Read Online Saved by Sin [Paladin Protection Agency 1] (Siren Publishing Classic) by Susan Hayes - Free Book Online Page B

was doing this on purpose. His cock didn’t care if it was intentional or not, it just liked what she was doing, a lot.
    “So, you were a marine? For how long?”
    Huh? It took him a moment to drag his brain out of the gutter it had dived into. Visions of Michelle, spread out on the table and drizzled in maple syrup, had suddenly sprung up in his mind. “I was in for five years. Geoff Remington recruited me before I’d even finished my stint, helped me adjust back to civilian life. Well, a semi-civilian life. I don’t exactly have a nine-to-five type job.”
    “No, I guessed that much.” She tipped her head up and stared at him intently, and he wondered what she was thinking. “Do you like it? What you do now?”
    “I did.” He paused and then decided to come clean with her. She deserved to know the truth about the guy she was trusting to protect her. “I’m not so sure anymore. Those scars you were wondering about? I got them on a protection detail that went wrong. Way wrong. The client was killed, along with some of the people with him. I was lucky and was thrown free of the car as it exploded. Or I jumped. I don’t remember, and no one is sure exactly what the hell happened.”
    “Someone you were protecting, they died ?” He heard the fear in her voice, and he dropped his eyes to the plate of food in front of him. How could he have expected her to react any differently? He had let someone in his care die.
    He caught a flicker of movement and looked up as she rose and started to come around the table. Then she stumbled, her arms wind-milling for balance, and he reached out to catch her by the waist as she tumbled into his lap.
    “Stupid bruises,” she muttered, and then she was kissing him, her arms fastening tight around his neck. “I’m so sorry, Sinjin. That must have been hard for you.”
    He just hugged her close, too grateful and amazed she hadn’t rejected him to say anything at first. When he did speak, he could hear the guilt in his voice and hoped she wouldn’t notice. “I should have made him follow protocols, but he didn’t want to listen to me. I let him get himself killed.”
    “No, you didn’t,” she argued. Her soft curves pressed into him, her voice in his ear. “If you did your job as best you could and he ignored your advice, then he got himself killed. I’m currently an expert on survivor’s guilt. So trust me when I tell you, this wasn’t your fault.”
    “It’s not the same thing.”
    “Bullshit.” The vehemence in her tone surprised him and he leaned back to stare at her.
    “It’s not the same, Michelle. Your ex offed himself because he wanted to hurt you, and apparently he thought he could keep you for himself if he was dead. I don’t get the reasoning, but since he’s still around, I’d say he knew something we don’t. That wasn’t your fault. But, baby, I was the security expert. I was the one who knew the risks and let him do it anyway.”
    “Does your boss think that? Does your company?”
    “No. Their investigation determined the client disregarded all advice and determined his own course of action after being informed of the risks.”
    “So, they don’t hold you responsible? And I don’t think you did anything wrong, so…” She laid her cheek next to his and hugged him. “The only person who thinks you’re guilty is you. I’d say you need to check your facts and maybe, just maybe consider the possibility that you’re wrong this time.”
    A glimmer of light shone from a corner of his mind that had been full of darkness and guilt since he’d woken up in that hospital bed. “You think you’re pretty smart, don’t you?”
    “Uh-huh.” She moved her head back to kiss him, a grin on her lips. “I do.”
     
    * * * *
     
    It all seemed so simple when she had said it to Sinjin. Like him, she’d been fighting her feelings of guilt. She had always known Robert had made his own choices, but she hadn’t truly accepted what that meant. Michelle