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Keeping Her Safe
Praise for Myrna Mackenzie:
“Mackenzie delivers a gripping tale—one packed with romantic conflict, electrifying sexual tension and unexpected twists.”
—Romantic Times on Morning Beauty, Midnight Beast
“Myrna Mackenzie pens a marvelous romance filled with love and humor, a truly enjoyable read.”
—Romantic Times
“Myrna Mackenzie treats us to a heartwarming, poignant and utterly satisfying romance as these marvelous characters go toe-to-toe in a battle of wills that leads to their own hearts.”
—Romantic Times on The Daddy List
“Readers will enjoy Myrna Mackenzie’s easy writing style, substantial conflict and appealing characterizations.”
—Romantic Times on The Scandalous Return of Jake Walker
Keeping Her Safe
Myrna Mackenzie
Dear Reader,
For years I’ve been thinking that I’d like to write a book about a bodyguard, so I was delighted when I was asked to write Keeping Her Safe and tell Vincent Fortune’s story. Vincent is the epitome of the protective hero, the type of hero that I love to write. Of course, the fact that he’s big and handsome and tough and has a reluctant soft spot for Natalie McCabe, the heroine, only added to the joy of writing about him.
And Natalie is just the kind of heroine I can’t resist, one who gives the hero a run for his money. Strong and feisty, Natalie is pretty sure she doesn’t want a bodyguard, even though she realizes she might need one. And being a woman who likes to fight her own battles, she just can’t help but end up thwarting Vincent at every turn, causing the sparks to fly and the heat to build, even as the outside danger threatens to end everything.
Writing Natalie and Vincent’s story was an adventure, being able to continue Ryan Fortune’s story made the experience even more exciting, and working with some of my favorite authors…well, I just couldn’t have asked for a more agreeable task.
I hope you find abundant pleasure in reading this and all of the books in THE FORTUNES OF TEXAS: REUNION series!
Best wishes,
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Bonus Features
One
Natalie McCabe stared up at the massive dark-haired man standing in the doorway to her apartment and wondered what she had gotten herself into. The man blocked the light from the hallway. His intense gray eyes and sharp-edged jaw were practically predatory. He looked very much like trouble, and right now she already had enough trouble in her life.
“You’re not Vincent Fortune, are you?” she asked, unable to hide her concern.
“None other,” he answered in a lazy voice. “Is there a problem with that?” He glanced down at her and then beyond her into her apartment.
Yes, there’s a major problem, Natalie wanted to say, even as she bit her tongue. When Daniel Fortune, San Antonio’s assistant district attorney, had told her he was going to assign her a bodyguard, she supposed that she had expected someone big—just not someone whose eyes took in so much. Within two seconds of opening the door, she would swear the man had registered every aspect of her house and every inch of her person. A shiver of awareness ran through her. This was a man who was used to being in control.
If there was one thing Natalie couldn’t deal with, it was having someone else trying to take her control away.
“Of course there’s no problem,” she finally said, trying to calm herself.
The man looked down, and Natalie realized that she had clenched one fist. “I’ve been hired to protect you,” Vincent said more gently.
“Yes, I understand that it’s a necessity. I’m okay with that,” she finally said.
The man looked amused, as if sensing her lie. “Mind if I come in, then?”
Natalie thought about that for two whole seconds. There was no way she was letting Vincent Fortune into her apartment. It wasn’t just that he was big, he was also handsome, with a killer smile and a low, sandy voice that promised carnal pleasure. Men like that were the kind that many women allowed favors. Women in those circumstances gave up more power than they should. Because they were lusting, not thinking.
Natalie was always thinking. Right now she was thinking that she had no business toying with the word carnal.
“Is it really necessary for you to come in?” she asked, desperately hoping the man couldn’t read minds. “Aren’t you just supposed to sit outside my house in a parked car watching for danger? Isn’t that how it works?”
He raised one dark brow, not smiling. When he looked down at her, Natalie felt small and frail, even though she wasn’t either of those things. At five-six, she wasn’t short, and she visited a club regularly and had taken self-defense courses.
“You and I need to establish a working relationship and some basic ground rules before I can decide what the best course of action is, Ms. McCabe,” the man said. “To do that, we need to sit down and talk, and you probably don’t want to talk in a place where anyone can overhear us.”
Okay, he had a point. Natalie took a deep breath, her options fading. Not for the first time she wished her situation were different. When she had been assigned to cover the party the governor had thrown to honor Ryan Fortune, noted philanthropist and head of the Fortune family, for his contributions to charity, it had been an ordinary day. Just as usual, her boss at the San Antonio Express-News had stuck her with the social circuit when she wanted the chance to cover hard news stories.
Then she had witnessed Jason Jamison murdering his wife, and everything had changed. She was no longer just a reporter but also a witness to a crime.
Not long ago, her tires had been slashed, and recently she had begun receiving threatening notes. She needed protection, and Daniel Fortune was convinced that his brother Vincent ran the best security firm available. Damn!
“I don’t mean to be a pain, Mr. Fortune,” Natalie said, still not inviting him in, “but exactly how do I know that you’re who you say you are? Especially given my situation, I can’t just invite a stranger into my house.”
Vincent nodded slightly. His eyes crinkled at the corners in a way that made Natalie’s stomach flutter. Don’t be stupid, she told herself.
“You’ve just become my favorite client, Ms. McCabe,” Vincent Fortune was saying. “Most people let me in without asking any tough questions. I’ll show you my credentials, but I’d also advise that you call my brother just to make sure that I am who I am. That way you’ll have some peace of mind.”
That was such a joke. She hadn’t had peace of mind since this whole Jason Jamison business had started. Moreover, she was currently involved in some sensitive sleuthing for an article she wanted—no, needed—to write, and having someone trailing her would be a decided disadvantage. Besides, this man, with his short dark hair, gray eyes and hard-muscled body, was not the kind to make any woman feel peaceful. Unless one counted the afterglow of a sexual encounter as peaceful….
“I’ll call Daniel,” she said, chasing her thoughts away as she pulled out her cell phone and dialed Daniel’s number.
“Hi, Natalie,” Daniel said when she had told him what she wanted. “Yes, that’s definitely my big brother. He’s a bit imposing, but I can assure you that he’s highly effective.”
Natalie looked up, and her eyes met Vincent’s. For a minute, she couldn’t look away, couldn’t swallow. Imposing was a good word for the man. It was a word she didn’t care for much.
“Are you okay with this, Natalie?” Daniel asked. “I don’t mean to scare you, but until Jamison’s case is complete, and with these notes circulating, you need to be protected. Vincent will do that. He’s more dependable than anyone I know, and he’s capable, as well. He’ll get the job done. All right?”
No, she was not all right. For years, she had been treated as a cute but inept little doll by her family. Moreover, Joe Franklin, her good-ol’ boy boss, felt that women should be happy just to write fluff pieces. Now Vincent Fortune would join the ranks of those who wanted to protect little Natalie McCabe from the world. He would smother her with his undeniable presence. But she had no choice. To change things, she had to remain healthy and alive.
“I’m fine with that, Daniel. Thank you.” She hung up.
“All right, come in and let’s get started, Mr. Fortune,” she said, stepping back and letting the man in her doorway inside. “But I’m going to be honest. I’m really uncomfortable having a man following me around.”
“Excuse me,” he said, “but I have to ask. Is it just the prospect of having a bodyguard that bothers you or the fact that I’m a man?” His eyes turned dark and he didn’t surge forward into her house as she would have expected. “Because,” he continued, “you should understand that most people are uncomfortable having a shadow at first. They get used to it. If the discomfort goes deeper, though, I need to know.”
She felt herself growing warm. “I just don’t like feeling helpless. Having someone paid to keep me safe makes me feel hemmed in, frustrated. I have work to do, Mr. Fortune.” It was important work, too. The story she was trying to uncover would not only help establish her as a respected reporter, but it would bring justice to many elderly people who had been wronged. She couldn’t give that up.
Vincent gave her a curt nod. “I respect your work, Ms. McCabe. I hope you understand that while VF Securities is my business and I take pride in my work, this situation goes beyond that. I take the intimidation of innocent individuals very seriously. That’s what I’m seeing here. You’ve been threatened. I’ve seen the notes that have been sent to you. Someone wants to frighten you. He or she wants you out of the picture. I don’t intend to let that happen.”
Suddenly the thing she had been avoiding thinking about came rushing back at her. I’m watching you, Natalie. You’re never alone, Natalie. Don’t let down your guard, Natalie. The notes had frightened her a great deal, it was true. Her hands had trembled just holding the bits of paper those notes had been written on, and she felt sick even remembering those moments. But giving in to that fear, letting someone else take away her choice to be strong and to be the one in charge…it just made the fear worse, in a way. She had struggled all her life for the chance to follow her own path. This was too much like admitting that her family had been right all along, like conceding that she really was weak, parasitically helpless.
The thought threatened to overwhelm her, suffocate her. She gave herself a mental shake and tried to stand taller. “Mr. Fortune, I grew up with parents and three older brothers who felt I was incapable of even walking across the street without assistance. I do understand the need for your expertise and your protection, and I am grateful for all you and Daniel are trying to do for me. But I have to be able to live my life and do my job without interference. I have to be able to have some semblance of normalcy.”
“All right,” he said in his dark, sexy voice as he entered her home and shut the door behind him. “I’ll do all I can to make that possible. I’m here to watch your back, and I’ll do my best to make it easy for you.”
But as he brushed past her, and she caught a whiff of his aftershave, a fragrance that only emphasized his masculinity, she couldn’t imagine it ever being easy to have this man watching her every move. Already she felt as if she were walking around in her underwear. His eyes were everywhere. She could see him assessing every nook and cranny of her living room, noting the locks on the windows, the open curtains that let in the sunshine.
She could almost hear her parents clucking every time she took a risk. She could remember her three brothers’ frowns if a boy so much as glanced below her neck. This kind of scrutiny was not new to her. The old, familiar sense of beating her head against the wall crept right back in, only this time she couldn’t pretend the scrutiny was unjustified, that she could handle everything on her own. Like it or not, someone really was threatening her.
“I appreciate your candor and your promises, but my life is going to change, isn’t it?” she asked softly.
“Yes,” he said, turning to face her. “It already has. You were at the wrong place at the wrong time, and because of that everything will be different from here on out.”
“Some people would say I was in the right place at the right time. Jason Jamison is behind bars.”
He gave a slight nod. “Yes.”
But Natalie had to admit that his first comment had been right, in a way. Because she was a valued witness whose safety was in question, she was going to be spending a lot of time with a man she wouldn’t ordinarily have ever met, one she would never have chosen to meet.
Natalie sighed and nodded. “All right, keep me safe, Mr. Fortune.”
“It will be my primary goal.”
And hers would be to keep her life as normal as possible, to make sure that Vincent Fortune remained a shadow, one she could shed once this mess with Jason Jamison was over.
Vincent sat down at Natalie McCabe’s fussy little kitchen table and did his best to look a little less formidable. In his line of work, having a little brawn was usually good, but it was never a good idea to make a client uneasy.
Natalie McCabe, with her soft, husky voice that couldn’t quite hide her nervousness no matter how hard she tried, was clearly uncomfortable where he was concerned.
“All right, Ms. McCabe, we’ll need to go over all that’s happened to you since you attended that party, and I’ll need to have an idea what your daily schedule is.”
“I can tell you everything that’s happened,” she said.
“Great. And the schedule?”
She looked to the side. “I’m a reporter, Mr. Fortune.”
“Vincent. We’re going to be spending a lot of time together and, really, I’m just not a ‘Mr. Fortune’ kind of guy.”
She blinked those light green eyes of hers. Eyes he would have been attracted to if she were not a client. But she was.
“Vincent, then,” she said, her tone reluctant. “I’m a reporter, Vincent. I interview people. If I tell you my schedule, you’ll follow me around, won’t you?”
He smiled. “That’s generally the idea of a bodyguard, yes.”
“Exactly. That’s going to be a problem.”
“In what way?”
Natalie looked at him dead-on. “Vincent, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but you are a…well, you’re a rather big man.”
He raised one brow.
She raised one right back.
“It comes up now and then,” he admitted, trying not to grin.
“Yes, well…my contacts might be intimidated by a man with linebacker shoulders. How am I supposed to get people to open up and tell me their secrets if they’re looking over their shoulders wondering what you’re doing?” She threw her hands out in apparent exasperation, and then she frowned. “I’m sorry, I know you have to look forbidding to do your job. I really didn’t mean to insult you.” She glanced up and he couldn’t believe it, but she really did look as if she thought she might have hurt his feelings.
“Don’t worry about it. Any of it. I promise you, Natalie, that I can stay out of your way when it’s necessary. There are times, though, that I’ll need to be a presence. If someone is threatening you, that someone needs to know that you’re not to be messed with. So yes, intimidation helps in those instances.”
Although he understood her concerns, his size had always been a bit of a problem, and not just for others. Vincent was all too aware of the fact that he was physically powerful and that his power needed to be tempered. People got hurt when a big man didn’t control his emotions. He knew that from personal experience, but he really didn’t want to think about that.
If he could help it, he wouldn’t let Natalie experience anything of that nature.
“I’ll keep my distance when I can,” he repeated.
She smiled warmly, and something moved deep inside him. Forget it, he told himself. She’s not for you. Not that any woman was. He dated women. He was, after all, a normal, healthy male. He just didn’t have relationships, not the kind where a man lost it over the color of a woman’s eyes, anyway. As far as he was concerned, the only things he needed to notice about Natalie were those related to this case.
“Now, tell me about the party,” he prompted.
She nodded, her lips suddenly tight. He could almost see her pulling herself together, straightening her spine, breathing more deeply, tightening every muscle as she prepared to relive what had to have been a damned terrifying experience.
“Take all the time you need,” he said gently, prepared to wait all day if necessary.
She lifted her chin high. “I don’t need time, Vincent. I remember that day perfectly. I had been asked to cover the party because it was considered an important social event.” Natalie frowned slightly.
“You didn’t consider it important?” Vincent asked.
She looked up, directly into his eyes. He could see that she would be an effective reporter. One look into those expressive eyes and a subject might give up every secret he possessed. Good thing he wasn’t a subject.
“I didn’t say it wasn’t important. It’s always an event when the Fortune family gets together, but this time it was the governor himself who was honoring Ryan Fortune for his charitable works. It was a very notable gathering.”
Vincent sensed that there was a huge but about to follow, but Natalie surprised him by stopping at that.
“And where did Jamison fit in?”
She frowned. “I thought that Daniel told you all of this.”
“He did. He’s not the one I’m guarding. I need to see things through your eyes.”
Natalie firmed her lips slightly, obviously reluctant, but then she nodded, her dark, shoulder-length hair swishing with her movement. “All right. I’d been assigned to cover the social scene but I was also planning my own story on Ryan’s effect on Fortune, TX, Ltd. in his role as an advisor. I wanted to interview Jamison, and I went upstairs looking for him, but when I got there I heard arguing. I didn’t know what it was, but I…well, I was curious. A reporter’s nose for news, I suppose.”
She looked to the side suddenly, swallowing hard. For a minute, Vincent worried about her.
“The words were ugly,” she said, “but when I got to the door, the arguing had stopped. At first I thought I’d caught a couple embracing. The man had his back to me and his arms seemed to be around the woman, tipping her back in that way you see in movies. I’m not sure exactly what I thought then. Maybe that they were one of those couples that likes to argue and then make up, I guess. At any rate, it was clear that this wasn’t a scene I wanted to witness, and so I turned away and even moved partly down the hall. Then I heard a strange choking sound, and things clicked—the fact that the embrace might not have been all that it seemed. I ran back and I heard a thud. Jamison was standing over the woman. ‘Good riddance. You were more trouble than you were worth,’ he said.”
Natalie turned back toward Vincent. “I’ve thought about that day over and over,” she whispered. “If I had only known what was going on—”
“Natalie, you know it wasn’t your fault.”
She shook her head and sat up even straighter. “I know.” But she didn’t sound completely convinced. Vincent couldn’t imagine what she’d gone through since that day. “Anyway,” she said, her voice regaining strength, “I stood there, frozen, until he looked up to me. Everything seemed to be so unreal. Then, he actually smiled. ‘Take a good look, honey. Because you’ll be next,’ he said. I knew for sure that she was dead, then. I didn’t even think. I just ran and I kept running until I realized that he would get away with murder if I didn’t come back. That was it. I turned around and drove back to the party. They arrested him, and he’s awaiting trial now.”
“The letters?”
“I saved copies if you need to look at them again.”
He didn’t ask why she had saved copies. He would have done the same. And she was a reporter, a person who lived by facts and evidence. But he shook his head. “The experts have gone over them thoroughly. There’s no way of telling who sent them or even if the person who mailed them was working alone.”
“I know. It seems hard to believe that a man accused of murder and under constant guard would be able to sneak messages out.”
“He’s been allowed visitors. Maybe he didn’t write the messages.”
“Yes. It could be someone on the outside,” she said. “An accomplice of his.” Vincent thought he saw her tremble, but she didn’t allow her voice to break. She didn’t show any other sign of being nervous.
He sat forward suddenly and leaned nearer, moving into her space, her soft floral scent filling his senses. “I don’t mean to be immodest, Natalie, but I make a point of being good at what I do. No one—absolutely no one—is going to get to you without going straight through me.”
Finally she smiled, her pretty pink lips curving upward in a way that made his breath hitch in his chest. “You’re a little cocky, Vincent.”
“It goes with the territory. A bodyguard has to be willing to go through walls and step on a few toes to make sure his client is safe.”
She glanced down at her toes.
“Not yours,” he said, grinning slightly.
“Don’t be so sure,” she said. “My parents and my brothers thought I was a hellion. They’ve spent years trying to get me to behave, and even though they’re normally sane, calm people, they’ve been known to go to extremes in their quest to keep up with me.”
“Is that a warning, Natalie?”
“It’s a sad truth, Vincent. I have been told that I’m unmanageable. Consider yourself warned. Now, do you have everything that you need to know?”
“I know enough to get started.”
“Good.” She rose to her feet. “Because I have an appointment.”
He nodded and stood. “All right, let’s go.”
Those green eyes suddenly flashed dark. “You told me that you would be discreet, but where I’m going…well, you just can’t.”
He gave her a slow, lazy smile. “Watch me, Natalie. Your welfare is on my head now. Where you go, I follow.”
“I’m not going anywhere important. Nowhere anyone else would be interested. Just to a neighbor’s house.”
“Well, then, let’s go meet the neighbors,” he drawled.
She blinked. “What am I going to tell them about you? How am I going to explain you away?”
Vincent placed both palms on the table and leaned closer. “You’re the reporter. You know how to relate a story. Tell them the facts…or make something up. Tell them I’m your lover, for all I care. But understand this, Natalie. Your safety is my concern, and I am not letting you out of my sight.”
She blinked and frowned.
“It’s for your own good,” he promised.
She frowned harder. “I know. I hate that. I hate that it’s for my own good. It would be so much easier to argue about it if it weren’t. All right, come on, lover boy.”
With that, Natalie turned and headed for the door. Vincent had watched any number of women’s backs over the years. Most of the women had been infatuated with the thought of having a man following them around, their own personal paid protector. But Natalie McCabe was royally pissed off. In spite of admitting to the necessity of having him here, she didn’t want her neighbors to meet him.
