Guarded by a Broody Biker (Back Away From My Girl)

1. Jem

One

Jem

I finally snap on a drizzly Friday morning.

It’s cold and damp outside, and the miserable weather has chased an extra-big crowd through the doors of the old market hall. The new customers mill around the stalls, bumping shoulders and scanning the different wares on sale, and the air is thick with the musty smell of their damp overcoats.

Raindrops drum against the domed glass ceiling high above. The loud buzz of conversation makes my head throb. Folks browse for second hand books and haggle over the cost of handmade soap, pointing at the weirder things for sale on the tables.

Meanwhile, my stall is tucked off in the corner, away from the worst of the crowd. People keep shuffling past, but they’re not packed close together, elbows jabbing in ribs, like they are in the middle of the market.

Normally I’m kinda salty about my stall being on the edge, wishing I could be closer to the action so I could sell more candles and maybe order from my favorite pizza place in celebration. A big sales day is a big deal for me. But today…

Today I’m relieved to be invisible. I huddle in my cheap metal seat, the rickety leg wobbling beneath me, and draw my scarf up and over my chin. Even though it’s muggy in here with all these bodies, even though I should be on my feet and calling people over to smell my candles, instead I’m trying to fold myself so small that I disappear.

It was a dream, I tell myself over and over. You got stressed and had a bad dream.

There’s no way my ex boyfriend really broke into my apartment last night. That would be insane, and Peter isn’t like that. He’s measured, calculating, cool.

“What are these, then?” A man in his forties asks, stopping by my stall and hitching up his belt. He’s barrel-chested but soft all over, and there’s more gray than brown in his hair. He sniffs and surveys the display of candles on my table, with their handwritten labels and the purple velvet tablecloth, like an emperor surveying his kingdom. A blunt finger prods at a vanilla and beeswax set.

“Candles,” I say dully, burrowing deeper into my scarf. We get people like this in the market all the time—Looky Loos who only want to quiz you, never buy—and I’m in no mood to stroke this guy’s ego by playing along.

“You should light them,” the man declares. “Candles are better when they’re lit. You’ll draw people over here like moths to a…”

He grins, rocking on his heels.

I sigh into my scarf. “Flame?”

The man throws his head back and booms out a laugh, drawing a few curious glances from nearby. When he straightens, he digs in the inside pocket of his jacket and pulls out a lighter. My spine goes stiff.

“I’ll start over here,” he says, going for the vanilla beeswax set again. “You light the ones at the back.”

My metal chair scrapes across the stone floor as I lurch to my feet, snatching the first candle away from his tiny flame. “Hey! You light them, you buy ‘em.”

The man stares at me, lighter still held over the table. A parade of emotions flickers across his weathered face: surprise, offense, mulish irritation. The determination to get his own way.

“I’m doing you a favor,” he says, all stubborn. This is a man who doesn’t like being told no, and lord, I am so tired of those. “If you want to sell these candles, you should light them up.”

“People don’t want to buy used goods,” I explain slowly, trying not to sound like I’m talking to an imbecile. My shoulders are tense with irritation, but even now, squaring off with this jerk, I can’t stop scanning the crowd over his shoulders. I’m on edge and twitchy, looking for Peter. Looking for a sign that I wasn’t dreaming last night. “They want candles where the wick has never been lit.”

The man scoffs, shaking his head. He’s spent all of five minutes at my stall, and now he’s an expert on the handmade candle business.

“This is why your stall’s quiet. Your bad attitude—”

“Oh, whoops.” Leaning down, I pull out the ‘Shop Closed’ sign with a flourish and set it in the middle of the table. “You’ve caught me right as my break starts. That’s too bad.”

He grumbles and shakes his head and still hovers by the table, muttering about silly little girls running their silly little stalls, and I level him a look as I squeeze out from behind the table.

“There’s a camera up there.” I jerk my chin up at the rafters, and thankfully the man doesn’t look. There’s no camera up there, only a whole colony of spiders. “Remember: you light them, you buy them. Have a nice day.”

The crowd brushes me on both sides as I plunge into the tangle of bodies, irritation making my teeth grind. This should be a good sales day for me, what with all these people, and now I’ve let myself get chased away from my stall by an old dude who can’t be told the word no.

Part of me wants to loop back and check he’s not literally setting fire to my stock, but the rest of me keeps pressing forward. To be honest, I was feeling kinda exposed over there, set away from the crowd like that. On display for any unfriendly prying eyes. Blending in with the customers, strolling between stalls and breathing in the delicious scents of the food section—this is better.

My stomach growls beneath my slouchy gray sweater, but I force myself to look at the rows of bagels and pastries and thick brownie squares and not touch. Not until I make a few sales of my own.

“Jemima.”

The voice in my ear makes my spine snap straight. I wheel around, ignoring the angry mutters when I tread on some student’s foot. Normally I’d never be so rude, but it’s him. He’s here.

Peter Hutchins. The man I dated for a month, then broke up with two weeks ago when he finally tried to kiss me and my all insides revolted at the thought. The man who’s been blowing up my phone ever since, and knocking on my door late at night, and ‘accidentally’ bumping into me in the grocery store. That guy.

Staring up at him now, I don’t know what I ever saw in this man. Oh, he’s handsome, in an objective sense—his features are symmetrical, and he’s got the kind of strong jaw and cheekbones that usually grace Hollywood actors. But there’s a coldness behind his blue eyes that makes me shiver, and his perfectly pressed shirt and pants couldn’t be a worse match for my own ripped jeans and scuffed boots.

“You look well,” he says now, so polite and calm. As though he’s not been stalking me day and night, taking some silent, savage pleasure the more unnerved I get. “Is that a new haircut?”

“No.” It’s called insomnia hair. Bad dreams hair. Laying awake all night, tossing and turning, unsure if you really did just hear someone leaving your apartment or if you dreamed it… hair.

I checked out in the stairwell, obviously, wielding an old mop like a weapon. I didn’t just lie there like a helpless melon. But there was nothing obviously out of place in my studio, no signs of a break in or anybody in the stairwell—and yet the little hairs stood up on my arms.

All this to say: I didn’t sleep well last night.

“It’s my lunch hour,” Peter says, checking his expensive watch. That’s another reason we were a terrible match from the beginning: Peter is the sort of man who orders expensive side dishes in restaurants ‘for the table’, while I stick to tap water and studiously count up every cent that I owe on the bill. He could never quite get over the fact that I was poor.

Actually, that’s not true. Knowing what I know now, seeing the way he’s enjoying terrorizing me, it’s finally clicked into place: Peter liked that about me. He liked being the powerful, worldly one. He liked situations where I felt helpless.

Yeah, I’m never dating again. One attempt was plenty, thank you.

“What are you doing here?” I raise my chin, and fight to keep my voice strong. If there’s anything I know about bullies, it’s that showing weakness only makes them worse.

Peter smiles his charming smile. “I just told you. It’s my lunch hour, and I’m hungry.”

“Right,” I say flatly, making it clear I don’t believe it for a second. Still, this is a free country, and I can’t exactly stop this man from wandering into a public market.

I turn to go, and his hand catches my arm. It squeezes firm—just enough to assert how much bigger and stronger he is than me, but not so hard that I could claim he was aggressive. “Wait, Jem.”

I jerk my arm out of Peter’s grip and wait, jaw clenched. Whatever he needs to say, he can say, then I’m getting out of here. Screw the candle stall. Screw ordering pizza tonight. There are still some old tins of soup in the cupboard, enough that I won’t starve, and I am so done with this day already.

“I have something of yours,” Peter says, sliding something out of his pocket. “You must have left it in my car sometime.”

Bullshit.

My mouth is dry, and my heart is knocking against my ribs, and it’s bullshit, bullshit, bullshit. I’ve been in Peter’s car exactly one time, when he drove us to a date at the marina, and I was so intimidated by all the spotless cream leather that I sat on my hands and barely moved an inch. There is no way I left anything in that car. No way that I left—

A photograph. An old Polaroid of me as a dark-haired toddler, sprawling sideways on my mom’s lap, cradled in her arms, the light of the camera flash flaring on the window behind us.

I snatch the photo from Peter’s hand, too sick to speak. He was in my apartment last night. That’s what he’s telling me. What he’s showing me.

“It’s a nice photo,” he says, low and calm. Only for my ears. “It’s such a shame that you’re all alone now.”

I don’t bother responding. What would I even say? Besides, my tongue is stuck to the roof of my mouth, and my throat is too tight to swallow. I turn and half-shove my way back through the crowd, pissing everyone off and stepping on loads of feet, but my head is spinning and I can’t think, can’t balance, can’t breathe.

A quiet chuckle reaches my ears, even over the roar of the crowd. A desperate tear leaks from my eye, and I dash it away with the back of my hand. Before I spill out of the market doors into the cold, drizzling street, gulping down lungfuls of fresh air, I’ve already decided.

I’m not helpless.

And I don’t have to be alone.

Not if I call in a professional.

* * *

An hour later, my phone turns over and over in my hands, a message typed out on the screen but not sent yet. Spartan Shield Corp. I’ve done the research, trawled the forums, and Spartan Shield Corp is the best, run by some guy called Cerberus . My would-be savior has a weird name, but that’s not what’s holding me back from hitting send and hiring my own personal bodyguard for one day and night.

Yeah… twenty four hours. That’s all I can afford, even after raiding my meager savings account and running a surprise candle sale on my Etsy store. The orders are rolling in, but I can only make so much money at short notice.

So I’ll have twenty four hours for this bodyguard to keep Peter away from me, and hopefully spook him so badly that he stays away. But what if Peter doesn’t break in again tonight? Or what if this would-be bodyguard doesn’t feel like playing along? What if all that money is wasted?

Sighing, I tap the corner of my phone on the velvet-covered table. An elderly woman browses my candles, picking them up one by one to give an almighty sniff, and I give her a distracted smile every time she looks at me. I waited until Peter left earlier, watched him saunter all the way down the street before ducking back inside the market, but I can’t afford to blow off a whole day of sales. Not if I’m about to make the most expensive purchase of my life.

“Lavender,” the elderly woman says approvingly, sniffing this candle even deeper. She’s got one of those super neat short perms, though a few hairs have frizzed loose in the humidity. “I always loved lavender. It helps you sleep, you know.”

Not when you’re being stalked by an unhinged ex boyfriend—but hey. Even lavender can’t work miracles.

“It was my mom’s favorite too,” I say, and the woman must hear the sadness in my voice because she sets the candle down and pats my hand.

“I’ll take three.”

I box them up for her extra nicely, wrapping them up in a cream ribbon and scraping the fabric with the edge of some scissors until the ribbon curls. I double-check all the wicks, too, to make sure they’re brand new, because Lighter Guy definitely scorched a few candles to make his point before he left earlier.

“A pretty girl like you must meet some interesting people in this market.”

The elderly woman has one of those wheeled shopping bags that looks like it’s made out of old curtains. She fumbles to get the box of candles inside, but when I stand up to help she waves me off.

“Yes,” I agree, hovering over the table awkwardly. “Interesting people. Definitely.”

I met Peter in this market, after all, over by the coffee stall one morning. He’s an evil bastard, but he’s definitely not boring.

“There!” My customer straightens up, pleased, and dusts off her hands. “Fits like a glove. Now,” she fixes me with a serious look, her wrinkled face creasing even more. “Take care of yourself, won’t you? Promise me.”

And she’s a stranger, someone I’ve never seen before or will see again, but the fact that she cares about me even a little brings a lump to my throat.

I nod quickly, waving goodbye as she wheels her shopping bag around. “I will.”

As soon as she’s gone, I snatch my phone up and tap send.

I’m getting myself a bodyguard.