Debra Webb - Personal Protector

“Unexpected traffic delays, sir. Nothing major.”

They had a tail. Ric glanced behind them once more, but resisted the impulse to stare. The unidentified tail was right on the bumper of the sedan.

Piper looked concerned.

“I’m sure it’s nothing we should worry about. Probably an accident or some sort of construction,” he offered in hopes of defusing the mounting anxiety clear in her pretty blue eyes. She was too smart not to understand that something was going on. “How about some champagne?” He reached for the complimentary bottle chilling in an ice bucket.

“That would be nice,” she murmured as she looked away to stare out the tinted window.

Ric met Raine’s gaze in the rearview mirror once more as he filled a fluted glass. The look that passed between them left Ric with a bad feeling in his gut. He and Piper couldn’t risk emerging from the car with an unidentified vehicle nearby. An evade maneuver would be necessary. Ric glanced at Piper and hoped like hell she wouldn’t go ballistic on them and demand to know exactly what was going on. He sure didn’t want to have to deal with an irate female, especially one as perceptive and headstrong as Piper Ryan. And blowing his cover at this point would be a major mistake. She could and likely would dismiss him. She intended to maintain dominion over her own life—risky business or not.

Raine made a sudden right, almost sloshing champagne on them both. The sound of squealing tires told Ric that the agents behind them had made a tactical move against the tail. Piper drained her glass, set it aside, then twisted around to see what was happening, but Raine moved too quickly. Before she could piece it all together and ask what was going on, the limo stopped in front of the Exhibit Hall. Raine was out of the vehicle and had opened their door curbside in less than five seconds. Ric scanned the area, though he knew Raine already had, then reached down to assist Piper out of the vehicle.

“I’ll be standing by, sir.”

Ric nodded to Raine and ushered Piper up the steps and into the building as quickly as he could without alarming her further.

The moment they entered the grand entry hall Ric felt immense relief. Those SSU jokers were getting braver and braver. They did not intend to back down. They just kept pushing, hoping for an opening to get close enough to assassinate one more news reporter. Ric gazed down at the woman at his side. Anger unfurled inside him. One thing was certain—they’d have to go through him first.

And Ric had no intention of making it easy for them.

Ric scanned the room once more, ever alert for any abrupt move or new face. He would feel a lot better when he had Piper safely back home in her apartment. It was evident that she was under twenty-four-hour surveillance by both the good guys and the bad guys.

Agent Townsend had managed to get a partial license plate number before the unidentified car disappeared down a side street. Now, an hour later, the only thing Ric knew was that the license plate could have come from one of two vehicles from the Atlanta area. One was owned by an elderly woman who was out of town, car included, and the other had been reported stolen earlier that evening, then found abandoned only minutes ago. Whoever had stolen it and used it to tail Piper was long gone.

Another dead end unless forensics found a usable set of prints, which was highly unlikely. SSU had proven too smart in the past for a mistake that simple, and he doubted they would suddenly grow so stupid.

His gaze instantly sought out Piper. She had relaxed immediately, or at least pretended to, when they entered the crowded Exhibit Hall. She mingled among the elegant and elite society attendees with an unparalleled grace and confidence. She introduced Ric by name only, not mentioning that he was her cameraman, and going quickly to another subject when the required formality was out of the way. Though the women seemed inclined to take special notice of him.

Ric had been given more private telephone numbers in the last hour than he could remember getting on his best night when he had been actually looking to pick up a woman.

He studied a watercolor by a local artist that was currently up to a twenty-eight-hundred-dollar bid. This was Ric’s first experience with a silent auction. A register stood on an ornate stand where guests could peruse the latest bid and up the ante, if they so desired, by simply signing their name and an amount they wished to bid.

Personally, Ric couldn’t see the attraction in this particular piece, but then, he wasn’t the artsy type. The closest thing to art he’d known growing up was the graffiti that marked the area as low-rent, possibly dangerous to anyone from the better side of town who happened to get lost there.

A tall, slender blonde approached him and Ric shifted to attention and smiled a greeting. He was pretty sure she had arrived with the new, hotshot sheriff of Fulton County.

Ric definitely did not want to be seen accepting anything that might even appear remotely like her number. He doubted the sheriff would be too happy about a move like that.

“A lovely piece,” she said, flicking her gaze from the watercolor to him in a furtive move. “Have you placed your bid?” She sipped her wine and licked her lips slowly, suggestively, then leaned closer. “The artist who painted it died recently. I’m sure the bids will go much higher.” She moved closer still. “And higher.”

“Actually,” Ric explained, angling his head so that he looked directly into her assessing eyes, “I’m not here for the art.”

Her smile was feline, and blatantly sexual. “I was relatively certain you weren’t.” She offered her hand. “I’m Sally Carter. I do Atlanta Live on Channel 9. And they tell me that you’re Ric Martinez. I’ve been dying to get the inside scoop on Piper Ryan for ages.” Miss Carter tilted her chin upward and whispered in his ear, “I would love to interview you for my ‘Kiss and Tell’ segment. The audience would eat you up.”

And so would you, Ric guessed. He eased back a step, putting some distance between them. So, this female barracuda wanted to get some trash on Piper.

She plucked a card from her dainty purse. “Give me a call when you have some free time, Mr. Martinez.” She gave him a thorough once-over and then a smile of approval. “I’d love some one-on-one.”

Before Ric could recite his polite, practiced response, she turned and drifted toward the other side of the room, ensuring that she gave him the full treatment as she walked away. He shook his head and tucked the card into his inside jacket pocket along with the rest.

“What did she say to you?”

The sharp demand jerked Ric’s attention to his left. Piper stood, seething, only a few feet away. Could that be jealousy blazing in those gorgeous blue eyes?

It sure looked like it to him.

Taking slow, calculated steps, Ric moved in on her. Her eyes widened slightly, but she recovered quickly and schooled her expression. “She said she wanted to have sex with me,” he offered candidly.

Wide-eyed, Piper demanded, “She didn’t?”

He shrugged noncommittally, a smile itching to spread across his lips. “But first she wanted to know if I’d had sex with you and what it was like.”

Piper’s mouth dropped open. She snapped it shut, then exhaled the outrage, which had just synapsed into word form, “That bi—”

He held up a hand to halt her outburst of indignation. “Don’t worry, I set her straight.” He leaned down so that he could whisper his next words. “I told her we hadn’t had sex…yet.”

The grin overtook his lips at the startled expression on Piper’s lovely face. Realization quickly dawned in her eyes, and her gaze narrowed accordingly. “You did no such thing.”