Griffin’s arms were around her before he thought better of it. “Careful.”
She went completely still. “Griffin.”
Just the sound of his name from her lips made him hard. They stood like statues for a long moment, gazing into each other’s eyes; the only noises around them were her fractured breathing and Griffin’s pulse hammering in his ears. Adam suddenly rounded the corner, shattering the moment. Marin jerked out of Griffin’s arms.
“Um, yeah. I’ll just make myself scarce.” Adam disappeared back down the stairs.
Marin pivoted on her heel and marched to her office. Since Adam had abdicated his surveillance—and it was a damn surveillance—Griffin had no choice but to follow her.
“Damn it, Diego, where are you?” she demanded as she slammed down the landline phone in her office.
Griffin leaned a hip against her desk. “Problem?”
The look she shot him shriveled his balls.
“You know, I do have a problem. Lots of them. And they all seemed to have begun around the time you showed up.” She jabbed a finger into his chest. “As I see it, Not-So-Special-Agent Keller, the way to solve my problems is for you to get the hell out of my office. And my life.”
He stared down at the finger still impaling his chest, because he couldn’t look at her and say what chivalry demanded he say. “Look, Marin, I need to apolo—”
“Don’t. You. Dare.” She punctuated each word with a fingernail to his pectorals. “Man up. You were into me the other night. Don’t lie about that. And don’t give me some lame excuse for why you suddenly had performance issues.” Her furious gaze fell to his crotch.
Performance issues?Griffin shot off the desk.
“Hold on a minute, Marin. I don’t have any ‘performance issues.’ Never have. Never will.”
She crossed her arms over her chest. “So, you’re just a tease then? Good to know. On behalf of women everywhere, maybe you should get some help with that issue.”
The roaring in Griffin’s ears did nothing to drown out the loud guffaw from outside the office. He snapped his head around just in time to see Adam doubled over in laughter. Griffin slammed the door shut.
“Listen up, because I’m only going to say this once,” Griffin growled.
But Marin wasn’t listening. Instead, she was standing over her backpack holding a package wrapped in brown paper. The same one Griffin had shoved inside the bag two days before.
Marin’s voice was quiet. “Seth gave me this the other night. I was so upset about Arnold, and later, Seth, that I forgot about it.” Slowly, she turned the package over in her hands inspecting it for clues. “It’s not even marked. I wonder how he knew it was for me?”
Griffin suddenly went on alert. “Were you expecting one?”
“Not that I recall.”
Something about this package gave him the willies. “Let me open it,” Griffin commanded.
The look she shot him said she was going to argue, but she silently gave in, tossing the package on the desk. “Suit yourself.”
Griffin grabbed a pair of scissors and slit the brown paper, peeling it back to reveal a generic white shirt box. He tore off the paper and set it aside before carefully opening the box. Marin gasped at the sight of her bloodied chef’s jacket. Griffin lunged for her just as her eyes rolled back in her head and her knees gave out.
“Adam!” he yelled.
* * *
“Drink this,” Aunt Harriett urged.
Marin shivered. She already missed the feel of being cocooned by Griffin’s warm body. When she’d come to in his arms, she’d felt safe and protected—just like in her dream. His lips had been pressed against her forehead, whispering at her to wake up. Unfortunately, waking up meant that he deposited her on the sofa in the Yellow Oval Room with the eyes of seven people trained on her like she was a high school science experiment.
“I’m fine.” Marin instantly regretted her peevish tone. “But thank you, Aunt Harriett,” she added.
Leaning in on Marin’s other side, Terrie tried to wrap a blanket over Marin’s shoulders.
“You’re shaking,” the housekeeper said, pointing out the obvious.