“His subtle way of saying he knew about Alliance.”

“That’s what I assumed. I asked him if he’d like to meet some of my friends. He winked, said he’d love to, and then handed me his card.”

Karen lifted both hands facing up. “So what makes you think g—”

“Ahh, just how he presented himself. Sometimes you just know these things.” Michael had flirted with the women in the room and appreciated the men. Oh, he’d been subtle but if there was one skill Gwen had perfected in the past few months, it was reading men and their intentions.

A man searching for someone…anyone…had a certain energy about him. Eliza had schooled Gwen for months about how to approach these men to help them learn about Alliance. There had been social events in which no contacts had been met. And others where Gwen was able to recruit men, and women, into their database.

“Michael Wolfe?” Karen tapped a finger to her chin.

“If he’s looking for temporary, I think you’d be the perfect match.”

“Oh, why?”

“First, you’re both beautiful people. The cameras would eat you up. Second, Michael’s high profile would prove difficult for many women to maneuver without cracking, and you, my dear, never crack.”

“What do you mean, I never crack?”

“You have your eye on the entire picture and would never lose sight of that under pressure.” Gwen waved three fingers in the air. “Third, you have no illusions that a temporary marriage might mold into a loving relationship.”

“All of our clients say that.”

“Yet some keep. If Michael is, you know, then that won’t be possible.”

Karen shrugged and pushed off the couch. “I think I’ll turn in early, see if any of his flicks are on pay-per-view.”

Gwen wished Karen a good night and made her way into their kitchen. She placed a kettle on the stove and boiled water for tea. She took in the small space with its cozy cottage feel and sighed. When the day came that Alliance did find a groom for Karen, she’d move away and Gwen would be living alone.

Neil MacBain paused the audio feed, shook his head, rewound the damn thing, and listened to it again.

“You do know that no one wears those anymore.”

“If that were true, finding a place to buy garters and stockings would be impossible.”

“Yeah, but you need to go to those sexy bra stores in order to find them.”

“Men love frilly underwear.”

Neil slapped his hand on the mouse and turned off the sound before he tortured himself anymore.

Fuck! I need to get laid!

Listening to Gwen’s polished accent mentioning garters and stockings shot his brain straight to his cock.

The desire to click on the video monitor made his right eye twitch, but he refrained and forced himself away from his surveillance room.

Blake Samantha, their son Eddie, and even Samantha’s sister Jordan were in Europe with plans to stay for at least a month. Their absence meant fewer people to watch over and plenty of time to think.

He hated thinking.

Doing was such a better pastime.

Doing meant standing in the shadows of tall buildings and watching over the only Harrison stateside he could.

Not that watching Gwen was a chore. Tonight she wore a floor-length, gold beaded number that sparkled in the light given off by the flash of photographers’ cameras by the red carpet. Though she wasn’t the focus of their lenses, she was the center of his. She offered one look, and one smile, to the paparazzi before walking inside the venue. Her lithe frame moved with the sort of grace and elegance that most of the people around her tried to buy but never quite achieved.

Gwen had played center stage to many of his fantasies.

Fantasies that would never become reality.

Neil shrugged out of his black leather jacket and tossed it on the side of his sofa. He unhooked his holster that carried the Beretta M9 he never left home without and set it on top of his jacket.

The two-bedroom guesthouse that sat on Blake and Samantha’s Malibu estate had been his refuge for five years. After five years, he finally felt some degree of comfort…of belonging. Other than the housekeeper and cook, Neil had no one on site he needed to watch over during the night.

He double-checked the system in Tarzana, and confirmed that someone there had set the internal alarms that shouldn’t go off unless breached. Gwen and Karen set the alarms when they left or when they turned in for the night.

Neil flicked on the local news, more for background noise than for company. He poured himself a drink and stretched out on the couch.

This was the life he wanted…low stress, even lower profile. He could guard a duke and his family in his sleep. No, make that in his sleep with a hangover…the kind you woke up from with the room still spinning. The people he’d known in the past would say he was wasting his time.

But it was his time to waste.

He brushed away memories of those past people, tilted his head back, and closed his eyes. His consciousness slid into sleep, his body relaxing with it.

The high-pitched scream of a security breach shot him to his feet and he was fully awake in half a breath.

Neil ran to his security room, hit a master switch, and a dozen monitors sprang to life. He scanned them quickly and found the breach in question in Tarzana. The monitor flashed red and displayed video feeds from inside and outside the house. Neil hit speed dial with one hand and placed the Tarzana feed onto his big screen.

The hall was clear, the motion detector hadn’t tripped the outside lights…the front door was closed. But the back door wasn’t secure.

“Gwen?” Neil overheard Karen calling from inside the Tarzana house, the audio feed now relaying every word clearly. The alarm sounded inside the house, probably loud enough to wake the neighbors. He heard the phone ringing both in his ear and in the house.

He flipped the feed, searching for her…his heart skipped several beats before Gwen appeared on screen.

She ran to the control panel, opened it, and started hitting numbers. Seeing her unharmed, Neil kept scanning the feeds. “Answer the f**king phone,” he said through clenched teeth.

“I forgot…” Gwen’s voice rose above the alarm.

“Turn the noise off,” Karen said.

Both Gwen and Karen were standing at the control panel. Once the numbers were pressed in, the alarm went silent.

Gwen moved from the panel to the phone. “Hello?”

“What happened?” Neil’s hand hovered over the mouse on the master controls, the one that would alert the local police to respond.