His Christmas Assignment. Lisa Childs

called this meeting about a job. In the year that he’d been working for his brother-in-law he’d had many assignments. Had Candace protested every one?

      “He’s proven himself over and over again,” Logan defended him. “He’s a damn good bodyguard!”

      “Garek Kozminski is a thief and a killer!” she yelled. “I can’t believe you would trust him. I never will!”

      Garek felt a twinge in his chest—one he refused to acknowledge as pain. Candace’s low opinion wasn’t exactly a surprise or unwarranted. And of course he had done nothing to change it; he’d actually done more to provoke it and her.

      Logan’s voice wasn’t just loud but it had gone chillingly cold when he said, “He helped save my life and my brother’s life—”

      “Because of his criminal connections,” she interrupted.

      “That’s enough,” Logan told her. He didn’t shout now; he sounded too weary to fight anymore. “Garek and Milek Kozminski are essential members of this team.”

      “They’re your brothers-in-law...”

      And maybe that was her real problem: Logan had married Stacy instead of her. She had obviously been in love with her boss for a long time; she’d left the River City Police Department when Logan did in order to join the fledging bodyguard business he’d started a few years before.

      “Candace,” Logan said, “if you can’t work with them, maybe you can’t work—”

      “Hey!” Garek said as he pushed open the office door before Logan could finish his ultimatum. He didn’t want Candace fired. Sure, she hated Garek. But he didn’t hate her.

      He wanted her.

      He had wanted her since the very first time he’d seen her. She was all long legs and sharp curves and sass. It sparkled in her blue eyes every time she looked at him. But she wouldn’t look at him now. Instead she’d tilted her head down so that her jaw-length black hair skimmed across her face, hiding her eyes.

      “I’m sorry I’m late,” Garek said, although he’d had a good excuse. Someone else had called him about a job, an assignment he might not be able to refuse no matter how much he wanted to...

      “It’s probably a good thing you were,” Logan remarked. “In fact you might want to give us a few more minutes...”

      Candace lifted her chin and shook her head. “There’s no need. I’m doing what I should have done a year ago...”

      A year ago was when Garek had started at the Payne Protection Agency—after his sister had married Logan Payne. He doubted Candace’s timing was a coincidence. She had probably wanted to resign then, but no doubt her pride had forced her to stay.

      “I’m quitting,” she finished.

      Logan jumped up from the chair behind his desk and cursed. “Damn it—”

      “You were just about to fire me,” Candace pointed out. “This is for the best, and we both know it.” She turned then and finally faced Garek. Her blue eyes had never been so cold as she stared at him.

      Conversely, heat rushed through Garek as his temper ignited. But before he could say anything, Candace pushed past him. He reached out and grasped her arm.

      She stared down at his hand. Her voice as cold as her gaze, she said, “Don’t touch me. Don’t ever touch me.”

      He would have teased her, as he had incessantly for the past year. But he sensed that her coldness was just a thin veneer for deeper emotions.

      Candace Baker was strong. She was nearly as tall as he was, and she was all lean muscle. But there was also a vulnerability about her that she desperately tried to hide beneath a tough attitude. Just like the coldness, neither was who she really was.

      “I didn’t figure you for a quitter,” he goaded her.

      “You don’t know me,” she said as she jerked her arm free of his grasp. “And you never will...”

      Before he could challenge her claim, she was gone. And he couldn’t have that. He just couldn’t have that...

      * * *

      “I’m a fool,” Candace berated herself as she tossed clothes into the open suitcase on her bed. “I am such a fool...”

      Not for quitting. Hell, she should have done that a year ago. She was a fool because she’d waited too long. And mostly because she had let him get to her.

      How?

      She knew what Garek Kozminski was. And unlike everyone else, she wasn’t going to forget—because she couldn’t let herself forget. In addition to being a killer and a criminal, he was also a flirt. Just a flirt...

      That was why he kept teasing her. And looking at her...

      She shivered even now thinking about how that silvery-gray gaze was always on her, touching her like a physical caress. He was just teasing her. He couldn’t really want to touch her. He couldn’t really want her.

      She was always the buddy, the gal-pal—never the woman a man actually desired. So he was just messing with her for his own amusement. She was not amused. She was furious. And the more he flirted with her, the most frustrated she got. That was why she had lost her temper with her boss.

      The doorbell rang, echoing throughout her bedroom from the wooden box on the dark blue painted wall. She doubted it was Logan paying her a visit. He had obviously been about to fire her before Garek had interrupted him.

      After what he must have overheard her saying about him, why had Garek tried to stop Logan? Instead of insisting his brother-in-law terminate her on the spot, Garek had actually tried to talk her out of quitting.

      But he didn’t know her. And around him, she wasn’t certain that she knew herself anymore.

      The doorbell rang again, or rather incessantly, as if someone were pressing hard on the button. With a sigh she turned away from her bed and headed down the hall. But before she could even reach the front door, it opened. She knew that it had been locked; she always locked her door. And nobody else had a key to her place.

      She reached for her holster only to realize she had left it—and her weapon—on her bed with the half-packed suitcase. But why would someone break into her place?

      She had nothing of value. And while she had once brought a Payne Protection client to her apartment in order to guard the woman, she was alone now.

      But then she was no longer alone as the intruder boldly sauntered into her apartment. He was incredibly tall with lean muscles and blond hair that nearly touched his shoulders. Her breath caught, but she shouldn’t have been surprised. Who else would have so easily picked her high-tech lock but Garek Kozminski?

      “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” she demanded to know.

      “I need to talk to you,” he replied. But he was looking at her that way he always looked at her—like she was an ice cream cone he wanted to lick.

      “So you picked my lock and let yourself inside?”

      He shrugged as if breaking and entering was inconsequential. But surely he knew there were consequences for crimes; he had spent time in prison for at least one of the probably many offenses he had committed. “You didn’t answer the doorbell.”

      “There are reasons people don’t answer their doorbells,” she pointed out. “I could have been gone.” If she’d packed faster, she would have been gone. That urge she’d had to run intensified—probably because she had come face-to-face with the reason she wanted to run. That she needed to run...

      His lips curving into a smug grin, he said, “But you’re here.”

      “Not for long,” she said as she spun around and headed back down the hall toward her bedroom. It wasn’t too