She had also run rings around her bodyguards, destroying more than one reputation. Apparently she’d driven any number of security personnel crazy—one by keeping him out so late at nightclubs he’d barely been able to function during the day. Another had quit after a solid week of shopping. It had sounded funny at the time. Sitting in the jungle on extended patrol, soaking wet, eating reconstituted food, and wondering if someone was drawing a bead on his spine, Ben had grabbed at the humour and laughed at the antics of Baby Roma just as hard as Gray and Blade and the rest of the guys.
They’d even made up newspaper headlines: Bodyguard Found Dead In Mall: Autopsy Reveals Death By Shopping.
Ben wasn’t laughing now. Roma Lombard might look like every man’s fantasy, but she was trouble in capital letters.
His eyes narrowed. He’d be damned if he would let her run all over him.
At Gray’s suggestion, they moved to a quieter part of the lounge. Ben accepted the envelope Gray extracted from his briefcase and automatically began examining the contents, but he was still having difficulty concentrating. His mind was firmly fixed on the one complication he could not afford—a sexual attraction to his client.
If he didn’t owe Gray any number of favours, he would have dumped Ms. Lombard’s sweet little ass on someone else’s lap.
Chapter 4
Roma could still feel the heat of McCabe’s touch. His palm had been warm, calloused, and so rough it had sent a hot shock of sensation up her arm.
Wearily, she assessed the situation. McCabe was her bodyguard, and she couldn’t do a thing about it.
He was mouth-wateringly gorgeous, even better than his photos, and she wanted him.
Yep, just as she thought, her life had just officially gone to hell.
She’d heard McCabe’s name mentioned often, although the actual personal information she knew about him was small. She knew he was a good friend of both Gray and Blade, and had been in the SAS with her brothers. He’d been married and was recently divorced, and he was now a single dad with custody of his child.
His blue gaze connected with hers again, and she decided she had one other piece of information. He didn’t like her.
Good, she thought tartly, squashing her bewilderment and a ridiculous pang of hurt. She didn’t want to be on intimate terms with McCabe. He was exactly the kind of male she didn’t need in her life: dominant, overconfident, a real lady-killer.
Roma frowned when she identified a thread of excitement still twining through the long list of negatives she was building against McCabe, but she didn’t question why she had to build a case against being attracted to him. He’d looked at her and she’d been turned on. The sudden attack of lust alarmed her, because she’d never lost control like that before.
His deep voice mingled with Gray’s as he methodically flipped through printed material and a sheaf of enlarged black-and-white photos. The edgy, simmering impatience had disappeared and he now radiated the cool competency of a man who was used to danger and knew just what to do with it.
Faded jeans and T-shirt aside, McCabe looked like exactly what she knew him to be: a highly trained professional, an ex-SAS assault and anti-terrorist specialist who, from the conversation, was now in business as a security consultant.
He began firing questions at Gray. Finally he looked up from the material in his hands. ‘‘Either it was a random shooting or the shot was wide. Did you pinpoint a trajectory?’’
‘‘We did better than that.’’ Gray pulled one of the photos from the stack. ‘‘We found the shooter’s nest. Second floor, third window from the right, just above the flower shop. The lady who leases the shop said there were several empty rooms with back stairs access.’’
‘‘Good position,’’ McCabe commented. ‘‘He shouldn’t have missed.’’
Roma blinked, hardly believing she’d heard right. The bluntness of McCabe’s comment flicked her on the raw. ‘‘That’s why all this fuss is for nothing,’’ she said curtly, irritated at being left out of the discussion as if she had no part in it, and stung by McCabe’s clinical assessment of the so-called attempt on her life. Stung by the memory of that single rifle shot. Anyone would think Lewis didn’t count, despite being the one with a bullet hole in his shoulder. ‘‘If the shooter was that professional and had wanted to put a bullet through me, why did he miss?’’
McCabe’s gaze fastened on hers. ‘‘Your boyfriend was hit.’’
Roma gritted her teeth. ‘‘Lewis isn’t my boyfriend, he’s a friend. There was also a large crowd. Maybe the gunman was after someone else. Maybe, as you say, it was a random shooting and he didn’t care who he hit.’’
‘‘Anything’s possible.’’
McCabe’s voice was low, with an intriguing roughness that made her tighten up inside; then it registered that he was soothing her, as if she needed to be babied out of her fears.
He switched his attention back to Gray, once again dismissing her. ‘‘Calibre?’’
‘‘Five point five six.’’
‘‘Sniper rifle,’’ he said softly.
Gray glanced at Roma. She knew what he was thinking. He didn’t like discussing the details of the shooting in front of her, but she wasn’t going to take the hint and walk away while they discussed the unpleasant facts. Besides, she’d made it her business to find out every last detail of the investigation. In point of fact, she knew more than anyone—she had been there.
McCabe eased the photographs and the report back into the envelope. ‘‘Any fingerprints?’’
‘‘Clean.’’ Once again Gray glanced at her as if she was made of delicate porcelain and shouldn’t hear gritty details.
Roma folded her arms across her chest and almost rolled her eyes with exasperation.
‘‘The room was sanitised before he left. Random target practice or not, he was a pro.’’
McCabe grunted and tapped the envelope against his thigh. ‘‘You need a lift into town?’’
Gray shook his head. ‘‘I’m catching a flight out, I’ve got a lunchtime meeting in Sydney. The family suite at the hotel is free, so that’s where you’ll be staying. Roma has her itinerary, and you’ve got my cell phone number if you need to get hold of me.’’
They shook hands; then Gray hugged Roma. ‘‘I know you think this is a lot of fuss about nothing, but if there’s even the suggestion of trouble, I want you back home and safe.’’
‘‘You worry too much.’’
A wry smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. ‘‘Where you’re concerned, sometimes I don’t think I worry enough.’’
Roma watched Gray stride away, fighting the urge to call him back and cancel this whole trip. She didn’t get to see much of Gray or Blade these days, and the gap in years had always precluded real intimacy, so this sudden urge to cling was definitely out of character. But now that her brother had gone there
