Her Private Bodyguard. Gayle Wilson

battered black metal filing cabinet that stood in a corner of the tiny office. Pulling out the top drawer, the only one that had anything in it, he thumbed through the mostly empty folders until he found the one that contained the information he had put into the ads he’d placed when he had first set up the agency.

      He handed one of the sheets to Joe and then sat back down behind his desk as Wallace read it. Joe looked at it a few seconds before his eyes came back up. The insurance agent took his pen out of his shirt pocket and put the paper down on Grey’s desk, poised to write. “References?” he asked.

      How about a supposedly dead ex-deputy director of the CIA, Grey thought, a little amused by the idea of putting Griff’s name down. Cabot would vouch for him, all right, providing a postdated letter of reference if Grey wanted it, but he didn’t intend to ask Griff or anybody else for any favors. Not to get a job he had reservations about taking in the first place. If these folks didn’t like his credentials, they could get someone else.

      “Ex-military,” Grey said. “That’s all on there.”

      “I mean somebody who could verify your qualifications.”

      “What you see is what you get,” Grey said softly. “If they don’t like it, they can get themselves another bodyguard to watch over their little heiress. You know, the one who doesn’t really need a bodyguard at all.”

      Joe’s gaze rose again, and he studied Grey’s face a moment. He looked as if he wanted to ask other questions, but after a few seconds, maybe because of what was in Grey’s eyes, Wallace put the pen back into his pocket and stood up. He folded the sheet Grey had given him and stuck it in the same pocket.

      “There ain’t nobody else,” he said, smiling, his good humor restored. “Not out here. I know that, and you know it. Besides, they aren’t gonna quibble over a résumé. This job won’t last but a few days at the most. You give ’em somebody’s name, and they probably wouldn’t even take the time to check ’em out. So why bother, right? I’ll vouch for you.”

      Grey nodded, again wondering why he was doing this. His instincts were still telling him it was a bad idea.

      When Joe reached the door, he hesitated before he opened it, looking back over his shoulder. “Might be good if you stay out there twenty-four seven. You know, so if anything goes wrong, they can’t come back on us and say, ‘Well, that wouldn’t have happened if…’ You know,” he said again, seeming to run down.

      “You want me to stay out at the Beaufort place?”

      “Might be best,” Joe said. “Until they get the security system in. Just as a precaution.”

      “I got a business to run,” Grey said, knowing how ridiculous that excuse was, even if Joe didn’t.

      “Yeah, well…Just a precaution, you know. And you got an answering machine and all.”

      “I thought you said—” Grey’s protest was cut off by Joe’s voice.

      “Almost forgot. Here’s the first payment,” he said, walking back to lay a check on the desk. “Retainer and the first week.”

      Grey looked down at the nice round sum on the check. Fifteen hundred dollars would take care of most of those bills, at least the ones that had “third notice” attached.

      “A thousand bucks a week plus expenses,” Joe said. “They’ll want receipts for those. Bean counters,” he said dismissingly.

      Grey heard the door close before he looked up. Wallace was gone, and he was alone with a check on his desk and a job he didn’t want but had, for some reason, apparently agreed to take.

      “Son of a bitch,” Grey said. “Stupid son of a bitch.”

      Angry with himself, he pulled open the bottom drawer of his desk and poured a shot of whiskey into the small tumbler he kept there. He tilted his head and knocked it back, closing his eyes as the liquor burned all the way down to his empty stomach, producing a small, satisfying glow. He put the glass back into the drawer and recapped the bottle with fingers that trembled.

      That telltale vibration bothered him. He had had the reputation of having the coolest head and the steadiest hands of anyone on the team. Steadiest hands of anyone except Hawk, of course, he acknowledged with a small, twisted smile.

      At least he hadn’t begun drinking it straight out of the bottle, he comforted himself caustically. That would probably come next. Probably right after his first encounter with Miss Valerie Beaufort and her millions.

      Chapter One

      Two things were clear immediately. The battered pickup parked in front of her house now hadn’t been there when Val left a couple of hours ago. And she didn’t recognize it as belonging to anyone she knew. Since she didn’t get many visitors, especially ones she didn’t know, both of those things made her wary. It was pretty hard to stray off any beaten path and end up out here. Her eyes studying the unfamiliar vehicle, she slowed her gelding to a walk, guiding Harvard slowly toward the ranch house.

      The truck sported Colorado plates, along with half a dozen pings and dents. There was more dirt on its paint job than the normal surface dust a vehicle would acquire in making the trek out here. This one had been in need of a wash job for a while.

      Her eyes traced over the porch, sweeping quickly over and then coming back to the shape that didn’t belong there. Almost hidden in the late-afternoon shadows, a man was sitting in one of her mother’s rockers, booted feet crossed at the ankles and propped on the wooden porch railing.

      A black Stetson had been pulled down over his face as if he were asleep. Val would be willing to bet money that he wasn’t.

      The boots were well-worn, she noted, her eyes moving upward to assess the length of his legs—long, muscular and clad in faded jeans. And a broad chest covered by a chamois-colored shirt, the sleeves turned back, revealing tanned forearms that were crossed over the man’s flat belly. Long-fingered hands lay totally relaxed on either side of his waist. As she watched, one rose, its thumb pushing the Stetson up off the man’s eyes.

      They were gray. Ocean-gray. Storm-gray. Rain-cloud gray. Valerie had time to come up with a couple of other totally inane analogies before he straightened in the rocker, putting his feet down on the porch and pushing the hat all the way back.

      His hair was coal-black and just a little longer than she normally liked for a man. Val couldn’t decide whether that was a stylistic decision on his part, or if he were just badly in need of a haircut. Her gaze came back to his face, but she found it hard to look at any feature other than those compelling eyes.

      They were silver now, opaque in the shadowed light, and set in a frame of thick black lashes. Their color was the only softness in a face as harsh as the country that surrounded them. The features were lean and darkly weathered. It was obvious his nose had been broken at least once, maybe more, and it sat defiantly crooked above thin, hard lips.

      “Ma’am,” he said, touching his hat in the traditional gesture of respect. A respect missing from the silver eyes. They examined her face as thoroughly as she had examined his.

      “Who are you?” she asked, her voice demanding, a little arrogant. That was a front, the tone developed long ago to hide her habitual nervousness at meeting strangers.

      “My name’s Grey Sellers, ma’am. Beneficial Life sent me.”

      There were a couple of slow heartbeats of silence.

      “Sent you for what?” Val asked. She really couldn’t imagine. He certainly didn’t look like any insurance salesman she’d ever seen.

      “To be your bodyguard,” he said.

      For just a second there had been something behind those shuttered eyes. Amusement? Val wondered. The emotion had disappeared too quickly for her to be sure of its identification, replaced by the same bland politeness that was in his voice.

      “My…bodyguard?