Above Protection by C.J. Pinard

He’s bearded, angry, highly trained, and has a job to do. She’s the damsel in distress who’s smarter than she looks, and doesn’t want anyone’s help. Could it be they both need something neither will admit to? Fate fueled by the laws of attraction may just decide for them.

DUKE: I didn’t ask for this. I was just doing my job, and they have the nerve to put me on a Witness Protection detail?
This is crap. I’ll do my assignment, then go back to my job and what I love – kicking ass and taking names. I hadn’t spent 6 years in the Marine Corps to be put on babysitting duty once I’d joined the FBI. The witness they assigned me to, Rayanne, is an annoying, brainless blonde with a sassy mouth and a body that belonged on a website you had to pay to access. Not that I noticed or anything.

RAYANNE: I can look after myself. I don’t need anyone’s help, and the government is being ridiculous for putting me in the Witness Protection Program. I’ll testify against my former bosses and then go back to my life as a single girl in the big city. I love my career as a paralegal, and once this Neanderthal they’d assigned to babysit me was out of my life, I’ll go back to it. I just wish he wasn’t so easy on the eyes. The beard, hard body, and that voice. Why couldn’t they have sent me someone ugly – and nice? Because Duke is neither of those things.