The Bodyguard (20)

WHEN HE MADE it to the kitchen minutes later, still panting, still aglow with appreciation, he looked, shall we say, like he’d just learned a vital life lesson.

I secured an ice pack to his shoulder with tied-together dish towels, refusing to be flustered, now, in a slower moment, by the proximity of his body to mine.

“Your shoulder’s really going to hurt for a few days,” I said.

“Worth it,” he said.

“Take some ibuprofen before bed.”

“Okay, doc.”

“And next time I tell you I’m good at something,” I said, “don’t make me hurt you to prove it.”

“Roger that.”

I gathered up my stuff and then turned to say goodbye, clutching my folder of paperwork to my chest like I had before—but feeling like a whole new version of the girl who’d walked in here.

Nothing like flipping a man on his back to bolster your self-esteem.

Recommend.

“So it looks like we start in earnest tomorrow,” I said, checking the tentative schedule Glenn had given me. “You want to drive out to your parents’ place in the morning, right?”

Jack nodded.

“We’ve got a team assessing the route right now,” I said. “This is much more rushed than our normal prep time, but we’re just going to fake it till we make it.”

Jack was looking down. He didn’t answer.

“We can bring a remote team with us tomorrow, and they can assess the ranch property while we’re out there—get some cameras installed, evaluate the layout.” That felt like a good plan.

But then Jack said, “Actually, that can’t happen.”

I shook my head. “What can’t happen?”

“We can’t take a security team out to my parents’ place.”

“Why not?” I asked.

He took a deep breath. “Because my parents can’t know anything about this.”

“Anything about what?”

He gestured around, like All of it. “Threats, stalkers, personal security.”

“How is that supposed to work?”

He shook his head. “My mom’s sick, you know? She’s sick. And if she knows about this, she’ll worry. Even though there’s really nothing to worry about. I’ve had stalkers for years—I’m totally immune to all that by now. But I’ve never told her about anything scary—and I’m sure as hell not starting the week she has surgery for cancer.”

“But…” I said. Then I wasn’t sure what to say.

“She’s a worrier,” Jack said. “Like, a world-champion worrier. And she’s facing some test results that are … not great. And ever since my brother died…” Jack stared at his hands like he didn’t know how to finish that sentence. “For me, I admit—a bodyguard is a good thing. I get it. But for my mom? Not good. I was reading up on treatments online, and stress can really impact people’s outcomes. I can’t make things harder than they already are on her. The only way to do this is to make sure my parents never know who you are.”

“But … how?”

“Your website says ‘Outside-the-box solutions for every scenario.’” He turned his phone toward me to show me the website for proof.

“That’s what you’ve been doing on your phone?” I demanded.

Jack shrugged. “It’s one of the things I’ve been doing on my phone.”

I gave him a look. “The web designer wrote that.”

“Your boss—what’s his name? Frank Johnson?”

“Not even close. Glenn Schultz.”

“He says much of the surveillance can be done remotely.”

Did Glenn already know about this and not tell me?

Jack went on. “He says you can stay close to me and a second group can monitor from afar.”

“But if you’re toting an agent along everywhere you go, won’t that kind of tip your family off?”

“Not at all.”

I put my hands on my hips. “Why not?”

“First,” Jack said, “my parents are sweet and impossibly gullible. And my big brother barely speaks to me. Second, you don’t look anything like a bodyguard.” He tilted his head a little and gave me his most heart-melting smile. “And last but not least?” he said. “We’re going to tell them you’re my girlfriend.”



* * *



BACK AT THE office, Glenn was still in the conference room, and half the team was there with him. It was all-hands-on-deck to get this Jack Stapleton project going.

I didn’t care.

“Nope,” I said to Glenn, charging right up to the head of the conference table. “That’s a hundred percent nope.”

Glenn didn’t even look up. “Are we talking about the ‘girlfriend’ thing?”

“Is there anything else to talk about?”

“It’s not a dealbreaker. We’ve done weirder things for clients.”

“You’ve done weirder things for clients,” I said.

“You’ve seen the man. Would it really be so awful?”

“I can’t believe you knew, and you didn’t tell me.”