LITMIR.BIZ

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out of his way.

      All right, so not today.

      Muttering an oath about Taylor’s not-so-distant lineage under his breath, Ian squared his shoulders and began to walk out toward the set.

      The noise level seemed to grow with each step he took.

      “You owe me, Taylor,” he growled at his partner. “Big-time.”

      “We’ll settle up later,” Randy promised through lips that barely moved. The next moment he smiled broadly. “Smile, damn it, Ian,” Randy hissed. “We’re not exactly walking out to face a firing squad.”

      “Might as well be.”

      Stoically Ian pushed back the curtain and walked out, blinking as he tried to accustom his eyes to the bright lights. He forced himself to endure this and made an effort to change his expression. He wasn’t about to become some grinning hyena. But he knew that if he continued to look as somber as he felt, not only would business not grow, it might even drop off.

      Dakota deliberately made eye contact with the taller of the two men, smiling warmly and willing him to loosen up. He looked as if he expected her to start poking at him with a hot branding iron.

      “And here they are now, folks.” Placing herself temporarily between the two men, she escorted them the final ten steps to the set.

      An arm hooked through each of theirs, Dakota nodded first to the right. “I want you to meet Ian Russell,” she said warmly, then nodded to the left, “and Randy Taylor, the two men who pooled their considerable abilities to form Bodyguard, Inc.” Gesturing for the men to take a seat on the cream-colored Italian leather sofa, she sat down on the overstuffed armchair that faced them. Only then did she glance toward her audience. “Not a very flashy name, I know, but it gets its message across, and I’m a firm believer that sometimes simple is best.”

      The woman probably wouldn’t know simple if it bit her, Ian thought. Because of the nature of his work, he was more than passingly acquainted with celebrity types. The moment any kind of fame came their way, they lost all perspective, became little demigod dictators without any sense of reality. Opulence became their king, not simplicity.

      “What these men provide,” Dakota was telling her audience, “is a very basic service.” A chuckle rose from the middle of the crowd, swelling and working its way to the outer perimeter until it seemed to encompass most of the room. “Okay, minds out of the gutter, people,” Dakota instructed with a laugh. “It’s not that kind of service.” Although, she could see why her audience, comprised predominantly of women, would think so, given the men they were ogling at. “It’s protection. These men are modern-day white knights. Ian,” she said, suddenly turning toward him, “why would I come to you?”

      “What?”

      He’d allowed his mind to wander, and Dakota had caught him completely off guard with her question. He’d been convinced that for the most part, since she appeared to be a savvy-looking woman, the talk-show hostess would know to focus her attention on and direct her questions to Taylor. Anyone could see that his partner was obviously the more gregarious of the two. Scratch that. “More” had nothing to do with it. He was the only gregarious one of the two of them.

      Maybe Ms. Dakota Delany wasn’t as savvy as he thought she was.

      Dakota shifted in her seat, her body language telling him that despite his hesitation, she wasn’t backing off. Her attention was completely focused on him.

      Damn you, Taylor, he thought, hating the trapped feeling that threatened to possess him.

      “There are a lot of other companies out there,” she persisted, her blue eyes never leaving his face. “Companies that are more established than yours. They all offer bodyguard service—something,” she said in an aside to the audience, adding a familiar wink, “that I would personally never avail myself of.” Her audience must be aware she had an aversion to having a paid-for shadow following her every move. She looked back at Ian. “Why come to you?”

      His eyes met hers dead-on, letting her know he didn’t appreciate being placed on the spot. He was here as a silent support, a nonverbal backup. He wasn’t the firm’s spokesperson. “Because we’ll get the job done,” he told her simply.

      Randy finally rode to the rescue. “Between us we’ve got fifteen years of experience on the force,” he interjected. “And we know the kind of precautions that need to be taken.”

      Dakota glanced at the silver clipboard MacKenzie had shoved into her hands at the last minute. Typed notes in neat, short paragraphs summarized the men and their firm. Already familiar with what was written there, she looked only to reinforce herself.

      “That’s right, both of you are former homicide detectives.” Turning toward the audience, she winked and said in her intimate way, “I do believe I feel safer already.”

      If Ian was hoping to catch a respite, the next moment found him disappointed. Dakota’s attention was back on him.

      “Being a former homicide detective makes you more familiar with the criminal mind than the average bodyguard might be.” She leaned into him, effectively blocking out the audience and making this a conversation between the two of them. “Tell me, why did you leave the force?”

      Randy was ready for this one. He had a pat answer all prepared, dealing with their wanting to grow as people, with their feeling that it was time to strike out on their own, etcetera.

      But just as he opened his mouth to reply, Ian was the one who replied, “Too much paperwork.”

      Delighted by the honesty, the studio audience roared in response.

      The laughter surprised Ian. He hadn’t expected this kind of reaction. He certainly hadn’t said it to be clever. He’d said it because it was true. Too much paperwork and too much red tape had driven him and then Taylor away from NYPD. There were too many rules to follow, and in his opinion a great many of them got in the way of doing decent police work.

      Some of the other rules were just too damn frustrating. He’d seen too many bad guys go free on technicalities. So much so that one day, he, the son of a cop and the grandson of a cop, didn’t want to be part of that system anymore.

      Protecting people, men, women, and especially children, from any impending dangers meant something. He felt it made a difference. Enough of a difference for him to change what he’d thought was his life’s calling in order to form this partnership with Taylor.

      Actually, the company had been Taylor’s idea, fashioned one lazy, sweltering-hot New York summer afternoon as they sat in O’Hara’s, nursing two well-deserved beers.

      The moment the suggestion had come out of Taylor’s mouth, he remembered taking to it wholeheartedly. Ian knew that Taylor had espoused the idea because he felt that there was a great deal of money to be made, protecting the rich and famous. His own reasons were different. He’d taken to it because, the way he saw it, there was a difference to be made. Even the rich and famous deserved to be free of fear.

      The laughter died down. Ian wasn’t following up his words so Dakota pushed a little bit more, hoping to get the reluctant guest to speak on his own volition. She had a feeling that once this man finally became vocal, he would have things to say that were worth hearing.

      “Any other reason than your dislike of putting things down on paper?” she asked innocently.

      Ian realized that just for the tiniest slice of a second, he’d gotten lost in her eyes, lost in her expression. Had to be the hot lights. They were all over the place and so intense they could make a grown man dizzy if he wasn’t careful.

      “Yeah, I like keeping people safe.”

      The smile Dakota gave him in response to his answer made him feel as if warm butter flowed in his veins.

      Reorienting himself to the immediate situation, he glanced at his watch. Only three minutes had gone by. That meant there were seventeen more minutes to endure, seventeen more minutes

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