Her Enemy Protector Read Online Free PDF Page A

was sympathetic, but it was something else, too. Intelligent. Razor-sharp. This guy knew exactly who and what her father was.
    “I have to warn you, Joe. Anyone who crosses my father ends up dead. As in six feet under.”
    Another calm nod.
    “And you still want to try to rescue me?” she asked incredulously. This guy was definitely in Charlie Squad! Either that or he was nuts.
    “Yup. Except I’m not just going to try. I’m going to succeed.”
    “How?” she asked in escalating disbelief. Even if he was in Charlie Squad, her father’s security measures were legendary. She was guarded around the clock, and if Joe tangled with her father’s men, he and possibly a whole lot of innocent bystanders would end up dead.
    “I have a plan,” he said mildly. “Would you like something stronger to drink?” He looked across the room, trying to get the attention of a waitress.
    Nobody plotted against her father this casually. “Which is it?”
    He looked back at her in surprise. “I beg your pardon?”
    “Which is it? Are you insane or brain dead to cross my father on his home turf?”
    Joe draped an arm across the back of the booth. The tanned limb was wreathed in muscles that made her gulp. He asked lightly, “Have you considered the possibility that I’m actually capable of taking on a man like your father and winning?”
    She snorted. “Nobody’s that good.” Even if he was in Charlie Squad.
    “I am.”
    Again, he spoke with a quiet certainty in his voice that stopped her cold. Was he that good? Could it be? Had her despairing pleas to a heretofore deaf God finally been answered? In a daze, she ordered an iced tea while he asked for another glass of water.
    After the waitress left, she asked him bluntly, “Who are you?”
    He completely ignored the question, saying instead, “So, Cari. Tell me about a typical day for you at your father’s house.”
    Over the next half hour, she answered his every question, and there were dozens of them. Even though they were pleasantly delivered, they amounted to nothing less than an all-out interrogation.
    Finally, he pushed back his empty glass and stared at the bad Van Gogh reproduction on the wall above their booth. Joe sat that way for a long time, and she didn’t break his intense concentration. What would it be like to have all that attention focused on her? A tingling started low in her belly that made her squirm against the vinyl seat.
    His gaze shifted to her, pinning her in place. “Well, Cari, I don’t see any feasible way for you to get out of your father’s house and come to me without tipping off Eduardo’s goons…and hence blocking all our escape routes. I’ve been watching you for weeks and your father’s security is downright impregnable. Worse, we’re in Gavarone, on his turf, like you said. His informants are everywhere.”
    Disappointment slammed into her, flattening her fleeting hopes. For a minute there, she’d thought she might actually have a chance. Why, oh why, had Joe stopped her from drowning if he couldn’t come through for her now?
    “So,” he continued casually, “I guess we’re just going to have to go with my original plan. I’m going to come inside the walls and get you with your father’s blessing, more or less.”
    “What?” She stared at him in shock. “You’re going to do what?” she repeated blankly.
    “I’m going to go into your father’s house and get you out myself,” he said with quiet finality.
    “You’re going to break into my father’s house? Didn’t you hear what I said? The place is an armed fortress.”
    “I’m not going to break in. I’m going to infiltrate the place. I’ll come in with a cover story and get inside that way.”
    She frowned. “My father doesn’t hire just anybody. Nobody gets close to him personally unless they’ve worked for his organization for years and proven their loyalty a hundred times over.”
    Joe nodded. “True, but he doesn’t completely control who gets close