HAYDEN (Dragon Security Book 5) by Glenna Sinclair

back of the room, watching everyone through those dark, smoldering eyes. I watched the way his eyes followed Megan around the room. He clearly had feelings for her. But there was something more about it. It wasn’t just about the way he watched her, but also the way he watched her family. Even in the way he looked at Hayden and me. It was as if he had a deeper connection to all of us than he should have.
    Maybe it was just my imagination. Those cops had been clear in their memories of him. They talked as if they knew him. But there was something wrong with their stories, with their behavior…I can’t say what it was, but it bothered me.
    “What do you think about Dante?” I asked Hayden later that night as we sat curled up on the couch in my condo, sharing a bottle of champagne we’d stolen from the party.
    “I think he’s dangerous. I think he’s putting his pecker in places where it doesn’t belong.”
    “You don’t think he and Megan should be together?”
    “I think he’s dangerous for her. I think she’s still nursing a broken heart and he’s just going to make that harder on her.”
    “He’s not Luke.”
    Hayden looked at me, his hand moving slowly over the back of my head. “He’s not Luke.”
    I lay my head on his chest, sliding my hand slowly under the hem of his shirt. “Did you like him before he and Megan hooked up?”
    “Not really. He was too distant and uninvolved. He wouldn’t talk to me even when we were on a job together.”
    “Have you ever really talked to him?”
    “No.”
    That single word was the most dismissive word I’d ever heard. It was clear Hayden didn’t like Dante and he didn’t want to talk about him. And that bothered me for reasons I couldn’t begin to analyze.
    Hayden’s cellphone rang, catching us both by surprise, I think. He sat forward and tugged it out of his pocket, glancing at the screen, but holding it in such a way that I couldn’t see it. He silenced it and tossed it onto the coffee table, clearly annoyed with whoever it was who saw fit to disturb the quiet on Christmas Eve.
    “Do you have family?”
    He glanced at me. “You run the background checks at Dragon. You tell me.”
    I tilted my head slightly. “You have a grandma in Baton Rouge.”
    “I do.”
    “Are you going to see her tomorrow?”
    “I wasn’t planning on it.”
    “Why not?”
    Hayden got up and crossed the room, disappearing into my kitchen. I followed, walking so quickly that I was slightly out of breath by the time I caught up with him. He was standing at the counter, pouring himself a glass of whiskey from my secret stash that was always hidden behind the cold cereal.
    “How’d you know that was there?”
    He smiled that charming smile. “Because I know you.”
    “I don’t keep that for myself. It’s there for Megan.”
    “I doubt that.”
    “It’s true.”
    “You want the world to think you’re this pious little thing, but you’re just as full of sin as the rest of us.”
    I crossed my arms over my chest. “Is that how you see me?”
    “I see you as this beautiful, strong woman who allows her mother to keep her under her thumb for reasons that continue to baffle me.”
    “Because she’s my mother. She’s the only family I have.”
    “No, you’re wrong there.”
    “Am I?”
    “You have us. You have everyone at Dragon. And all those people absolutely adore you.”
    My eyes moved slowly over his face. “All of them?”
    “Everyone single one.” He put down his glass and came over, pressing his fingers into my hair as he pushed my head back, forcing me to look up at him. “I’ve never met anyone who spoke just two words to you and didn’t fall helplessly in love with you.”
    I tried to pull away, tried to shake my head. “You’re teasing me again.”
    “No, I’m not. I’m being completely honest, something I rarely am.”
    “Yeah, I know.”
    “But I can’t help but be that way with you. You do something to me, Sam. You bring out the good in