Read The Protector (Lone Wolf, Book 1) for Free Online Page A

I was paying too much attention to how red my
cheeks were getting to really appreciate it.  
    “So, I’m what…a call-girl
bodyguard?” asked Layne, wiping at the corner of one of her eyes under the
sunglasses as she kept chuckling and sighed.   “Oh, my God, that was too funny.   No, Elizabeth—your father didn’t choose me for any other reason than
keeping you safe.”
    Now I just felt stupid.   I bristled at that.   “I’m sorry,” I said tersely, feeling my
cheeks redden so severely, I wondered if they’d ever go back to being
flesh-colored again.   “It’s just my dad
is the type of person who would…who would do that.”
    God, how could I possibly dig
myself out from this hole?   And she was
still chuckling about it, which didn’t help matters much.
    “That’d be an awfully specific
job,” said Layne, shoving her sunglasses up onto her head as we hit the city
streets.   Here the sunshine didn’t even
reach us—it was getting late in the afternoon and the skyscrapers and buildings
hid the rays of sun completely.   Layne
cast another mirthful glance in my direction, then shook her head.   “I mean, think about it.   A bodyguard call-girl for a fishing baron’s
daughter.   That’s an awfully specific job.   I don’t know how many
people like that exist in this whole big world.”
    So from that…I guess she knew I was
gay.   Exactly how she knew, I wasn’t
certain, but at least we had that out of the way.  
    “I’m sorry if I’ve insulted you,” I
said, my words sounding brittle and just the least tiniest bit prim.   “It wasn’t my intention.”
    “Hell, that wasn’t an insult,
sweetheart,” she said, casting me another sidelong glance.   Her voice had dropped about an octave at
those words, and a shiver ran through me that I couldn’t control.   Oh, God, that voice .   It was pure, velvet sex.   She chuckled a little at my obvious, visible
shiver, and then she was pulling into a parking garage.  
    She took the ticket the attendant
machine spat out at us, and after ascending the very long ramp with all its
sharp turns, she parked on the third level.   We hadn’t said anything more to each other, and I was feeling so frazzled
and embarrassed that the moment we pulled into the spot, even before she threw
the Cadillac into park, I had the door open, and was trying to push myself up
and out of the vehicle as I fumbled with my crutches.  
    It was unreal how quickly she
turned off the ignition and sprinted around to my side of the car.   I stared at her for a long moment, with the
sunglasses perched on top of her head, her hair swept to the side.   I stared into those damnable flashing blue
and green and brown eyes that seemed to never stop shifting color, and that
also seemed to pin me to the spot with their bold intensity.
    “Let me help you,” she said softly
as she took the crutches from me, as she looped a strong arm around my middle,
placing my arm around her neck.
    She was so strong, the kind of
strong that made me think she’d probably won every fight she’d ever gotten in,
the kind of strong that is so obvious that you half wonder if she could bend
steel girders around an arm, twisting them into pretzel shapes.   But she was so gentle, too, as she held me
firmly about the waist, but with such a soft touch, and helped me limp across
the parking garage and to the elevator, taking each step slowly and at my pace.
    As I leaned against her, I realized
that I was paying a really unfair amount of attention to how she felt against me,
the firmness of her muscles, her hip bone pressing against mine.   There was something out of place in all
those sensations, though:   I felt a
slim, unnatural hardness against her side, close to her breast, in an odd
shape.  
    I went cold a little when I realized
it was a firearm.  
    The elevator dinged and
opened, and Layne helped me into it, pressing the ground floor button once I
was leaning against the back wall.
    I stared