He grinned slowly, devastating in ways she didn’t have the emotional bandwidth to unpack.
“Your turn,” Chloe rushed out, redirecting her brain before it wandered into romance-novel fantasy territory.“Ask me something.”
He studied her, focused and genuinely interested.Not dissecting.Discovering.
“What made you start all this?”he asked, nodding at the planners and color-coded filming schedules.
“My videos?”She laughed softly.“A client moved away and begged me to post workouts online so she could follow along.I didn’t think anyone would watch.Maybe my aunt.”
“And now you’ve got ten million people hanging on your every squat rep.”
She groaned, cheeks heating.“It sounds creepy when you say it like that.”
“It’s true, though.”He leaned in just a fraction.“You built something big, Chloe.An empire.On your own.”
The compliment hit harder than she expected, as if someone had engulfed her in an enthusiastic, affectionate bear hug.It was nice, dangerously nice, being seen that way.
“I guess I did,” she murmured.“But sometimes I feel like I’m standing on the edge of a cliff hoping the wind doesn’t shift.”
His expression softened around the edges.“I’m here now.Ain’t no wind knockin’ you over on my watch.”
The words slid into her like low heat.
She cleared her throat.“We should get back to work.”
Neither of them moved.
Eventually, Kayne pushed up from the chair, his voice threaded with something she absolutely shouldn’t want.“Anytime you want to tell me more,cher, I’m right here.”
And as he stepped toward the door, Chloe had the very unsettling realization that she wanted to tell him more.Possibly too much, in ways that were entirely, catastrophically unsafe.
#
Kayne stepped intothe hallway before he did something really stupid.Like walk right back in there, haul her out of that chair, and kiss her until both of them forgot why he was in St.Louis at all.
He exhaled slowly.
Lord have mercy.He’d been around beautiful women.Plenty of them.The COBRA Securities compound practically ran on them.But Chloe Giordano had a way of looking at a man that made his ribcage feel one size too small.She had soft eyes and an open heart.All her energy was wrapped in muscle and stubbornness.Chloe was the type of woman who didn’t just slip under your defenses, she pitched a damn tent and ordered room service.
He braced his hands on the wall and let his head drop forward, breathing in, then out to clear the energy buzzing through him.He tried to remember how long it had been since someone had looked at him as if he mattered.
Professional.That’s what he was supposed to be.Not some fool losing IQ points every time she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, pretending to be shy when he knew damn well she wasn’t.
“Get a grip, Serruto,” he muttered.
But the second he closed his eyes, her voice slid back through his head:
“I guess I did ...but sometimes I feel like I’m standing on the edge of a cliff hoping the wind doesn’t shift.”
Something in him had gone rigid at that, as if old instincts were waking up, older wounds stirring.He knew what it felt like to pray the ground stayed steady beneath your feet.
And he’d meant every word he told her: “I’m here now.Ain’t no wind knockin’ you over on my watch.”
And that was the problem.The more he learned about her—the loss, the grit, the hope—the blurrier the line became between “job” and “I’d burn the world down before I let anything touch her.”
Kayne pushed off the wall and paced the length of the hallway, needing motion before he crawled out of his own skin.The hallway smelled faintly of lemon cleaner and a trace of Chloe’s perfume drifting out under the door.It was sweet and delicate.It in no way matched the steel in her spine, but somehow fit her perfectly anyway.
He should walk it off.Go check the perimeter.Call the office.Do literally anything except think about the way she’d smiled when he’d told her about Cajun country, as if she’d tucked the image somewhere special, and wanted to know the boy he used to be, not just the man he’d become.
