Seducing Lauren(36)

“It’s okay,” I assure them all. “I’m fine. I don’t need to go public to be happy. I’m proud of them, and now my friends know, and that’s all that matters.”

“I’m so excited for you!” Jill exclaims happily. “Can I have sex with the actor who plays Stephan in the movie?”

“Jesus, Jill,” Zack growls.

“What?” She blinks at us innocently.

“Uh, I’ll see what I can do.” I laugh and shake my head at her. She’s nice.

And she’s my friend.

“Did you have fun?” Ty asks, and kisses my hand as he drives us back to my place.

“I did.” I pull my hand from his and push my fingers through his soft hair. “They’re really cool and they make me laugh.”

“And they love your books, so that must be good for the ego,” he adds dryly.

“Tonight was good for my ego. It was fun to hear them talk about the books. About what they like about them, and when Cara read from it, I thought I was dreaming.”

“Don’t you ever interact with readers?” Ty frowns.

“I do online,” I reply thoughtfully. “And it’s fun. But this was the first time face-to-face. It was fun.”

“I’m glad.” He squeezes my thigh affectionately as we pull into my driveway.

“Shit, is that my alarm going off?” I ask in panic as he comes to a stop.

Headlights fill Ty’s car from behind us.

“Stay in the car.” His voice is firm as he jumps out of the car as a second car joins the first behind us.

Thank God, it’s the cops.

But I’ll be damned if I’ll stay in the car and sit idly by while my house alarm is going off.

I jump from the car and stomp over to the guys.

“I told you to stay in the car.” Ty’s voice is exasperated.

I just shake my head. “No way. I want to know what’s going on.”

“Your alarm went off about ten minutes ago,” Dan Teller informs me. He’s one of the newest cops on the force in our small town. “Will you please key in your code and we’ll look around?”

“Sure.”

“I don’t want you going anywhere near that house until we know it’s safe.”

“I have you and three cops with me, Ty.” I gesture to Dan, and Kyle and Adam, who pulled in behind Dan. “I’m safe.”

As Ty swears under his breath about stubborn women, I lead the guys up to the front door and key in my pass code, silencing the alarm.

“The alarm company said it was a breach in the windows in the back of the house.” Kyle pulls a flashlight from his belt and gestures to the other two. “Each of you circle the house and I’ll go through the back.”

“I’m coming too,” I begin, but Ty grips my upper arm in his hand and pulls me against him.

“No.”

I frown up at him but he just raises a brow, daring me to defy him.

Talk about stubborn.

The officers are gone for what feels like forever and I’m just about to tell Ty where he can shove it and go find them when they come through the house to the foyer where Ty and I are waiting.

“There’s no one here, but we need to show you something.” Adam’s face is grim as he gestures for us to follow him to the pool house.

“Motherfucker,” Ty growls when we reach the pool. All of the windows in the pool house have been broken. Large rocks from my garden litter the cement floor, along with shattered glass.

“Don’t walk in here,” Kyle warns me as I take in the destruction around me. The bottom of my pool is full of glass as well.

“My pool,” I whisper.

Ty pulls me against him and hugs me tight.

“Who would do this?” I ask.

“That’s what we were just about to ask you,” Dan replies with a soft smile. “Any ideas?”

“I know who did this,” Ty replies. “Her ex-husband.”

“How do you know?” Kyle asks.

“No one else would do something like this.” I pull out of Ty’s embrace, keeping his hand firmly in my own, grateful that he’s here with me. “It’s definitely Jack. He knows how much I love this pool.”

“He must have been served with the protection order today,” Ty agrees grimly.

“Can you prove it?” Adam asks.

“That’s your job,” Ty responds coldly.

I shiver as I glance around the room again. This took work. These windows are strong, and the destruction is extensive.

“How could he have done all of this in five minutes?” I ask.

“He couldn’t have,” Kyle replies, his head tilted in thought. “There had to be at least two people doing this.”