Packing cool reserve around her wistful thoughts, she watched her colleagues smiling, laughing, discussing the success of the Elite System, the snowstorm outside, the cafeteria meatloaf, the trials of potty training two-year-olds. It was all so…normal.

Oh, God, what I would give to know normal . Instead, she was planning her next trip into obscurity, before her past caught up to her.

*

Across the room, Logan’s head snapped up. He combed the crowd, eyes narrowed, searching for the cause of his distraction.

Despite an entourage of employees, he’d felt a chill. Scanning a moment, his eyes landed on Allison’s gorgeous form folded in shadows near the bar.

He couldn’t explain it, her sudden detachment, but he felt as if he’d stepped into a walk-in freezer. It bothered him, like something that was rightfully his had been taken away.

A whiny tone pierced his intrigue. “Don’t you think we should broaden my territory to the upper Midwest?” Kurt Keegan inserted himself into the conversation, taking over the surrounding chatter.

Logan pulled himself into the moment. “Lance Briggs has Michigan and Wisconsin covered.” He exhaled. “Didn’t we have this discussion four weeks ago?”

A flush crept along Keegan’s starched collar. “Sure, but you know, the orders are really pouring in, and I thought—”

“I gave you my answer.” Logan stood firm. “A few drinks at a casual company function won’t change my mind. Keep up with your own territory. Tonight, enjoy the party.”

That’s one thing he didn’t like about company functions. Offer a relaxed setting with food and booze, and some people believed the line between friend and boss blurred.

His attention drifted back to Allison. Then again, sometimes those lines do blur .

A brusque nod ended his conversation with Keegan. He moved across the room. Allison stood tucked between the wall and the bar wearing a pensive frown, her eyes downcast. She looked sad, alone. Lost. He lengthened his strides.

En route, he watched her take a sip of her martini and immediately shove it away, making a face like she’d bit into a lemon. Recently, he’d noticed something was different about her. An added glow in her cheeks. Maybe the change in weather, or—

“What the hell have you done?” Nostrils flaring, Rick stood in his path like a bull stamping the ground, prepared to charge.

“I’ve been making the rounds. You know, being social. That thing you hate. Now I’m getting a refill.” Logan gestured to Rick’s empty glass. “Want one?”

“I want you to quit obsessing over Allison.”

“Whose obsession, exactly?”

Rick ignored the retort. “What were you thinking, walking into a packed room with her like she’s your damn date?”

Logan set his chin at a hard angle. “Maybe she is.”

A brooding light flickered in Rick’s eyes. “You wanted proof. I have it.”

Warning prickled over Logan’s scalp. “Concerning…”

“Who else?” Rick scoffed.

Logan braced himself. “What about her?”

“Not here.” Rick shook his head, his expression almost gloating. Like a gambler with an ace up his sleeve. “Get her to leave. Then we’ll talk.”

“Can’t do that. She came with me.”

Rick mumbled something about the biggest idiot on the planet. If Rick thought he could he could force Logan’s hand, he had another thing coming.

“Can’t you act like normal people, and leave work at the office?”

Rick shot back, “Hey, I’m just following your lead.”

Zing . That bullet grazed its mark. Lately, Logan hadn’t been true to his own vow to separate work from pleasure. The thing that had ended his military career. But when it came to verbal warfare, he had his own arsenal and history with his brother-in-arms. “What’s the matter, Rick? Bitter everyone else is having fun and getting laid except you?”

“If your idea of fun is getting screwed over , I’m all for Camp Celibacy.”

“How morally superior.”

Hostility sizzled in the air. “You know, ‘shallow’ doesn’t wear well on you—like it used to.”

“You win. ‘Power trip’ looks better than ever on you.”

“I’d rather look good in that than ‘horny stupidity’ any day.”

“I want her. I admit it. Happy?”

“Not until that woman is history.”

Logan dug into the trenches. “Allison is the reason we’re straddling the billion-dollar mark. I went against your judgment and hired her. She translated our system into six languages. We have the global advantage over every other system. She’s to thank.”

“And thanks to her it’s like you’re one step away from leaping out of a plane without a parachute.”

“Jealous?”

Rick revealed a dimly amused grin. “A little.”

“Let it go.”

“Can’t.”

“Then for God’s sake, shut up.”

“Can’t do that either. I have as much at stake in this company as you. I’m the dude waving the glow wands on the runway, as you’re trying to land in the dark.”

No getting around that analogy. “Thanks for the pep talk, Captain Invincible.”

“Now you’re just flattering me.” Rick’s expression fluctuated between amused, frustrated and pitying. Typical married guy, four kids, retired from the military—and worth hearing out, as he harped on his usual cautionary tale. They used to goad each other like this all the time. Their friendly hostility reminded him of old times. He had to admit, if Rick’s attack wasn’t founded on truth he wouldn’t be fighting so hard.

Rick said low, “She’s not Stephanie.”

Logan’s fists clenched. “You think I need someone to tell me that?”

Despite the antagonistic words, images flashed in his mind of his sister Stephanie’s outcome. She’d been horrifically brutalized. Logan had taken time off base, his first year in the military, to answer his sister’s frantic call for help. It wasn’t Stephanie, whose asshole quarterback high school boyfriend beat her up. It was Sarah, their youngest sister, who’d called him sobbing, begging for his help. Steph had been too damn proud to ask for help or speak out against the abusive bastard who kept her trapped.

“My sister has nothing to do with this,” Logan said, his voice allowing no secondary questions.