Bodyguard/Husband Read Online Free PDF Page A

everyone. You may not have thought of your encounter as a date, but he did. You think about it, and when another name occurs to you, tell me immediately.” He closed the notebook and slid it into his jacket pocket. He’d call Quantico as soon as they landed, and have background checks run on these names. He had a killer to catch.
     
    B Y THE TIME H OLLY pulled into her driveway twelve hours later, she was done in, mentally and physically. How had Jack crammed so much into one day?
    He’d dragged her off the plane in Memphis and rushed her off to Chancery Court, where a marriage license and a judge awaited them.
    “You’re not suggesting that we really get married?” she had asked in horror, drawing odd looks from the other happy couples.
    Jack had pulled her into his arms and whispered in her ear. “If anyone checks, I want everything in order, including the record of our marriage. Especially the record of our marriage. In a small town like yours, word would spread like wildfire if we were living in sin.”
    Shaken more than she wanted to admit by both his words and his warm embrace, Holly did as she was told—signing forms, repeating words, saying “I do”at the appropriate time. At some point Jack slid a ring on her finger, and gave her one to slip on his. Matching rings. He was full of surprises.
    Then they raced back to the Memphis airport, where a small jet waited to fly them down to Jackson. By the time they picked up her car from long-term parking, Jack was stiff and quiet. His exhaustion was obvious in his white, pinched lips and his sunken eyes. When she’d suggested that he try to sleep while she made the hour’s drive to her house, he didn’t object.
    She pulled into her garage and reached for the driver’s side door. The new wedding band knocked against the door with a metallic click, an undeniable reminder that, at least for the moment, she was connected to this stranger by the most intimate of bonds. She glanced over at him. He was awake, his gray eyes soft and heavy-lidded.
    “Honey, we’re home,” she said.
    He straightened and flexed his shoulder, then climbed from the car. “Pop the trunk and I’ll get the bags,” he growled, his voice gruff with sleep.
    “Thanks, dear. ” Holly opened the door into her kitchen and was greeted with the smell of old food and the blare of music peppered with gunfire from the living room.
    “Damn,” she muttered.
    Jack came in behind her. “Go back to the car,” he commanded, setting the bags down quietly. “I’ll check it out.”
    To her horror, he reached behind his back and pulled out a big gun.
    “Whoa! Hold on, cowboy.” She grabbed his arm. “It’s my sister.” She looked up at him. “Tell meyou’re not going to be waving that thing around town. Not very subtle, honey. ”
    He scowled at her. “Never grab an armed man.”
    She held up her hands. “No problem, sir.”
    He holstered his weapon, but when she started toward the living room, he stopped her. “I’ll go first. Where’s the light switch?”
    “It’s just Debi,” she insisted, gesturing to the left.
    He reached around the doorframe and snapped on the lights.
    “Sheez!” Popcorn flew everywhere as Debi jumped up, scrambling for the remote control. Her hand closed around it and the din of ominous music and gunfire stopped. “You scared me to death, Hol! What happened to you? You’re late.”
    Debi’s hair, which was the same dark brown as Holly’s but enhanced by a deep red rinse, was messily twisted into a pile on top of her head. She wore a droopy T-shirt over leggings, and her face, bare of makeup, was shiny and pretty, if thin.
    “And it’s midnight and you’re still up,” Holly countered. “Don’t classes start tomorrow?”
    “Oh, baby, who’s this?” Debi had spotted Jack. “Mmm, did you bring me a present, Hol?”
    Don’t say it, don’t say it, don’t say it, Holly thought, intoning the mantra that never seemed to work for her. She cringed as Jack