Bodyguard SEAL (SEALs of Coronado Book 8), Paige Tyler [best classic books txt] 📗

the other guys should hang around until the valet brought his vehicle, but Noah shook his head.

“We’re good,” he said. “If someone was planning to make a move against Peyton, it would have been during the signing when there were people everywhere.”

After hugs all around, Sam and the other guys left with Laurissa and Tabitha.

“Did you have fun?” Noah asked, moving them past the people hanging around outside the hotel, including two guys arguing about their fantasy football stats.

“I did,” Peyton said, liking the feel of Noah’s hand on her lower back. It was warm and comforting. “I’ve loved doing book signings since the first one I went to years ago.”

While they waited for the valet to bring Noah’s SUV around, they talked about other book signings she’d done until they got interrupted by shouting from halfway down the sidewalk. It was those two guys and their fantasy football argument, which seemed to be getting heated.

“Wonder what their problem is?” she said.

“I don’t know, but they both sound like they’re pissed and drunk as hell,” Noah muttered. “Those kinds of things usually never end well.”

“You sound like you speak from experience.”

He shrugged. “You hang out in enough bars and you see these kinds of fights all the time. If someone doesn’t get between them, they’ll be trying to kill each other in a minute.”

No sooner were the words out of his mouth than fists started flying. Peyton gasped. Crap, she might write about people fighting in her books, but she’d never seen one in real life. Beside her, Noah cursed under his breath.

He caught the eye of the guy manning the valet stand. “You might want to call hotel security. This is going to get out of hand quickly.”

Peyton cringed as the one man shoved the other to the ground, then jumped on top of him and started punching him in the face.

“Um, I’m not sure we can wait for security,” she said. “Maybe you should go over there and do something before they get to the part where they actually kill each other.”

Noah snorted. “And leave you here by yourself? I don’t think so.”

“The valet attendant is right here. I’ll be fine.” She made a face as she looked around him at the two men brawling. “Those guys might not be. One of them is already bleeding.”

Noah scowled and glanced over his shoulder, then cursed again. “Stay right here.”

Peyton nodded, but Noah was already striding toward the men fighting.

Noah reached down and jerked the bigger man off the top of the slightly smaller one, shoving him back from the fight. Then he bent down and helped the other guy off the ground. Peyton hoped that would be the end of it, but both guys went right back at each other, forcing Noah to get between them.

Where the heck is hotel security?

She glanced toward the hotel entrance, not understanding why there wasn’t anyone on the way.

She was so focused on the door she didn’t notice when a van squealed into the circular driveway and slammed on its brakes a few feet away. She jerked her head around in time to see a man in jeans, a dark sweatshirt, and a ski mask jump out the side door of the vehicle.

Peyton instinctively backed away, her heart suddenly pounding. She didn’t know how she knew the guy was coming for her, but she did.

She screamed Noah’s name at the same time she turned to run toward him, but Ski Mask grabbed her around the waist, picking her up off her feet and dragging her toward the van. She punched at the man’s arm at the same time she tried to elbow him in the ribs. That always worked in her books, but this guy didn’t even budge.

“Noah!”

He was already sprinting toward her, but it was too late. Ski Mask had already dragged her into van. The man fell backward with her into the vehicle, not bothering to even close the door as he held her tight and yelled at the driver to go. She screamed and struggled with all her might, terrified of what these men might do to her once they had her away from Noah.

The van rocked as it started to speed away from the hotel, but before she could do more than take another gulp of air to scream again, there was a blur of movement, then Noah was in the vehicle with her and the man still clasping her around the waist. She had no idea how he’d caught up to the speeding van—or what he was going to do now that he was in it—and she really didn’t care. He was here. Nothing else mattered.

Then Noah was leaning over her. One hand came up to gently move her head to the side as his other hand came down in a fist to whistle by her face and smash into Ski Mask’s jaw. The guy’s head bounced off the floor of the van, his arm relaxing around her waist.

Noah lunged forward and punched the driver in the back of the head, then tossed Ski Mask out the side door. Without a word, Noah wrapped his arms around her and jumped out of the still moving vehicle.

Peyton thought she might have screamed—she wasn’t sure. All she knew was that she was prepared for a lot of pain the moment they hit the ground. The van hadn’t been moving too fast as it spun through the parking lot and out onto the road, but it sure as heck wasn’t standing still, either.

When the impact with the ground came, it didn’t hurt at all. That was only because Noah had wrapped himself around her so that he hit the pavement instead of her. She stayed safely tucked in his protective embrace until they came to a tumbling stop. She was still lying on his chest, looking around in confusion as he sat up with her.

“Are you okay?” he asked urgently. “You aren’t injured?”

She was shaken but moved her arms and legs,