Hunting Season: Werewolf Bodyguard Romance (Guarded by the Shifter Book 1) by Kate Rudolph (new reading TXT) 📗

answering service. She hung up before leaving a message. If he wanted to talk he would have picked up.

Then she tried AR. If her father couldn't be reached, her oldest brother was almost as good. He was their father's right-hand man and heir. He did the family dirty work.

But AR didn't answer either.

Stasia cursed and set the phone back down. She hated the games her family played. No doubt her father and AR were busy. They would be able to give her a dozen convenient and logical reasons why they couldn't answer her calls.

But in reality, they weren't answering because they thought if they ignored her for long enough she would give up and accept that Owen was going to be her shadow until they decided she was safe.

Safe.

She didn't think she could ever truly be safe as long as she was the daughter of Armand Selby. And short of time travel, there wasn't a way to untie that knot.

Owen knocked on the door again, an unwelcome reminder of all of the control that her father tried to wield over her.

She ignored him and instead consulted the calendar app on her phone to see what she had to do today. She'd been trying to keep herself busy in the couple weeks since she had left her previous job and she was happy to see that she had a volunteer shift coming up.

She eyed the window in her sitting room that looked out over Gramercy Park. If her apartment was just a few stories lower, she would have been happy to sneak out and lose the guard dog. But she had stopped playing games with security details when she was a teenager. She was a thirty-four-year-old adult woman now.

If she didn't want to be followed, she would just have to lose him the old-fashioned way.

Chapter Five

Owen pressed his fingers against the door. Solid. Mahogany? Maybe. Definitely fancy and hard. Nothing he could bust down. Not that he would. That would give exactly the opposite impression that he wanted to give to Stasia.

He could barely hear her walking around inside the condo. The sound of her footsteps was mostly drowned out by his own beating heart, but at least he knew she was safe and sound where she was supposed to be. He'd have to figure out another way inside.

It wasn't like he was going to hold her prisoner. Though his mind did briefly flash on a pair of fuzzy handcuffs he'd once been chained to a bed with. Would she be into that?

Definitely not something he would ask. He wasn't that stupid.

If he couldn't get inside the condo and he couldn't get her to agree to protection, his presence was useless. But Owen didn't panic. Sometimes clients got cold feet when their guards showed up. It made the whole thing more real. He'd probably be freaked out too.

Though he doubted there were many baddies out there who could take down a freaking werewolf.

The princess wasn't who he’d expected. He wasn't easy to stare down and ignore, and she'd done it like it was nothing. Definitely not some precious flower.

He wanted to test her boundaries. Wanted to see if he could make that sour face of hers crack a smile. And he wanted to taste her lips more than he wanted his next breath. The attraction wasn't fading, even as the minutes passed and she kept ignoring him.

His wolf didn't like that.

He and his wolf needed to have a talk. He couldn't deal with a split personality in the middle of a job.

He pulled out his phone and called Gibson. It was embarrassing to have the door slammed in his face, but he still needed to report it to his boss.

Gibson answered on the first ring. "You all set?" Owen could hear road noise in the background of the call and assumed the boss was coming back to the city.

"Negative. Client wouldn't let me in." He traced his finger up and down a patch of the door as if that would magically open it.

The major didn't like that. "What?"

Owen let out a frustrated breath. "Seems like a family squabble. I'm working on it."

"Do you need me to call the brother?"

Owen considered it, but dismissed it. "Give me a bit more time. I'll let you know." He didn't want to call in reinforcements just yet. Maybe he could get the princess to deal with him.

"Affirmative." Gibson hung up without bothering with any pleasantries. He had more jobs to manage and wouldn't bother Owen until the next report.

He was about to put his phone in his pocket when it vibrated with an incoming call. "This is Myers."

"Peters with Selby Security." He didn't know the man, but the company was obvious.

"You're on the surveillance team?" What was wrong? Hostile in the area? Had they detained the attempted kidnappers? Owen forced himself not to hound the man for answers; clearly he was calling for a reason.

"Yes. Confirming Ms. Selby's exit."

"It's doctor." The correction came automatically and then his brain caught up. "Wait. What? What exit?"

"We have eyes on her out the back exit. Where are you?" asked Peters.

Not good. Not good. Not good.

It was a rookie move to let the client slip out the back like a teenager breaking curfew, and he hoped it didn't get her killed. "Fuck. Hold. I'm coming."

"Shall we detain?" Peters was all professionalism, which was good because Owen was ready to beat himself bloody for his stupidity.

"No. Keep eyes on her." He didn't want her hating him or the security detail even more. There was time to fix this.

If he hurried.

He sprinted down the stairs and towards the back of the building. Of course, Stasia was already gone. She had a few minutes on him, but that wouldn't be a problem. No doubt Mr. Peters had eyes on her, but Owen wanted to find her himself.

His wolfish instincts hummed.

Going out the back was clever, if juvenile. And he hadn't expected it. Dr. Nichols kept messing with his expectations and he'd