Proof (Targes Executive Protection Book 1)

I saw the exact moment when Cass mentally checked out. His entire body stiffened, and his eyes went blank.

It was the way it was supposed to be. We both had to play our parts. He was the suspect, and I was his interrogator and nothing more.

I couldn’t help but find myself back in that shower with him. Even though I couldn’t remember an entire chunk of my life, my memory of what had happened in that shower was crystal clear. I could still feel the way he’d kissed me, the way he’d held me afterwards, both in the shower and later.

I was the one who’d taken his hand after we’d silently dried ourselves and I was the one who’d held on to him as he’d tried to move toward the door so he could leave the room.

I should have let him go.

I should have done a lot of things.

But from the moment I’d woken up in the middle of the afternoon only to find my traitorous body draped over Cass’s, I’d been caught in a maelstrom of emotions. I hadn’t moved, though. I’d pretended I was exactly where I belonged. I’d imagined what it would be like to fall asleep in Cass’s arms every night and wake up to find myself still in them every morning.

It was all a shit show. A stupid fantasy that had begun when the hero worship I’d felt for Cass since I was a kid had turned into something else.

Something I wasn’t allowed to feel.

Something that would leave me burning in the fires of hell if my father ever found out.

The thought of my father immediately led me to thoughts of Sully. If he were here, he’d know what to do. Sully always did. It was who he was. My protector, my best friend, and the stand-in father I’d needed because my real father had been forced to work two shitty jobs to keep a roof over our heads and food on the table.

While silence was often a cop’s best friend during an interrogation, I didn’t like it.

Not with Cass.

But the man in front of me wasn’t Cass. I didn’t remember much, but that I did know.

His own words the night before had confirmed that my gut and my brain hadn’t been in alignment since our first confrontation. I knew I was missing something important, but I didn’t know what it was.

I suddenly felt as twitchy as Cass probably did. He might have looked hard and indifferent, but his body betrayed him every time his eyes shifted back and forth between us and the open kitchen door. One of his fingers tapped his arm every few seconds and his breaths were too even.

A man like Cass didn’t let cracks appear in his armor. He’d been trained not to. That had been the military, though. Life with his family hadn’t been much better.

But prison was an entirely different thing.

I closed my eyes to try to get a hold of myself and be the cop I’d once been. I didn’t want to think about Cass and his life behind bars. I didn’t want to think about the fear and loneliness he must have felt from the moment his cell door had been closed with him on the wrong side of the bars.

I couldn’t feel them.

If I did, that would be the end of all this. I’d never know the truth; I’d never understand how a man who’d become a part of my family from the moment he and Sully had met on that football field became a man who’d stood accused of murdering three people and trying to kill a fourth.

Stood accused?

Where the hell had that come from?

He hadn’t stood accused… he’d been proven guilty in a court of law.

Pain began to build behind my eye. I knew what would come next if I didn’t manage to control it. The last thing I needed was to end up curled into a ball on the floor again.

“You mind if we take a walk?” I asked, catching both Cass and myself off guard. Where the hell had that come from? I was supposed to be interrogating the man.

It was all I could do not to jerk when a jolt of pain went through me.

“Fuck it,” I whispered beneath my breath because I was tired of thinking. I was tired of trying to put together all the pieces that kept appearing the more I delved into the past. “I’m going for a walk,” I announced as I climbed to my feet. “If you want my brother to tear you limb from limb when you tell him you lost me in the woods, then stay here.”

I left the kitchen and carefully maneuvered down the extremely weathered and undoubtedly rotted porch steps. Cool air greeted my skin. It had been chilly inside the kitchen with the door open for so long. Now, though, the breeze was comforting, and the sun warmed my face. I closed my eyes and let my head drop back a little so I could enjoy the warm rays. The pain in my head began to lessen.

The creaking of the stairs that were just behind me told me I was no longer alone. It was both exciting and terrifying.

Terrifying in a good way, unfortunately.

The memory of Cass grinding against me in that shower had me thinking about what it would feel like if he did the same thing against a tree. When my body began to react, I started walking in the hopes of tempering my bout of lust. I didn’t know or care what direction I walked in because Cass wouldn’t let anything happen to me.

I stopped so suddenly that I felt Cass’s front press against my back. His hands wrapped around my biceps, probably to keep him from actually running into me.

“You okay?” Cass asked.

I nearly moaned when his warm breath flowed along my neck. All I had to do was push my ass back a bit and I’d know if Cass wanted the same thing I did.

Fortunately, he was stronger than me because he quickly released me and stepped back. I felt like I’d lost something.

The pain behind my eye began to intensify. Okay, so maybe the walk hadn’t been the best idea.

“JJ, just close your eyes, okay?”

Cass’s deep, smooth voice draped over me like the softest of blankets. I could feel him at my back again. I closed my eyes.

“Just keep ’em closed, sweetheart,” Cass murmured. I could sense him moving around me. I wasn’t afraid, though. His hands gently closed over my shoulders from behind. “Okay, there’s a log just a few feet to your left. I’m going to steer you to it and tell you when to stop. You work the pedals, and I’ll take care of the rest.”

Even though it hurt like hell, I laughed. “The rest?” I asked. “I’m supposed to trust a guy who didn’t know shit about driving the muscle car he’d just painstakingly restored but decided doing donuts in abandoned warehouses was a good idea anyway?”

There was a long beat of silence, and I feared I’d fucked up whatever little truce we’d been in the middle of, but when Cass’s chest pressed up against my back, that fear turned into something else.

“Yes, you are,” he whispered into my ear before letting his lips skim over the sensitive skin right behind my earlobe. His words didn’t sound like an order, but they didn’t sound like a flippant response either. They’d sounded almost… desperate?

“Okay, I’m just going to turn you a bit and then I want you to walk straight. The log is only about six feet away.”

The searing bolts of lightning behind my eye reminded me where we were and what was happening. Fuck, I really didn’t want him to see me like this yet again. “Cass. I’m fine, I can⁠—”

“—move forward six steps,” Cass interjected. He didn’t sound desperate anymore. “And if you don’t shut up about it, I’m never going to kiss you again,” he continued, his voice lighter now.

I could feel my skin heating as I remembered what I’d told him in the bathroom after he’d refused to stop talking.

“I don’t think I said never,” I groused as I let Cass maneuver me into position on the log. Images began to flash in my mind, but I couldn’t make sense of any of them. I wanted them back. Even though they were responsible for the pain I was feeling, I still wanted them back.

They’d felt warm.

Peaceful.

Instead of forcing my eyes closed, I relaxed them and kept them closed because I wanted to. For the first time since I’d woken up from my coma, I didn’t want to escape the pain. I wanted those images back. If I could just focus on them then maybe I’d see the complete picture.

“Breathe through it, JJ,” Cass murmured softly. His big hand rubbed circles against my back while the fingers of his other played with mine. I did as he said and took long, deep breaths in through my nose and slowly released the air from my mouth. It didn’t take the pain away, but it didn’t get worse, either.

I let my mind focus on Cass’s voice and the feel of his body supporting mine. My head was on his shoulder. It felt good to no longer have to try to hold myself upright.

After all, Cass would never let me fall.

I wasn’t expecting this, JJ. I wasn’t…

They were Cass’s words but not from now. The man next to me was humming something as he continued to rub my back.

Those words had been his, but from another time. I could hear that little wobble in his voice that he got when he was nervous. I desperately tried to come up with the image that went along with the voice because Cass didn’t get nervous. He didn’t get tongue-tied. Or confused. Not to mention I sure as shit knew he’d never spoken to me like that. His voice, the silent plea behind the words, the hushed way he’d spoken them… I would have remembered that because they were nearly identical to the words he’d always spoken in my fantasies. We’d be wrapped in each other’s arms, our lower bodies intertwined as we both came down from the natural high we’d been riding from the moment he’d kissed me for the first time.

“Tell me something I don’t know about you, Cass,” I blurted, desperately squeezing my eyes closed so I could chase down the fading image as it began to disintegrate like ash.

“Something about me you don’t know,” he repeated.

“Something about you that no one knows,” I clarified. The image was already gone by the time Cass responded, so I leaned more of my weight against him and remained as still as I could so the pain in my head would fade away, just like the picture had.

“Your brother is the worst fucking cook ever… ever,” Cass said. I could feel his smile even though I couldn’t see it.

I chuckled. “That doesn’t count because I’ve known that for a lot longer than you have.”

“Fair enough. Okay, um, I can’t stand butterflies. If I see one, I’m gone. The little assholes show up in my dreams all the time, though. I wake up covered in sweat.”

“No way,” I griped. When Cass didn’t respond, I carefully opened my eyes. No blinding light, no searing pain. I forced myself to sit up so I could look at him while he spoke. Cass gave me a quick glance. His expression made something inside of me go warm.

A good warm.

A peaceful warm.

I’d never seen this side of Cass before. He looked younger, lighter… like a weight had been lifted from his shoulders.

“You are,” I said. “You’re afraid of butterflies,” I repeated and then I was laughing.

“Okay, smart-ass, your turn,” Cass said before giving me a playful nudge with his shoulder. “Something no one else knows.”

I mulled the thought over for several long beats before saying, “When you first got your Mustang and I saw how excited you were about trying to restore it, I checked out a bunch of books from the library about cars and read them every night before I went to sleep. I couldn’t find a book about your car specifically, so I asked the librarian for help.” I chuckled as Mrs. Winsky’s face flashed in my brain.

“She thought I was asking for a book about horses. When I explained to her what I was talking about, she looked at me like I was crazy because what seven-year-old wants to read a book about a muscle car? When she told me the library didn’t carry that kind of book, I was heartbroken. She’d always been nice to me, so a week later, she surprised me with this huge book. It turned out to be some book about the history of Henry Ford and how he came up with the idea for assembly lines. She said it was mine to keep. I didn’t have the heart to tell her it wasn’t the kind of book I’d been looking for. I read it anyway because it did talk a little about building cars. I must have read it a hundred times while you were restoring your car. I wanted to find something helpful so you’d think I was smart.”

“You were smart,” Cass murmured. I could feel his eyes on me. “I wanted to give up on that car so many times and just use the one I’d been given by my father, but you kept encouraging me… all of us to keep going.”

Cass fell silent. His body brushed up against mine for the briefest of moments. I was unable to speak because I was still trying to absorb his words. Had I, a kid who hadn’t even reached double digits in age, really been one of the reasons he’d kept going with his car? There was just no way.

“You changed something in me, JJ. Even though you were just a kid, you were the reason I made a lot of the choices I did long after we finished the car,” Cass admitted.

His words nearly knocked me off the log. “No,” I said with a shake of my head. “No, my family⁠—”

“Your family taught me a lot of things I didn’t know, like what it actually meant to be a family. I could go on and on about what being with you, Sully, and your father meant to me all these years, but we’d be sitting here all day.”

“But I didn’t do anything special⁠—”

“Yes, you did. You just didn’t know it,” Cass interrupted. “You gave me strength and courage, JJ. I know you and your brother didn’t have it easy when you were kids. Losing your mom, your dad needing to work so hard to make ends meet. But from the first time I met you, you were so different from anything I’d ever known. You were stubborn, determined, loyal, kind, and so full of hope…”

Cass paused for a moment. He dropped his eyes to look at his hands. I couldn’t take mine off him. Every word he’d said was the truth. I’d seen that in his eyes as he’d held my gaze. I’d heard it in his voice. He wasn’t telling me some anecdote just to amuse me.

He was really telling me the truth.

“Your brother and I, we were close,” Cass continued. “But we were at an age where guys just didn’t talk about that stuff with each other. I think he knew some of the things I felt, but neither of us ever brought it up. You, though… you were different. You were like this reflection of the kid I’d always wanted to be. I’d given up on all those things by the time I was fifteen and met you guys. My life had already been planned out for me. I was an Ashby. I had the best of everything when I was growing up. It had always seemed like the perfect childhood.” Cass fell silent for a long time. I wanted to touch him in some way, to remind him I was still there, but I didn’t want to risk him clamming up.

He eventually let out a light chuckle that held no humor in it at all. “Money and power. Power and money. The Ashby way. And it’s all yours for the low, low price of your soul,” Cass mocked as he spoke like he was a salesman doing a commercial. He paused for a few moments and stared at the dense tangle of trees and underbrush in front of us.

“I was all set to buy in and then, out of nowhere, a man with an accent so thick I rarely understood what he was saying and his two sons—one a hard-ass who didn’t take shit from anyone and the other who only saw the good in people—showed me that real family didn’t come with a price tag. I doubt you even remember, but you were the one who told me I could choose any path I wanted. I think you were around ten. We were sitting at that old picnic table in your backyard. Sully was making lunch inside the house. Somehow, we got onto the subject of what I was going to do after I graduated. I couldn’t give you an answer. I guess I didn’t want to because then I’d have to face up to what my future held for me. You started listing off all these things I could do with my life. The stuff you were suggesting was real, too, not just a kid’s fantasy. You told me I had a choice, and you knew I was strong enough to make it. Every time I saw you after that, you’d find some way to remind me of that.” Cass smiled. “I had a choice.”

He turned so he was looking at me. “You, James Joyce Ferguson, were the one who saved me without even trying.”

I was so taken aback that I didn’t know what to say. The man had rendered me completely speechless. I couldn’t even remember what we’d been talking about before he’d blindsided me with his admission. I did remember that day. He’d seemed so lost. I didn’t recall what exactly I’d said to him, but I did remember how scared I’d been for him after that day.

“At that point it was hero worship, but as I got older, I was crushing on you hard,” I blurted.

Holy shit, had I really just said that? I shook my head in disbelief. I could feel the heat building beneath my skin. I opened my mouth to try and come up with some joke to get us past my outburst but the only thing that came out was, “Hard.”

Cass lifted his eyebrows at the word. He had a cat who caught the canary smile on his face.

“Not hard like hard hard. Hard,” I continued. My cheeks and neck felt like they were on fire.

Stop talking, JJ.

“Not just when I was a kid, either. Every time you’d come home, I was⁠—”

Shut the fuck up, JJ.

“I was… hard,” I groaned because I had no idea what I’d been trying to say.

Cass was laughing now. A full-on, real laugh. The kind of laugh that had mesmerized me as a kid.

I gave him a hard shove. He only laughed harder. The sound made me not care what had caused it. If someone could just hand me the key that would let me unlock Cass’s laugh whenever I wanted, I’d never wish for anything else.

He finally straightened and attempted to bring his mirth under control. As much as I wanted to extend the moment, I couldn’t. I was too busy replaying his words in my head. The idea that I’d given Cass anything at such a young age was hard to believe in itself, but to have helped him change the course of his life—I couldn’t even make sense of that.

“JJ,” Cass said softly. When I looked at him, he leaned in and kissed me gently. It was short and sweet but just as soul-stealing as every other kiss we’d shared. “Thank you,” he whispered against my lips. There was no laughter in his voice, no amusement. He was thanking me for real. I didn’t know if it was because of what he’d seen in me as a kid or just being able to relive that memory and finally getting to laugh after what had probably been a really long time.

I reached up to close my fingers against the wrist of the hand he had pressed against my cheek. I managed a nod before I kissed him the same way he’d kissed me.

It wasn’t enough. No amount of kissing this man would ever be enough for me.

After that, neither of us spoke for a long time. It felt strangely comfortable, as though we’d been sitting on that log for a lifetime and neither of us were in any rush to leave it.

I was replaying our conversation in my head when something suddenly clicked in my brain. My stomach fell out as more things began to fall into place. It wasn’t a memory, though. Everything was from the present. Every word, every minuscule action. How had I missed them?

The sour taste of bile flooded my mouth.

There’s an explanation. There’s an explanation.

“JJ!” I heard Cass say sharply.

I was instantly catapulted back to the log we’d been sitting on. Cass was standing, though. He had his hand extended.

“What?” I asked stupidly.

“I asked if you wanted to keep walking or go back home?” he explained. I could already tell he was trying to get a read on me.

“Home,” I responded as lightly as I could. I might have managed to throw in a smile, but I wasn’t sure. I was too consumed with all the raw emotions that were tearing me apart inside.

I was in front of Cass as we walked along a narrow part of the trail, so I used that fact to my advantage.

“Cass.”

“Hmmm?” Cass responded. He still sounded relaxed and happy.

Content, even.

And I was about to blow it all to hell. I had no choice, though. He’d given me no choice.

“Truth,” I reminded him.

When he didn’t respond right away, I stopped and turned around. He was several feet away. If he had been content, that was gone. If he’d been happy, that was gone too. And he sure as shit wasn’t relaxed.

Cass tipped his head in a nod. He was responding to my reminder that he’d agreed to tell the truth to any question I asked.

My body was shaking violently, and I could feel the pain behind my eye building, but for once, I didn’t try to stop it. I wanted it to come. I wanted it to transport me back to five minutes earlier when it had been just me and the real Cass on that log.

The Cass I’d been in love with from the time I’d been old enough to understand what that meant.

“James Joyce,” I said.

Just like that, Cass’s entire body stiffened. Then he dropped his eyes and that was all it took.