settled for slipping back into her minion role. The only difference now was that her smiles had gone from forced to overly sweet and her tone was polite even as she let him know just how pissed she was. Not that he could blame her, because he couldn’t. She’d been so fucking adorable when she’d handed him the beer, he thought with a wistful sigh.
“And is there a reason why she’s suddenly pissed at you?” Ryan asked, plucking the beer out of his hand and dumping it out before dropping it in the bucket with the rest.
“She found the file,” Hunter admitted after a slight pause.
“Oh,” Ryan said, putting a world of meaning into that one word.
“Exactly,” Hunter said, still trying to figure out how he was going to make this up to her.
“Then why is she still here?”
“Because I wouldn’t let her leave.”
“Do you think that’s a good idea?”
“She’s not going anywhere,” Hunter said, especially while he was stuck on house arrest and wouldn’t be able to get to her if anything happened.
But once he was off house arrest…
She still wasn’t going anywhere, he decided.
“I need you to do me a favor.”
“What’s that?” Ryan absently asked, as he pulled out his phone.
“I want you to look after her when this is all over.”
“Why?” Ryan asked, throwing him a curious glance.
“Because she’s really good at what she does and I plan on keeping her on after this,” Hunter explained, not bothering to point out that knowing that she was safe was the only way that he was going to be able to sleep at night.
“I see,” Ryan murmured thoughtfully before asking, “Now, by ‘really good at what she does,’ are you talking about sex? Because I’d like to get an idea of her qualifications.”
“She’s not my type,” Hunter said, as he hooked his foot behind the leg of Ryan’s chair and-
“Son of a bitch!”
-decided to see what his devious little assistant was up to.
Chapter 19
“This was a stupid idea,” Kylie finally admitted, as she gave up searching under the end table and sat up with a sigh as she glanced around the large office, wondering why she was doing this. She should just focus on doing her job and counting down the days until she could put all this behind her. It shouldn’t matter that he was struggling with this, but it did because she remembered what it felt like to be trapped.
Well, that, and she didn’t actually want to leave.
She liked it here, loved her job, and she even liked Hunter, and that was the problem. If he’d been a jerk after everything that happened, she could have ignored the pained expression on his face when he’d admitted that he was struggling without a second thought, but instead, he’d tried to make it better. He also hadn’t pushed her to forgive him, lost his temper, or tried to blame her for what happened like her ex-husband would have. Instead, he’d quietly accepted her glares, sat outside the bathroom door when her second encounter with alcohol ended like the first, and kept her from falling apart last night.
She still wasn’t happy with what happened, but right now she had bigger problems to worry about.
Maybe it rolled under the couch? she wondered as she leaned back over and-
“What the hell are you doing?” the man that she’d gone to five different stores for this morning asked.
“Can I help you with something, Mr. O’Mallery?” Kylie absently asked, wondering if Amazon would be able to deliver a new Nerf gun today.
“I’d love another beer,” Hunter drawled, making her lips twitch as she glanced up and-
“It doesn’t work,” she said, licking her lips nervously as she looked from the large Nerf gun loaded with a hundred, correction, ninety-nine small foam balls aimed at her to find Hunter leaning back against the couch, looking completely relaxed.
Not taking his eyes off her, he raised the gun and-
“Son of a bitch!” came the shouted reply from somewhere behind her as the large toy gun that she hadn’t been able to figure out fired a round.
“Really?” he asked, aiming the gun back in her direction.
Swallowing hard, Kylie licked her lips nervously as she glanced over her shoulder and-
“You bastard!” Ryan snapped when Hunter fired off another round, hitting his best friend in the knee.
“What’s with the gun, Miss Jameson?” Hunter asked, drawing her attention back to find the large Nerf gun aimed at her chest.
“Distraction,” she managed somewhat weakly even as she had to admit that she hadn’t