him intently. The man seemed to realize what he was doing because he seemed to shake himself loose of whatever thought was going through him and said, “Well, might be that you’re on their radar now and not everyone’s going to be as accepting as you hoped.”
Dane hadn’t even considered that when he’d spoken up. Not that it would have changed anything necessarily, though he did need to think of Emma. Looking over his shoulder wasn’t appealing, but it wasn’t something entirely new to him either. “I guess I’ll just have to get better at keeping my eyes open.”
“I wish it were that simple,” Jax commented.
“What do you mean?”
“Did you ever find the phone bill that went missing?”
Dane tensed. He hadn’t even given it much thought after that first night. He glanced at the desk and started to rise.
“Don’t bother, I already checked behind the desk. It’s not there. I checked all the drawers too as well as your desk in the study.”
Dane knew that should bother him but he was too anxious to care at the moment. “They were in my house,” he whispered as the ramifications set in. What if they’d been here when he and Emma had gotten home and had only taken off when they realized he wasn’t alone? “Oh God,” he muttered.
“I’d like to have a friend run a check on your phone to see if anyone tapped into it. Chances are they just wanted the number so they could harass you with hang up calls, but it would be good to check. After that you should probably change your number.”
“What friend?” Dane asked numbly.
“Someone who works for a security firm out in Seattle. I started working there a couple months ago – they’ve got a lot of resources we can tap into if we need to. But let’s start with the phone and see where that leads.”
Dane nodded, too overwhelmed to do anything else.
“I think I should hang out with you guys for a few more days till this is cleared up. Sheriff Granger is checking with business owners in town to see if any of them saw any strangers in the past few days. I got enough of a look at the car that he can start a check on similar makes and models in the area.”
“You want to stay here?” Dane asked. How the hell could he have the man he was struggling to resist even in this moment staying under the same roof?
“Look Dane, you’ve made it pretty clear how you feel about me and I have zero interest in pursuing someone who thinks I’m no better than the shit he scrapes off the bottom of his shoe.” Jax grabbed his half-finished plate and dumped the remaining food in the garbage.
“My job is to protect people and whether you like it or not, you and Emma need me. So unless you want to risk leaving your kid without a father, you’ll get over yourself and accept that this is how it has to be.” Jax dropped the plate into the sink so hard, Dane was stunned it didn’t shatter. “I’m going to go check the perimeter.”
Dane watched him grab one of the guns from the shoulder holster that was looped over the coat hook and then he reached for Dane’s keys off the key holder by the door. “Lock up behind me. I’ll let myself back in.” And with that he was gone.
***
Jax let himself back into the quiet house and locked the door behind him. He’d been outside for nearly an hour though it had taken him only a few minutes to check the surrounding area. He’d spent the rest of the time trying to repair the damage Dane had somehow managed to inflict on his emotions. Their encounter in the shower had been too much for him and he’d tried to use the time he spent preparing dinner to get his feelings back in order. But one look at Dane when he’d walked into the kitchen had robbed him of his resolve and touching the man, even just to check his injury, had put him right back to where he’d been when he walked out of that shower – wishing like hell he could just wrap himself around Dane while the outside world faded away. And then one comment