Page 7 of Challenging Luke

She wasn't native to Washington. When she had chosen to attend the University of Washington, she hadn't known she would stay in the state forever. But meeting Ash had changed things. She had found a forever friend whom she couldn't live without.

"Mill Creek."

She nearly fell out of her seat when he answered; a town she not only knew but one that was barely more than twenty miles from where she lived.

"Are you pulling my leg? How long has this plan been in the works?" Her suspicion was at an all-time high. What were the odds? Had he known about her for a while? Was their meeting last night really a coincidence?

"To answer all the questions I'm sure you have right now, no, I'm not pulling your leg. The plan has been in place for over a year, but we only purchased the office three months ago. I knew nothing about you at the time. In fact, I only learned your name this morning when Caden filled us in on the information he learned. The contract we received was strictly for Alexander Fletcher. We had no idea who he was meeting until we got to Rome or that he even had a meeting. We were hired when he resurfaced to see what his motivations were, so we came here. Surveillance only. When we found out he was here to meet someone, Caden was tasked with finding out who. I didn't get that information until this morning."

She watched his face to gauge the validity of his statement, and what she found was sincere. She believed him when he said he hadn't known who she was when they met last night.

"So, where do we go from here?" she asked.

Her life was still complicated; she had a career that required her focus and she had no idea if Alexander would heed her warning to back off.

"We enjoy lunch and then head our separate ways back to Washington. And I keep an eye on Alexander for you. Just to make sure he doesn't give you any trouble."

Monica tried to hide her disappointment to his response. She didn't have time for more than what he was offering. But it was insane that she didn't want her one-night stand to end. She had lied to herself before. She had known it was more when it was hard to leave him sleeping.

"So that's it? One date and then I'm nothing more than a job to you?"

"Oh no, that's not all." He smirked. "Then we have that second date. And another after that. And another after that, until you either kick me to the curb or realize we have something amazing together. The choice is completely up to you."

She didn't hide her smile this time. She let it spread across her entire face.

"And if I wanted to kick you to the curb the moment I stepped off the plane in Seattle? I have other friends who can watch over me."

She would never call them, but Luke didn't need to know that. If he looked into her as much as his team said they did, then he knew she could easily have another team assigned to her in a heartbeat. Wes would probably even do it without much of an argument.

Okay, maybe not. Wes loved to argue.

"I would try to persuade you to give me that second date, but either way, I’ll be in charge of protecting you. I'm not leaving that to someone else."

Butterflies took flight in her stomach at his declaration. Now she understood why Ash and Trista fell so hard. There was something to be said about a man who used that deep voice to tell her exactly how things would be.

Monica leaned back in her chair and crossed her arms over her chest.

"I think you just earned yourself that second date after all."

His sexy smile told her just how screwed she was. She didn't have time for the complication a relationship would bring, but hell would freeze over before she let a man like Luke just walk out of her life without first seeing how things could go.

CHAPTER SIX

Being able to charter a private jet had its perks. One of them was that it gave his team the privacy to speak freely without the worry that they would be interrupted or overheard.

“What are the odds that Alexander will slither back to the hole he crawled out of?” Caden shuffled the papers on the small desk between the seats.

“Not likely.” He thought back to what Monica told them about the meeting yesterday. “I doubt Alexander would come out from hiding after all this time if he didn’t have a plan in place. He had to know Monica wouldn’t roll over that easy.”

“You would know that better than anyone, wouldn’t you?” Ryker wiggled his eyebrows at him.

Luke threw his pen at his friend, who only laughed at his antics.

“We aren’t talking about that.”

“So we aren’t talking about the fact that Monica lives close enough to our new office that the chances of running into her when we land are pretty high?” Austin attempted to clarify but Luke saw right through it.

“That’s exactly what we aren’t talking about.” He shook his head.