Page 23 of Kyle

It seemed Dec was in the mood to share so I pushed. “You have problems with people touching you?”

“Fuck yeah.”

I’d only seen Declan and his sister together a few times, but as I thought about it, I’d never seen him hug her.

“Damn, brother, we’ve touched you. Why didn’t you ever say anything?”

“Man, you don’t touch me. You smack my arm and shake my hand.”

“There’s a difference?”

“Huge.” Dec didn’t look like he wanted to elaborate and I wasn’t going to pry more than I had. “You’re gonna have to be gentle with her,” he continued.

“Say what?”

“Slow and gentle, Kyle, or she’ll shut down on you.”

Hell no, I did not want to have this conversation. I had enough crazy shit swirling around in my head, I didn’t need more. What I did need was to figure out a way to stop thinking dirty thoughts about a woman who’d been through so much in her life she didn’t need me piling more shit on top of her. If she was scared of me pressing her against a wall, she’d lose her mind if she knew all the ways I wanted to fuck her. She’d be freaked the hell out if she knew I wanted her to open up and let me in, tell me every secret she kept buried. And she’d really have a panic attack if I told her there was a part of me that wanted to toss her over my shoulder like we’d talked about and carry her off, never to let her go.

But I couldn’t have her, not like I wanted, not like I needed, so she’d never know how impressed I was with her strength, how sexy I thought she was when she was being brave. How fucking gorgeous I thought she was. And I’d certainly never tell her that my cock throbbed thinking about fucking her in the shower.

So knowing all of that, I played dumb and asked, “What the fuck are you talking about?”

Being as Declan was not stupid and had caught on to my play, and didn’t call me out.

“Right. I see you’re not ready. Just as long as you know you’re shit at hiding your feelings. I’m gonna hit the sack. I’ll be up in a few hours to take watch.”

Declan beat feet down the hall, leaving me alone with my thoughts. Slow and gentle was not what I needed to hear. What I’d needed was my friend to beat some sense into me. I needed him to give me shit and remind me I couldn’t have her. That in a few days I’d never see her again.

A few minutes later Anaya came into the living room in a pair of sweats and a tee. I had no idea how the hell she was going to wear pants to bed when it was hot as balls in the house, but I didn’t comment. Mainly because I was trying not to think about her, period. And wondering how she was going to sleep in sweats would lead me to think about her in bed, which would make me think about how badly I wanted to join her in that bed and strip those damn pants off her.

“Do you need help with anything?” she asked.

“Nope,” I rushed out and she flinched at my harsh response, making me feel like an asshole. But the only help I needed from her was her going to bed, which would put much needed distance between us. “I’m going to upload the pictures Dec took tonight and send them to Garrett, and hopefully we’ll have something by morning,” I explained, hoping to soften my previous response.

“Who’s Garrett?”

“He works with us. A roadside bomb ended his career in the military and due to his injuries, he doesn’t deploy with one of our teams. He’s strictly intel. Anything computer-related goes through him.”

“But he’s okay now? His injury?”

Her sweet concern for my teammate wasn’t helping my quest to push her away. Instead it made me want to pull her into my arms. What the hell was it about Anaya Baker that had me so tied in knots? Why couldn’t I stop thinking the craziest shit when she was around? Pull her into my arms? Where the fuck had that come from?

“Yeah, he’s fine. It was a long time ago.”

“Good.” She smiled. “If you’re sure, I’m gonna head to bed.”

And why did her smile make me feel so fucking good?

“I’m sure. Get some sleep.”

“Night.”

“Goodnight, Anaya.”

It had taken me almost two hours to get all the pictures sorted, uploaded, and a SITREP drafted and sent to Garrett. And through it all I was still thinking about Anaya. Her ferocious desire to save a bunch of girls she’d never met, never even seen. Most people would’ve gone home, thinking that it was horrible what was happening but wouldn’t have made the choice to help. But not Anaya, she faced her fears straight on. How she thought she was screwed up was beyond me.

My attention went to my laptop when I got an immediate email back from Garrett. He was running the images now and would have something for us in a few hours. Good, the sooner we knew what we were dealing with the better. None of us wanted to delay getting the girls to safety, but we had to be smart about it.