Her Marine Bodyguard by Heather Long Page B

beer now?” He didn’t bother to hide his grin at her laugh. In the hours since he’d arrived, her pinched expression had relaxed. She had relaxed.
    “Mind if I split yours?” She patted the bed next to her, and he obliged her request.
    “Not at all.” He popped the cap off the first one and passed it over. Even after sating his initial lust, his body still stirred at the sight of her taking a long drink. “You should get some sleep.” Uncertain of the time, he glanced over his shoulder at the digital clock face. Barely twenty hundred. He wanted to call Foster, see what the detective learned. Whoever her attacker was, he’d gone from sending notes to trying to take Shannon in a matter of days. Brody didn’t need to be a profiler to recognize the escalation as dangerous and odd.
    “I’m not tired— I mean I am. But I’m not sleepy.” She picked a slice of pepperoni off the pizza and turned it over, studying it.
    The last thing he wanted to do was douse her simple joy with reality, but the clock on how long he had till NCIS came calling continued to tick. “You up for talking about the letters and the kidnapping attempt?”
    “Probably wouldn’t help us if I said I never wanted to talk about it.” She sighed and nibbled another bite. He passed the beer to her to wash it down and waited for her to decide. He didn’t have to wait long. “I don’t understand it.”
    “What part?”
    “Any of it.” She spread her arms. “Brody, look at me. I’m an artist.” He had a hard time not looking at her. Gorgeous, curvy, and muscled—the perfect example of the feminine form. Strong and delicate, bold and fragile. “Okay, I didn’t mean look at me like that .”
    “Like what?” Because he could stare at her all day. Leaning in, he nibbled the sauce staining the corner of her mouth, and her lips parted to greet his kiss. Soft, like her, edged with enough demand to send a pulse to his cock and wake him up. The combination of beer, pizza, and Shannon was a heady cocktail.
    “Like you want to eat me up,” she said against his lips.
    “Hmm, tempting.” But as much as he’d like to keep her in this bed for days, they had work to do. Though keeping her in his bed had its advantages—no one else would get near her.
    With reluctance, she settled back on the pillows. “You have to ask your questions.”
    “Yeah, babe. I do.” He drained the last of the first beer and then opened a second. “Before Lauren found those letters, had you received others?”
    “I have no idea,” she answered immediately, and when he frowned, she continued, “No, I mean it. I don’t really go through the mail often.”
    “What do you do with it?”
    “With the orders coming in over the last year, I simply haven’t had time.” Finished with her slice of pizza, she accepted the bottle and took a long drink, then the second slice he offered her. She definitely needed to eat more. “So, a lot of times, the mail is delivered and it sits in a pile by the front door until I get to it. I haul it upstairs and leave it on the counter. Jeanine or Henry will come by and pick it up. They deal with anything involving business.”
    The couple acted as her agent and business manager. He’d met them briefly during his leave in Dallas the same week he’d spent with Shannon. They were…remarkably unremarkable. “And they hadn’t been by in the weeks leading up to your Boston trip?”
    She stretched her leg out, one foot balancing on his calf, and he studied the contrast of her painted delicate toes against his ruddier skin. “You know, they were busy. Jeanine was dealing with the details at the gallery there, and she has other clients. Henry…wait, no. Henry stopped by.”
    “When?”
    Teeth dragging over her lower lip, she shook her head. “I have no idea. Let me think.” Fortunately, she took a bite of pizza and chewed it with an air of deliberation. Tipping the bottle back, Brody took a long drink. Chances were the detective had