He stroked his short beard, their faces remaining close, so close he almost brushed his mouth over hers. “You can keep telling yourself that, girl, but that doesn’t mean—”
“Girl?” Her brow arched, her attention dipping to his mouth for a split second. “Your Southern charm and terms of endearment won’t work on me.”
He cocked his head. “You’re preparing to run away with the assumption you’re going to look guilty for the missing sources, despite the fact your name has yet to be sullied. And we’re having this conversation right now?”
“Exactly,” she said, letting go of a flustered breath. She pulled her head back as if realizing they were close to kissing. “This is not me.” Ana pointed a finger back and forth between them. “And if you try and help me, you’ll only threaten my focus.”
“Like you’re losing your focus now?” He just couldn’t help himself. He even laid on his accent a bit thicker, lifting his chin a touch when he spoke.
Her palms landed on his chest with a shove. He refused to budge. His balance was just fine right now. “I-I don’t understand what it is you’re doing to me, but—”
“I’m not doing anything to you, darlin’.” I’d like to be, but this is the definition of wrong time, wrong place. There was something in the air, though. Magic, mysticism, whatever it may be . . . there was a pulsating electric current between them that drew him to her, preparing to forgo his mission and scoop her into his arms. To hell with the consequences.
“I’m sorry. I have to go, but please do yourself a favor and stay out of what’s going on. Leave D.C.”
He swallowed at her cryptic warning. What had she gotten herself involved in? “I can’t watch you leave.” He shrugged. “I’m persistent, and I don’t forgo a challenge. So, if you remember working with me back in Charlotte, you should already know that this night ends in one of two ways.”
Ana’s eyes locked with his, a questioning eyebrow waiting for him to go on. Her hands remained on his chest, and surely, she felt his heart drumming harder beneath her touch.
His entire body was lit. Alive with her eyes and hands on him. “Either you let me help you, or I walk you into the Hoover Building myself, and we have a nice little chat about what happened tonight.”
Chapter Eleven
“I can drive.” It was his rental SUV, after all. “My head isn’t that bad.”
“You admitted someone got the drop on you tonight, and you lost your balance. You really think I want you behind the wheel in the dead of night?” She opened her safe inside her master bedroom walk-in closet and knelt to retrieve her pump-action Remington 870, 9mm, and K-bar knife. She handed him the weapons, then went for ammo.
His heart nearly exploded. “A woman after my own heart.” Wow. “Every closet should come equipped with a Remington.”
“And by the way, if I can handle firearms like these, I think I can handle driving your SUV.”
“Really, I—”
“You want me going with you, then let me drive.” She was also persistent, he’d give her that.
He zipped his lips. This was a woman not to be reckoned with. A Southern woman at heart, perhaps. “I’m gonna ask one more time, but are you sure you want to run?”
“It’s not running. I need to be at a location outside of Atlanta in”—she checked her Apple watch—“about ninety-four hours. And let me remind you that I’m perfectly capable of going by myself. I don’t need a babysitter.” Pivoting one knee to better face him, she threw a finger in the direction of the weapons bag. “I can probably shoot better than you.”
“Ha!” He crouched, the weapons separating the two of them, because why wouldn’t a shotgun be what was between him and the woman he wanted to kiss? And he did want to kiss her. Her eyes lowered to his mouth as if she were reading his inappropriate thoughts right now. That little twitch of her lips said it all. She was wondering how his mouth would feel on hers, too. “You do know what I do for a living, right?”
She rolled her tongue over her lower lip before drawing her eyes to his—ohhhh, she was screwing with him. It only turned him on more. “I thought you were retired. Since when do security contractors go around shooting on U.S. soil?” She braced herself with one hand on the floor next