Fool Me Once (First Wives #1)

“I’ll be around.”

She attempted a smile. “See. I’m covered.”

“I’ll call the crew.”

She shook her head and turned toward her room. “I need a minute.”

Once she left the room, Danny turned toward him. “How bad is this guy?”

“Nasty,” Reed said.

“They don’t get worse,” Cooper added.

“How soon can you get a system in place?” Reed asked.

Cooper lifted his phone to his ear. “Two hours.”

This Reed wanted to see.




Dressed in a simple pair of blue jeans and a sweater, Lori had her hair pulled back and her sleeves up. Bringing her condo up to speed on security was something she’d considered doing off and on throughout the years she’d been there, but as each one moseyed on through without any crime, she hadn’t bothered. Besides, being in complete control of her own world and space had been a priority. Asking for help, even if it was an alarm system, felt as if she was relinquishing some of that control. Only now it would be unintelligent to pretend she could hold back the likes of Ruslan if the man entered her space.

Cooper brought in a team of four men armed with wires, monitors, sensors, speakers, and cameras.

Danny had left to visit a local friend since there were plenty of men around to keep her safe. Reed shadowed Cooper for a while, asking questions.

As each hole was cut into the ceiling or drilled into a window casing, Lori felt her privacy slipping away.

“What kind of service monitors all this?” she heard Reed ask Cooper.

“It’s a private company.”

“Armed response, I assume.”

Cooper smirked. “Showing up with a baseball bat is useless, don’t you think?”

Lori appreciated the sarcasm, which made light of the absurdity of it all. Much as she’d have liked to slip into her office for a couple of hours and finish some work, that wasn’t possible with the pounding and drilling going on all around her.

“So what branch of the service were you in?” Reed asked Cooper.

“Marines. What about you?”

Reed shook his head. “Didn’t serve.”

Cooper looked him up and down. “I pegged you for the Army.”

“No, no.”

Cooper watched a monitor as one of the technicians aimed a camera in the far corner of the room. He flipped a switch and another camera from the hall came into view.

“Nothing in my bedroom,” Lori told him.

“Main living spaces only. Nothing in the bathrooms or the bedrooms.”

“Good.” She sucked on her water bottle. “Guess there won’t be any wild dining room sex,” she muttered to Reed as he walked by.

He placed a hand on her hip and nuzzled her neck from behind.

“We can make up for it,” he whispered.

She turned into his arms. “How was your week? We always seem to be talking about my world.”

“Mine is boring.”

“I’ll take a little of that right about now.”

“I bet. How was Trina?”

“Frazzled.”

Reed rubbed her shoulders as they chatted. “Her name popped up online when I was reading the news yesterday. Is her estate what’s causing all of this?”

“Ruslan Petrov has no dealings with me outside of Trina. I was as shocked as Trina when we learned she inherited everything.”

“Which made her father-in-law mad.”

“I guess. He’s blowing smoke.”

Reed looked over her shoulder. “Smoke that has gotten the attention of some influential people, apparently. How is it you have these kinds of connections?”

Lori followed his gaze with her head. “Oh, this isn’t me. This is all Sam.”

“The lady from the other day.”

“Yes, my overprotective friend. She knows everyone.”

“Apparently.”

“This will all blow over, I’m sure.”

He wrapped his arms around her, kissed the side of her head. “You’re a strong woman, Lori.”

She leaned into him, happy to have him holding her. Strong or not, it was nice to have his support.




Reed stared up at Lori’s ceiling. She’d finally fallen asleep, her hand under her cheek as it rested on his chest. Her mouth was open slightly, each breath a tiny whisper across his skin.

The crew left her house and Cooper lingered until Danny arrived, with the promise to return at dawn.

Lori argued, but Cooper told her that he didn’t take his orders from her. He apologized for it but made no excuses for his plans to invade her life.

The entire situation struck a raw chord inside of Reed. There was big money, big guns, and serious manpower behind the security team Cooper spoke of. And while Sam might be behind it, how was it she had pull over Lori?

He was dangerously close to coming right out and asking Lori a few questions to get him closer to the truth. If he was just a guy who flittered into her life on accident, he would have asked already.

But that wasn’t the case.

He had to be careful. Cooper had questioned him with more than just a look while he was following the man around. He’d pegged Reed’s profession . . . well, his previous one, by a hair. He wasn’t a military guy, but he had gone through the police academy and worked as a cop for over a decade.

Reed lifted his arm that wasn’t holding Lori and rubbed the scar on the left side of his jaw. One nasty case and the battle scars to go with it, and he’d left the force. Falling into the world of private investigation was easy. He knew the law and how to avoid breaking it all while doing his job. He had a small pension from the force and didn’t take on many cases unless they paid well. In short, he was doing okay.

He hated seeing shitty things happen to good people. Up until he spent any time with Lori, he was under the impression that all lawyers were assholes. In his experience, the stereotype was true.

Since his client was once a lawyer, he assumed this case was a product of two shitheads crapping on each other, except that Lori hadn’t been his target when all of this started. And his opinion of the profession had vastly changed in just a few short weeks.

Lori muttered something in her sleep, snuggled closer, and something that felt suspiciously like a conscience stirred in his chest.





Chapter Twenty




“I need more information from you,” Reed told his client the following Monday.

“What kind of information?”

“You want to discredit Wentworth.”

“If you say it a little louder, the whole world will hear you.”

Reed put his phone to his other ear and stared at his wall while he spoke. “One politician slinging mud at another isn’t news. It’s expected. Besides, my line is secure.”

“Yes, Reed. I’ve told you this.”

“And you’re looking at his ex-wife to find something.”

“Most ex-wives are pissed enough to let something out.”

Except Shannon wasn’t pissed . . . she was hurt. “If she’s ticked, she’s not showing it.”