Singe (Guardian Protection #1)

“You need to leave,” he stated matter-of-factly.

I couldn’t say I disagreed with him, but there was still a piece of me that ached to follow her.

“What the hell happened back there?” I asked.

He shoved off the wall and started for the door. “Go home, Levitt.”

I reached forward and caught his arm. “You need to talk to me here. I know her… I mean, I knew her. When I was a cop—”

“I know all about the fire.” He glanced down at my hand on his bicep and yanked it from my grasp. “I also know that she does not need to see you right now.”

I took another step toward him. “Fine. But that doesn’t explain why she bolted out into traffic to get away from me. Is…” I cut my gaze over his shoulder and to her door. “Is she okay?”

He continued to stare at me, giving away nothing in his reaction. In a low rumble, he asked, “She look okay to you?”

She had. She’d looked more than okay. Carefree and radiant, even. But all of that had splintered into a million broken shards when I’d shown up.

I’d done that to her. Not on purpose. I had no idea she’d be in that bar. But, right then, I knew she was on the other side of the door. And, if I went after her the way I longed to, that pain in her eyes would have become mine to own.

I’d done enough to that woman without adding this selfishness to the list.

I rubbed the back of my scarred neck and dropped my eyes to the ground. “Tell her I’m sorry.”

He didn’t reply. Nor did he move as I backed into the elevator. When I started digging through my pockets for my security card, he slid in front of me. Respect blazed in his eyes as he waved his card in front of the sensor and then slapped the button for the garage.

Slowly backing out of the elevator, he said, “She’d say she was sorry, too.”

My chin jerked to the side. He hadn’t said it with malice, but it still wounded me all the same. I didn’t deserve any apologies. Especially not from her.

Johnson held my stare until the door slid shut.

Completely numb, I rode the elevator down to the garage.

I didn’t go back to my hotel room. Or the bar.

I did the one thing I hadn’t done in years.

After picking up a bottle of Jack and committing a minor trespassing offense, I stared up at the stars above the empty lot in Park Hill Estate while trying to figure out where it had all gone wrong.





It didn’t feel like I was moving, but somehow, I knew I was falling. The world became a blur as terror faded into acceptance.

I was going to die.

My only hope was that it wouldn’t take long for that sea of flames to end my twenty-two years of life. Every memory I’d made, every breath I’d taken, every dream I’d had for the future—they would all become nothing more than fuel to feed the dancing, red conflagration. And then, when it was ultimately smothered out, my entire existence would be extinguished right along with it.

In those seconds, as I plummeted toward my death, the fear subsided and I became hyperaware of my surroundings. A cool rush of air licked at my skin despite the unbearable heat roaring up at me. And, as though someone had parted it from above, the cloud of smoke broke apart, revealing a clear night sky. I stared up at the stars in rapt awe, wondering if this was my father’s way of letting me know he was there with me. He’d been gone for six weeks. Maybe he’d come back for me. With the thought, a calm washed over me.

Nothing felt real anymore.

There were no more screams for help.

No more pleas to God that would go unanswered.

Yet, as every nerve ending in my body exploded in pain, I heard someone yelling. Masculine war cries pierced through me in a way that left me unable to focus on the overwhelming agony flooding my system. Shock did weird things to a person, because I was very aware that I was on fire, but as my lungs burned for a single breath, my heart yearned to soothe the man’s suffering.

And then I died. Or so I assumed as the world around me fell silent and the bright light faded to absolute darkness. It was utterly beautiful in the sense that it was nothing.

No pain.

No fear.

No heartbreak.

The end.

Until his strong hand landed on mine, snatching me back from the grips of death.

“Hang on!” he barked, dragging me clear of the flames.

I struggled through the unbearable pain to find my way back to consciousness, his voice being my only guide.

“Stay with me,” he ordered as I felt my shirt being frantically tugged over my head.

Those three words were all it took for the terror to engulf me again.

Hope was funny like that. Without it, accepting the inevitable was a simple process. But, when presented with even the thinnest threads to hold on to, my body’s fight response kicked in full force.

I gasped as I sat straight up, my hands flying out to the sides as adrenaline flooded my veins. A choked, “Oh God,” tore from my throat as I flailed and did my best to help him get my shirt off. His hands slapped down on my aching flesh, patting out flames before tearing my pants down my legs.

I struggled for a gasp of air, but panic had paralyzed my lungs.

“Shhhh. Calm down. Paramedics are on the way,” he assured me, kneeling beside my head and brushing the hair away from my face. “It’s over.”

But it wasn’t. And, if the excruciating pain devouring my arms and my chest was any indication, it never would be.

I peered up into his dark-green eyes as he raked them down my naked body.

“Holy shit,” he breathed. “You’re okay.” The lie showed on his grim face.

It was bad. That much was clear.

But I was alive.

“You…you saved me,” I squeaked, tears pouring from my eyes.

His lips thinned, and he shook his head. “You gotta keep breathing.”

The fire roared behind him, lighting him from the back. He looked like an angel. His face was shadowed, but I would never forget a single curve of it. From the hard angles of his jaw to the delicate dark lashes that surrounded his eyes—I committed them all to memory. He was beautiful, and for the briefest of seconds as he stared down at me, soot streaked across his handsome face, I feared I’d made him up.

When I had been hanging from the window, he’d seemed to appear out of nowhere. What if my panic-stricken mind had somehow conjured him? What if he was nothing more than one last hallucination from my subconscious as I sought any possible way to avoid accepting the inevitable?

“Oh God, are you real?” I cried, my body trembling in fear of the truth.

His forehead crinkled. “I’m real,” he swore before sucking in a shaky breath. “I just don’t know if you are, Butterfly.”

A sob caught in my throat. “Please don’t disappear.”

He blew a ragged breath out. “Same goes for you. You stay with me. And I’ll stay with you.”

The sound of sirens screamed in the distance, but for what felt like a million years, his gaze never left mine.

I cried.

He soothed my soul without actually touching me.

I writhed in agony.

He whispered promises that it was almost over.

I prayed for death.

He refused to let go.