Free Guarded Heart by Anya Breton

why did he do it?
    “Did they date?” she found herself asking as her gaze
drifted back to her client.
    “No.”
    “She’s very jealous.”
    “She wishes that would change.”
    “She told you this?”
    Irvin’s head shook in her peripheral vision. “Observation.”
    Brook examined Irvin with a keen eye, searching for clues on
his face as well as on her empathy net. “Do you think her jealousy could turn
violent?”
    Salt-and-pepper brows lifted slightly though his gaze
remained steady on hers. “Do you mean to ask if I think Mira is behind the
attacks?”
    If she’d meant that, she would have asked that. Brook merely
stared at the male rather than insult him with brusque words.
    “I think she has it in her,” Irvin said. “But I don’t think
she’d do it.”
    “Has it in her?”
    “Mira has a dark side,” he said.
    “How do you know that?”
    “I’ve happened upon her during one or two…incidents.”
    Now Irvin had every ounce of her focus. That nearly coy
hesitation on the final word promised juicy information. “What sorts of
incidents?”
    “She destroyed one of Morgan’s ceramic vases when he upset
her.”
    Irvin shifted his gaze to the pair that had recently stepped
away from the wall. Brook watched as well, noting how Morgan led the female
with a hand on her forearm. He wouldn’t leave the room without his Ranger
guard, would he?
    Irvin had stopped. There had to be more to the story. She
pressed for it. “How did he upset her?”
    “I don’t know for sure. I asked but Morgan didn’t have an
answer for me. And he was incredulous. He was inclined to believe I’d
misconstrued her actions. That it had been accidental, when I’d clearly seen
her snatch up the piece and hurl it at the window Morgan had recently passed.”
    “The window ?” Brook repeated in shock despite knowing
most of Morgan’s house was made of windows.
    “Yes. Lucky for us, her aim sucks.”
     
    Morgan was frustrated. On too many levels. Mira’s arrival
had only highlighted it. He’d told her to stay safe. Elsewhere. Putting in an
appearance at a party he was sure to attend wasn’t staying safe.
    But that wasn’t what frustrated him. His bodyguard did.
    Neptune’s beard. Brook had never looked as alluring as she
did tonight. That gown was indecent with the way it shifted over her lush
curves like water sluicing over a naughty statue. She should have let him see
the thing before he’d paid for it. He would have sent her back for something
with sleeves. And a hoop skirt.
    “I’m already here, Morgan,” Mira said as he marched her to
the door. “It’s more suspicious that I’m leaving early than it would be if I
stayed.”
    He bit back the urge to scold her for ignoring his command
in the first place. Mira’s concern was touching. Or it would have been if he
hadn’t known her true concern.
    Brook.
    Two days ago he hadn ’ t
considered Mira might want him as more than her boss—before Brook had called
her his girlfriend. And two days ago he would have laughed at Mira’s jealousy.
As if he’d want Brook. And yet…
    It was all he could think of now. He’d barely kept his hands
to himself when the Ranger had joined him and his companions minutes ago.
Morgan had wanted to caress her generous breasts through the silk until her
nipples strained for release. He would have settled for a hand at her waist.
Touching her had become integral to the success of his evening. That meant Mira
had to go.
    For her own safety, of course.
    Morgan nudged her toward the coat check. “I’ll tell anyone
who asks that you came only because I’d asked and your illness sent you home.”
    “What illness? I feel fine.” She dug the heels of her
designer pumps into the gaudy-patterned carpet. “Really, Morgan—”
    “It’s too dangerous,” he said for the seventh time, ignoring
the satin fabric beneath his fingers as he pressed her shoulder toward the
counter, because acknowledging it would invite comparisons to other