The Bodyguard (39)

Plus we were at threat level yellow.

And we were in the middle of nowhere.

In a house surrounded by five hundred acres of pastures. So there wasn’t even that much to do. Besides possibly track the positioning of the cattle.

I mean, it might as well be threat level white.

A paid vacation, everyone said. But there was a reason I never took vacations. What, exactly, was I supposed to do with myself all day?

I’d be technically working. I just wouldn’t have … any duties.

But before I could panic, there was a rap on the door as loud as a shotgun.

We both jumped.

Through the door, we heard Hank. “Jack, I need to talk to you.”

It wasn’t until all of Jack’s tension snapped back into place that I realized how much joking around about our sleeping arrangements had relaxed him.

Even his posture shifted. He straightened up and left the room.

Should I follow him?

I hadn’t been invited.

In a normal job, whenever I was on shift, I always kept the principal in my sights. But this was anything but a normal job.

Still uncertain, I made my way back to the kitchen, but I stopped when I neared the back door. Jack and Hank were just past it, on the screen porch. I couldn’t see them, but I could hear their voices through the open kitchen window.

And they were talking about me.

“You actually did it,” Hank said. “You actually showed up here with that girl in tow.”

“You seemed fine with it at the hospital.”

“Yeah. I seemed fine with a lot of things at the hospital.”

“What am I supposed to do? Mom invited her.”

“Only because she thought you wouldn’t come without her.”

“Mom was right. I wouldn’t come without her.”

“You’re making things harder on Mom. And you don’t even care.”

“You’re making things harder on her. And I care about that very much.”

“Doesn’t she have enough to deal with right now?”

“I’m only here because she asked me to be.”

“She wants to see you. Not some stranger.”

“Hannah’s not a stranger. She’s my girlfriend.”

I winced a little at the lie.

“She’s a stranger to us.”

“Not for long.”

“Tell her to leave.”

“I can’t. I won’t.”

“Tell her to leave, or I’ll kick you both out.”

“I dare you. I dare you to do that and then tell Mom what you did.”

“This is a private, family matter. The last thing Mom needs right now is to be entertaining some Hollywood bimbo.”

Then I heard a scuffle. Then a clunk. I stepped closer to peek through the screen, and I saw that Jack had shoved Hank up against a wall.

“Does anything about that girl seem like Hollywood to you?” Jack demanded.

It’s a heck of a thing to see two grown men fighting over you. Even if you know it’s not a real fight. And even if you know the fight is really about something else.

Still. I held my breath.

For a second, I thought Jack was going to defend me.

“She’s as un-Hollywood as it gets,” Jack said then, his voice low and menacing. “Have you seen my other girlfriends? Have you seen Kennedy Monroe? She’s nothing like any of them. She’s short. Her teeth are crooked. She barely wears any makeup. She doesn’t self-tan, wear extensions, or dye her hair. She’s a totally plain, unremarkable person. She’s the epitome of ordinary.”

Wow. Okay.

“But she’s mine,” Jack said then. “And she’s staying.”

I was still coping with “epitome of ordinary.”

Another scuffle, as Hank pushed Jack off of him.

I stepped way back so they wouldn’t see me. Of course, that meant I couldn’t see them anymore, either.

“Fine,” Hank said. “I guess I’ll just have to make her so miserable that she leaves on her own.”

“If you make my Hannah miserable—”

My Hannah!

“—I will make you miserable right back.”

“You already do.”

“That’s more about you than about me, buddy,” Jack said.

But Hank was still trying to win the fight. “I’m telling you I don’t want her here. But I can’t even remember the last time you cared about what anybody else wanted.”

“You don’t want her here, but I need her here. And so do you, even though you don’t know it. So back the hell off.”

I guess, at that, one of them decided to storm off, because next I heard the screen door whap closed. Then, on the heels of that, I heard it again.

Out the kitchen window, I could see Hank stomping off toward his truck—and Jack charging in the opposite direction, along the gravel road toward a thicket of trees.

What I wanted to do … was go hide my plain, unremarkable, epitome-of-ordinary face.

For, like, ever.

But Jack was my principal. And this was my job.

So I followed him.





Thirteen


WHEN I CAUGHT up, he stopped walking, but he didn’t turn. “Don’t follow me.”