Speaking of which, Suzanne needed to get back to her plan, ASAP. Which meant being sweet to Roman instead of sour. It was time to buck up and get the job done. Time, she sensed, was of the essence with Roman. Because if she let him stick around too long, she was very much afraid it wouldn't be attraction that would do her in, but the fact that she'd enjoyed talking with him this morning in the taxi.
"Do you have a girlfriend?" she asked in what she hoped was a sultry tone. Granted, it was hard to sound sultry when she was running this fast.
She could have sworn he almost stumbled on the path before he said, "No."
"Mmm." She made sure to draw the sound out in a husky tone she'd never used before. "It must be hard to go out on your own dates when you're with clients nearly twenty-four seven." She turned her gaze to him and let it linger longer than it should. "Somehow I can't imagine you living as a monk, though, do you?"
His expression didn't change, apart from a muscle that began to jump in his jaw. "Most clients aren't interested in my personal life."
"Sure they are," she responded. "They're just too afraid of that forbidding expression you wear all the time to ask. But I've been around enough men my whole life to see right through it. Icy exteriors always melt." The muscle was jumping even faster in his jaw as she forced herself totally outside of her comfort zone. "Besides, if we're going to be with each other practically every second of the day and night, don't you think we should get to know each other?"
"No."
Her laughter came unbidden. Real laughter, not fake I'm-trying-to-seduce-you laughter.
It was a majorly bad idea to think that the bodyguard she didn't want was cute, but in that moment he'd sounded like a stubborn little boy who was upset that he wasn't getting his own way. All because of a client who wouldn't respect professional boundaries and stop poking into his personal life. Of course, his response only helped to egg her on more. After all, she had never liked being told what she could and couldn't do.
"I'll start," she offered as if he hadn't said no. "I was born in April, and I'm an Aries through and through. All fire, all the time. What month were you born?"
He didn't reply for a few moments, but then when he must have figured she could look up the information, he said, "November."
"A Scorpio." She wasn't at all surprised. "I recently read this article about the sexiest astrological signs. Aries won big points for passion, although we can also be quite impulsive. Do you want to know what the researchers said about Scorpio?"
"No," he said again, but it was resigned and halfhearted this time.
"It said you're dark and mysterious and utterly addictive." She tried to tell herself that her heart was only beating fast because they were running, before making herself go even further with it. "Does that sound right to you? Because from what I've seen so far, I'm thinking it's dead-on."
Finally, he turned to her, and she held her breath waiting to hear what his response would be. Would he finally flirt back? Or had she not managed to break down his professional walls at all with her sexy banter?
Unfortunately, it turned out that combining held breath with running that fast was a bad move. A side cramp hit her so hard she doubled over.
"Suzanne." She could hear the concern in his tone. Along with the clear promise that he'd take care of her. No matter what. "What happened?"
"S...si...side cramp."
"Don't try to talk. I know it hurts, but I want you to breathe as normally as you can."
She felt his arms going around her as he spoke in a gentle voice while helping her move off to the side of the path and over to a water fountain.
"Drink. Slowly, or it will make the cramp worse."
She wanted to guzzle the city's entire supply of water. But she knew he was right and only let herself have one small sip, and then another, until the cramp finally started to ease.
"Thank you, the water was just what I needed." And, she had to admit, the feel of his strong arms around her was nice too. So nice that when he finally deemed her okay enough to stand up on her own and let her go, she missed his touch. More than she wanted to admit.
A part of her wished she could apologize for making him so uncomfortable with her personal--and deliberately sexual--questions. But though he had helped her so sweetly, she couldn't let herself go soft now, could she?
Besides, she wouldn't have needed to sprint as if her life depended on it if his presence hadn't been stealing her every coherent thought this morning in her office.
"I'm okay to run again now."
She could still read concern on his face, but he didn't try to stop her from jogging down the path, simply kept pace with her as he had before. She knew she should start back in on her sexy questions, but in the wake of his gentle voice and comforting hands, it was hard to find the motivation. Soon, she'd force herself to get back on task, but for a few minutes would it really be so bad to let herself enjoy his company as they ran through the park on a lovely day? Because no matter how much she wanted to deny that she felt safe with Roman, the truth was that when he was around, she felt almost bulletproo--
The SOS ringtone trilled from the phone she'd strapped to her upper arm. The harsh sound couldn't be ignored. Even passersby turned to look at her with alarm.
"Damn it." She'd been so hopeful that she was done with the nonsense her brothers were so worried about. Not only because she was tired of wasting so much time dealing with the online attacks, but also because it would also prove to her brothers that she didn't need a bodyguard. Unfortunately, this ringtone meant there was a big problem at Sullivan Security. One that she needed to deal with as soon as humanly possible.
"What's wrong?"
"It's my office." She'd already turned around on the path. "We've got to head back, immediately."
So much for being bulletproof.
CHAPTER SIX
Suzanne was crazy fast on those long legs. Roman had never found anyone who could outrun him before, but just minutes into their run, he'd realized he might finally have met his match. When she got the emergency call from her office, she all but blazed back through the park--while protectiveness blazed within Roman.
It wasn't simply because his job was to make sure nothing happened to her. After seeing her interact with both employees and business partners today, and her family the night before, he now knew for sure that she didn't deserve to be treated poorly. Not by anyone.
He'd planned to wait until she was more comfortable with him before questioning her about the email, phone, and corporate server attacks that her brothers had informed him about, but time was now of the essence. Shoving aside his heated physical reaction to the way she'd said, "You're dark, mysterious, and utterly addictive," minutes before--when it had seemed strangely like she was trying to flirt with him--he focused his full attention on the current threat.
"What's going on?"
"Our main server farm has been attacked. It's not completely taken down yet, but we've got to act fast to keep it from collapsing." Her expression was full of grim fury. "We have too many individuals, too many businesses around the world counting on our software to let it go down for even a second."
"Your staff is already on it, aren't they?"
"They are. And I need to get back in there and get into the trenches with them."
He had seen enough to understand that while Suzanne would never say it herself, one of the reasons her staff needed her in the trenches with them was because her brain worked at unmatched speeds. If anyone was going to be able to come up with a solution to this problem quickly, it was likely to be her. She was miles more intelligent than any woman--or man--he'd ever met. And yet, she never shoved her brains in your face.
But he was pretty sure she was sprinting back to her office for more reasons than that. She also seemed to be the kind of person who was determined to fix every problem all by herself. Take the way she'd rejected her brothers' attempts to help, for instance. It wasn't that she wasn't a team player. It seemed more
that she might believe accepting help meant she was weak. Whereas Roman had learned a long time ago that sometimes letting someone else help you out of a rough spot was the very best choice you could make.
"How many times has this happened?"
They were running so fast neither of them should have been able to say much, but her answer was perfectly clear. "Too many." She made a little growling sound. "We put in several new safeguards for our servers. This shouldn't have happened. At least not this quickly--unless someone knew exactly where to look, exactly what to aim for."
Her statement brought his earlier thoughts about digging into her employees' backgrounds back to the forefront. "Do you think someone from inside your own company could be doing this?"
She shot him a horrified look. "No. No way. That's not what I'm saying, not at all. My employees would never betray me."
She was obviously disgusted with him for even suggesting it, but it seemed like an obvious question. At least for a guy like him, who had made the mistake of trusting the wrong person before. Honestly, he couldn't imagine what it would be like to have trust like hers, but he wouldn't press his point now. Instead, while she worked on getting the servers back to a hundred percent again, he'd start doing some digging of his own.
"I don't know who's doing this, but whoever they are, they're damned smart if they could unravel our systems in less than twenty-four hours. Which means we'll have to up our game."
Right alongside the anger was a competitive edge. It was almost as if she welcomed the chance to spin her game up another level. By the hour, his respect for her grew. Respect that could be dangerously close to turning into something more if he didn't lock his usual ironclad self-control back into place.
Roman was panting by the time they pushed through the front door of Suzanne's building. She was too, but that didn't stop her from sprinting up the stairs instead of taking the elevator.
Without pausing, she ran straight toward what he assumed was command central for her corporate servers. She didn't seem to remember that she was still in running clothes, nor did she seem to notice that she was dripping with sweat as she quickly conferred with her employees. To Roman, it was almost as though they were speaking a foreign language. Seconds later, she was sliding into a chair and opening the laptop her assistant had brought for her.
No break. No transition or cool-down time. She simply went straight from the hard run to her even harder job with absolute focus, and not one second of complaint. There was work to be done, and it was obvious to Roman--and to each and every one of her employees--that she would do it.
Suzanne Sullivan impressed the hell out of him.
Despite his father raising him never to make the mistake of trusting a woman, he knew better than to underestimate women. More than once in his line of work, the threat had been female. The women he'd dated hadn't been dingbats--not all of them, anyway--so he understood that brains combined with beauty weren't an impossibility.
But he'd never met a woman like Suzanne.
*
It wasn't easy, and Suzanne wasn't happy that her employees' work plans for the day had been upended yet again, but that didn't make it any less satisfying to finally get all the servers back up and running. Even better, while they were at it they mapped out a new plan to make their system even more impervious to attacks.
She looked down at her watch, surprised to see that it was almost seven thirty. "I didn't mean to work everyone so late." Just because other tech companies operated around the clock, didn't mean hers did. Sure, she worked a zillion hours, but that was different. This was her company. It was her responsibility to make sure she took care of everyone, no matter what. "Please apologize to your families for me."
Everyone told her they were more than happy to work late, but she knew they must all be starved and ready to head home. Lord knew she was desperate for a long soak in the bath with a big glass of wine.
Finally pushing back her chair, she belatedly realized she was still wearing her running clothes. She could hardly remember even going for a run. Only the feel of Roman's arms around her in the park remained.
She spun around on her swivel chair and found him standing nearby. Everyone else was already gone. "Have you been there the whole time?"
"I briefly stepped away a couple of times, but you were always in my line of sight." She should have been indignant at being watched like a toddler who couldn't be trusted not to stumble into danger, but Roman was so unobtrusive that it was getting more and more difficult to muster up any anger at him for doing the job her brothers had hired him for.
When it came to her brothers, on the other hand, she could still be furious. And she was. One day, she'd pay them back for trying to take over her life like this. Preferably when they didn't see payback coming.
Her phone alarm went off and a message popped up on her screen: Rosa's online bullying meeting, 8 p.m.
"I have a meeting in thirty minutes."
"Another meeting?" He frowned, looking more forbidding than usual. Sexier too, she thought with a small sigh. She hadn't yet figured out how to stop feeling weak in the knees--and hot all over--around him. "You've had a long day already. Can you reschedule?"
"No. I really need to be there. Which means we've got to take the world's fastest shower." She blushed as she realized the way that sounded--as if she were suggesting they shower together. "In separate showers, I mean," she clarified before she belatedly remembered that letting her accidental suggestion of a co-shower linger would have been perfect for the mock seduction she was supposed to be staging.
"I knew what you meant."
Was it her imagination, or did his voice sound a little strangled? As though the thought of the two of them in the shower together had the same effect on him as it did on her--instantly heating up every cell in her body.
"I'll show you where the men's showers are on the way back to my office."
He shook his head. "I can't leave you alone in the building for that long."
She was too tired and hungry to keep herself from snapping, "So that means we really do need to shower together, don't we?"
"I'm fine like this, Suzanne."
He always said her name like that--so serious and sober, and yet warm and rumbly too. It made her blood heat up more each time he said it. Worse, no matter how much she tried to deny it, she couldn't help but want to find out exactly what it would sound like if he said her name when they were sweaty and barely dressed...and not from a run.
"If you feel anywhere near as gross as I do right now," she said, "it wouldn't be fair to make you stay this way. You can use my private shower." Before he could protest, she said, "I won't leave my office while you're in there. Scout's honor."
"Let me guess," he said as they headed toward her office. "Instead of selling Girl Scout cookies on the corner, you masterminded a computer program that did it for you."
"Sometimes the simplest way of doing something is best." She smiled, thinking back to how much she'd enjoyed working on this at school. "But that definitely doesn't apply to selling Girl Scout cookies. It was a lot of fun figuring out not only how to sell enough boxes to make lots of money for charity, but also how to win the grand prize for our local troop." They'd reached her office by then, so she said, "I need to send a couple of quick emails, so why don't you shower first?"
She'd barely finished composing her first email by the time he stepped back out of the bathroom, looking and smelling deliciously clean. Not to mention as drop-dead gorgeous as always in his white shirt and dark suit. Her jaw was going to dislocate soon if she kept letting it fall open like this.
"Your turn," he said, and even the way he turned his left wrist so he could button his cuff with his right hand made her melt inside.
She tried to play it cool and unaffected as she headed into the shower, but it didn't help that the room was all steamy and smelled like Roman. Her skin felt extra sensitive as she ran the bar of soap over herself. He was right that it had been a long day
already, and not just because of the back-to-back meetings and server attack. What had mixed her up the most were all those hours with his dark eyes on her, especially when she couldn't quite seem to rein in how much she liked having him so close.
The problem was, letting Roman stay would mean her brothers won. And since she absolutely couldn't allow that to happen, she needed to stick to her game plan without letting a foolish attraction derail her.
Still, she had to force herself to put the skimpy dress back on. She wasn't looking forward to having to wear another super-sexy outfit tomorrow morning--if she wasn't able to convince him to kiss her and resign by then, that was all the more reason to work harder to get to her plan's finish line.
"Do you have a jacket?" he asked when she emerged from the bathroom. "The temperature outside is bound to have dropped by now."
She did, but she couldn't risk covering up now and blowing her chance to tempt him over the line. "I'll be fine."
But she hadn't counted on how hard the wind was blowing when they headed outside to catch a cab. By the time a taxi pulled over to the curb, it was impossible to hide how cold she was.
Warmth suddenly enveloped her, along with the scent of clean male, as Roman draped his jacket over her shoulders. She knew she should give it back to him, but couldn't resist wrapping it around herself like a blanket instead.
"Thank you," she murmured as he opened the taxi door and she slipped into the backseat.
She gave the driver the address, then told Roman, "Looks like we've got just enough time to get to Rosa's if traffic isn't too bad."
Her growling stomach nearly drowned out her last few words. God, she was starved. She really hoped Rosa wouldn't mind her raiding her kitchen. Suzanne felt a pang of guilt as she realized that if she was this starved, Roman must be desperate for food, given that he had to have a good fifty pounds on her. All of it muscle. Seriously sexy muscle...
"You need to eat," he said, clearly expecting her to argue with him.
But even if she could go without food a little while longer, she knew he couldn't. "We both do." She got the driver's attention. "Change of plans. Can you pull over at that pizza place on the corner?" Turning to Roman, she said, "It's a hidden gem. They make this one pizza that's the best I've ever had. It's called the--"