, but there it was.

“Whatever. Everyone is good at something naturally. Think.” There was just the tiniest bit of spark back in her eyes. That’s what made him keep going right now, when he’d have rather rammed a train spike through his wrist than keep talking.

“I...uh...” He lifted his shoulders. “I was a Boy Scout.”

“You’re outdoorsy. You camp?”

“Well, yeah.”

“You could be a tour guide, hiking instructor... I assume you know how to swim so—dive teacher. You would probably make a killer park ranger. With your skill-set, I’d look into an animal preserve, maybe somewhere in Africa or Asia. They’re always having to police for poachers, on top of keeping the grounds safe. There’s a whole world out there that could use a guy with your skills.”

“Huh.” He blinked at her. He’d always seen himself in the SEALs. Assumed one day his number would be up and it would be someone else wondering what they could have done better. “I don’t think I’d go anywhere right now.” Shane had only been in the civilian life for three years. The way he saw it, he owed Aegis Group a solid five years before he looked to go anywhere else. Still, two more years, and then what?

He didn’t want to be that guy. The one who never knew when to retire. He’d like to move on to something he could do until he died.

Shane glanced at the clock.

Shit.

“It’s getting pretty late. You should see about some sleep.” Shane gave her knee a little squeeze. Hell, neither of them had much rest the last thirty-six hours.

“Where are you sleeping?” Lacey didn’t move a muscle.

“Down the hall.”

“Outside the suite?” Her voice wavered, just the tiniest amount.

“Two of us are always outside those doors, watching over you.” He nodded at her bedroom door.

“I know I’ve been a bitch to deal with, and I keep asking you for more favors, but...would you stay? I just feel safer with you around.”

No.

That was the worst idea possible.

“Please? I promise to be on my best behavior.” Her gaze pleaded.

His mouth went dry.

Lacey was independent to the point of being foolhardy, and now she was asking for help. He could no sooner tell her no than deny gravity.

“If that’s what you want. Sure.” Those words felt dragged out of him.

“Thank you. I know I can be a pain in the ass.”

Lacey stood and shrugged the robe off. Someone had found her new clothes to wear. The simple black tank top and yoga pants weren’t fancy, but they also didn’t have a month’s worth of dirt holding them upright. They did fit her like a second skin, reminding him of everything he’d touched and held before.

She pulled the comforter back and crawled under the blankets.

Shane moved slower, needing a moment to prepare himself.

He took a deep breath, chanting, Nothing will happen, to himself.

Lacey wanted companionship, that was it.

Shane toed off his boots and unclipped his holster. While they didn’t openly carry in the rest of the hotel, within the suite they remained armed. He slid it into the top drawer of the night stand and shut it. For now, he wasn’t her bodyguard, he wasn’t protecting her from anything except nightmares.

Lacey curled up on her side, her head pillowed on her hand, watching him.

Yeah, the clothes were staying on.

Shane slid under the blankets and turned the lamp off, plunging them into semi-darkness.

“Thank you.” Lacey rest her hand on his arm.

“Get some sleep. I’ll be here for the next few hours and then I’ll take a shift outside.”

“I would have been sleeping on Josh’s sofa tonight. That thing always smelled weird. I had these nightmares about turning on a black-light and what I’d see.” Lacey chuckled and shifted closer. “I met Josh on a trip to Nepal. It was summer, and we hiked up to the Annapurna Mountains. It’s where the Gurung work for the summer, when people aren’t climbing Everest. We—I don’t know if I should call it helped, but we contributed—to harvesting the honey. It’s so potent there that if you eat it from the comb you get high. We laid on this cliff, stoned out of our mind from honey, and just...laughed.”

“What took you to Nepal?”

“I was working with a group tracking the movements of snakes, and Josh got there as part of a backpacking tour. He was really interested in what we were doing, so he left the tour and started working with us, filming most of it.”

“Does everyone who meet you go crazy, or is it just me and Josh?”

Lacey laughed, the first true sound of joy he’d heard from her since they’d tried sharing dinner in the truck.

“I do seem to inspire poor life decisions.” She sighed.

“No, you don’t.”

“If it weren’t for me—”

“You have to stop talking like that.” He rolled to his side and looked down at her, the light from the window glinting off her eyes. “You’re different, Lacey. But a different people need. You make people like Josh—and me—realize there’s more out there.”

“Before now, I’d have taken that as a compliment. Now...I have to wonder if it makes me culpable.”

“No.” He cupped her cheek, willing her to understand. “It’s not your fault, Lacey. It will never be your fault.”

“It’s hard to believe that right now.”

“Then I’ll believe it for you until you can, too.”

If Lacey was guilty of anything, it was being too open to going wherever the wind took her, for enjoying life too much, for seeing wonder and opportunity where others wouldn’t. She saw the world differently, with a fresh perspective people like him needed. Shane knew he was too bogged down in the way things were, in sticking to what he was familiar with, but without this chance encounter, he might never have realized he couldn’t see the forest for the trees.

He wrapped his arm around her, pulling her close and tucking her head under his chin.

Lacey was special, and if he could show her that, keep her wings from being clipped by fear, the world would be a better place. She clung to him, her grief familiar because he’d been in her shoes a dozen times. In the end, there was rarely something he could have done differently. The hardest part of life was accepting that some things were out of his, or her, control.

Shane eased his grip and Lacey leaned back enough to peer up at him.

“You realize if it’s not my fault, it isn’t yours, either?” She spread her hand against his chest. “You know what I’m thinking because you’ve been here. You are here. It’s easier to recognize someone going through the same thing you are, isn’t it?”

Lacey didn’t seem to require an answer. She laid her head down and slid her arm further around his waist.

He bent and kissed the top of her head.

Half the time he wanted to strangle the life out of her, the rest of the time he wanted to hold onto her.

Lacey shifted, getting more comfortable. Or so he thought.

Her breath warmed his cheek, then his lips. His throat went dry, or he’d have told her to roll over. Her mouth was soft and supple against his, stirring up emotions better left ignored. Despite his intention to keep his hands—and other body parts—to himself, her kiss was a command, not an invitation. He grasped her hip, and instead of nudging her away, pulled her closer until her warmth soaked into him.

This was a bad idea.

He opened his mouth to tell her to stop, and her tongue swept into his mouth. Her hand fisted the front of his shirt, and she leaned into him.

Shane tried to say her name, but it was lost in the slide of lips and her muted groan. The sound of her need stoked the embers of his lust. It wasn’t that long ago that they’d given in. He could still remember the clench of her body, the way they fit together.

This wasn’t the time, and she sure as hell wasn’t in the same headspace as he was.

He grasped her wrists, pulling her hands off him, and rolled, pinning her under him. He gritted his teeth, steeling himself against the way her body welcomed him into the cradle of her embrace.

“Shane.” She somehow managed to infuse his name with both frustration and longing.

He pressed the back of her hands into the mattress and pushed up onto his elbows.

“Lacey, this isn’t a good idea right now.”

She went still under him, her body still thrumming with so much life he could practically feel the vibrations in his balls.

“I want to hold you,” she whispered.

“You need to sleep, Lacey.”

“I need you.” She lifted up, straining at his hold. She could just barely nuzzle his cheek. Her lips traced his jaw, and more than once, he felt the flick of her tongue.

Fucking hell.

If he let go of her, he wasn’t sure she wouldn’t grab hold of him. And if she did that, he wasn’t strong enough to make himself get up and leave her.

“Okay.” She sighed and pulled against his hold. “Maybe need is a little strong, but I want you here. I want to be with you.”

He was toast, and he didn’t even care.

Not once had he ever understood one of the guys falling into bed with a client. But the need coursing through his veins? It made no logical sense. On paper, he and Lacey were water and oil. They didn’t mix. Or they shouldn’t. But they did.

The how and why didn’t matter.

“Shane?” She shifted under him, oblivious to the mini mind explosions going on inside of him.

What he knew was that she showed him a new way to view the world. He’d be damned if he didn’t do anything humanly possible to lift the burden of guilt from her shoulders long enough for her to get it through that thick, beautiful skull of hers that she was not to blame.

Which meant he wasn’t getting out of this bed for a while.