LITMIR.BIZ

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when he wanted it. Given what he did for a living, he wasn’t looking for long-term. He’d had that with Beth, and though it had been amazing, he wouldn’t find it twice in one lifetime.

      Griffin dialed Connor on his secure line. While he spoke, Kit rubbed her arms and looked around. Was she thinking of running? He would catch her. If he had to bring her in wounded, it was better than bringing her in dead. She wouldn’t get far on her injured foot. He’d bandaged it, but any pressure and it would resume bleeding.

      She shivered again, and he removed the sweatshirt from his motorcycle trunk and tossed it to her. She smiled at him gratefully and pulled it over her dress. The shirt was long on her, falling below the hemline of her dress. He was momentarily fixated on her pair of slim, toned legs.

      Her legs weren’t her best feature, though. Her best feature was her eyes. He could get lost in their depths. He could see so much going on behind them. He liked that. He liked it a lot.

      “Get her to the safe house. I’ll send a computer as soon as I can,” Connor said.

      “Right. A computer.” Connor’s wife Kate, also known as Shade, had reasoned that Kit would be more comfortable and possibly of use to them in the immediate future with a computer in her hands.

      Kit drew the hood of his sweatshirt up, and Griffin smiled. It worked on her. She had a sexy nerd look, her hair wild around her shoulders and her lips twisted in annoyance.

      He wrapped up his call and disconnected. “Ready?” he asked her.

      She glared at him from under the hood. “If I run, you’d have to chase me.”

      “That’s right.”

      “But you don’t want to hurt me.”

      He didn’t want to hurt her. But if he had to tackle her, he would. “I will do what I need to bring you in.”

       Chapter 2

      She was going to run. Her muscles clenched. Her history with the Locker hadn’t indicated that she’d had deception training. In his line of work, Griffin expected liars. Kit was a refreshing change of pace.

      Kit made it two steps before he caught her and pushed her against the brick wall of a nearby building. He exercised control as he held her wrists in his. He wasn’t looking to break her arms.

      “You’re hurting me.” He loosened his grip. She pulled her arm free and punched him in the face.

      It barely registered. He’d been struck harder—much harder—before. Tonight, even. “We need to work on your self-defense skills.”

      Her mouth trembled. Her eyes welled with tears. Was she going to cry? He shouldn’t care if she did.

      “Let me go, brute.”

      Brute? He had been called a lot of names, but never that. “Will you run?” he asked.

      She shook her head. “I know you’ll catch me. But I won’t stop trying to get away from you.”

      “You won’t have to deal with me for much longer. After I drop you off, you’re someone else’s headache.” Maybe someone else could get through to her that she was in danger and needed protecting.

      They walked back to his motorcycle, and she kicked it over. He looked at her in surprise. “Don’t like the bike?”

      “Look at me. How do you think I feel right now?”

      “I have no idea how you feel.” Angry, clearly. He righted the bike.

      She folded her arms over her chest. “So that part of you is broken. You kill people and you manhandle me. You don’t care how I feel.”

      “I am not paid to care how you feel. I am paid to keep you safe. How is your foot?”

      “It hurts.”

      “I’ll help you onto the seat,” he said. He lifted her in his arms.

      “Everyone can see up my dress,” she said, squirming in his arms, trying to tug it and the sweatshirt down.

      “There’s no one here,” he said.

      “I’m never wearing a dress again,” she said.

      He liked her determination and gave her credit for attempting to flee. “You look good in it.”

      “It’s a designer dress,” she said.

      “Whatever it is, it’s nice.”

      “My sister bought it for me,” she said.

      “You may have to explain why it’s damaged,” he said.

      She rolled her eyes. “Please. She couldn’t care less. She has a closet full of dresses, and this one is four sizes too big for her.”

      Her sister was supermodel Marissa Walker. Marissa had been on the cover of some sports magazines in a swimsuit and had traveled the world. Rare for two sisters to have such extraordinarily different talents.

      “Are you thinking about sleeping with my sister now?” Kit asked.

      He hadn’t been. “Are you thinking about me sleeping with your sister?”

      “Don’t be gross.”

      Not much about Marissa Walker was gross, but imagining a sibling with a lover was. “You brought it up.”

      “I’m trying to figure you out,” she said. She touched the side of his face and then his ear, running her finger down the curve of it.

      He turned his head. “Stop that.”

      “You’re bruised, and your ear is bleeding,” she said.

      His ears were ringing, but they would stop. “I’ll look at it later.”

      He helped her onto the bike and then mounted it. It was a short distance to the safe house. He circled the block twice, ensuring he wasn’t followed. The safe house was a temporary holdover for the night. Kit would change hands many times to lose any trail connecting her to her final destination: a supersecret military base. Griffin hadn’t been told the location. From what he’d understood, few knew it existed.

      Five more minutes and he could finish this job. Kit was alive, and that was how he would remember her. The beautiful, feisty hacker in the red dress. When he stopped in front of the safe house, he helped Kit off the bike and let her lean on him as they took the stairs to the back door.

      Kit removed the sweatshirt and extended her hand to him.

      “Keep it,” he said. He didn’t need it and she seemed to be more comfortable having it.

      “Thank you,” she said. She knotted the sleeves around her waist.

      He knocked once on the door, and it opened a couple of inches. “It is a truth universally acknowledged...” the voice said.

      Griffin finished the quote. “...that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.”

      He guessed Kate had picked the quote. Since she and Connor had married and were starting a family, she believed that their operatives were destined for the same happiness. Griffin had tried to tell her that happiness came in many packages, not all of them involving a spouse and children.

      Griffin’s life had been made better by a woman, but most relationships ended with deep unhappiness. Even Beth, whom he had loved with his whole being, had broken his heart when she’d died.

      The door opened all the way.

      He set Kit across the threshold. “She needs shoes. She has an injury to her foot, and a doctor should look at it.”

      The man inside nodded. Griffin didn’t recognize him, but he didn’t know every operative in Connor’s network. “I’ll take care of it.”

      “Good

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