Chapter 12
twelve
Olivia had done it on purpose. Grabbed my hand. I mean, not that anyone held someone’s hand unintentionally, but she had done it to fuck with me. Get me rattled. At first, it worked. Holding hands was for middle school and old people. I felt ridiculous strolling down the sidewalk like that.
But then as Olivia talked, I forgot we were walking in tandem, our fingers intertwined. She was an easy conversationalist, moving from one topic to the next without missing a beat. She told me about her grandparents, about growing up an identical twin, about her love of the beach. She laughed easily, too, which surprised me. At Benito’s she had been scared and there had been no smiles or laughter.
The smile disappeared when a guy bumped into her. She looked at him and froze in fear.
“What’s the matter?” I was reaching for my gun.
Her shoulders relaxed. “Nothing. When I first looked at him I thought he was the guy who put me in that room. Which is stupid. He looks nothing like him.” Olivia’s cheeks turned red and she avoided my gaze.
Now I was glad I was holding her hand because I pulled her closer when she would have attempted to put a few feet between us. “I’ve got you. You’re safe with me.” That was the one thing I could absolutely offer her—protection.
“I want to be safe everywhere,” she said, sounding frustrated. “Alone, at school, in my apartment, at my sister’s. It makes me mad that I feel this way. I feel vulnerable and I hate it.”
That I definitely understood. “I get that. I hate that feeling, too. But it will ease up as you’re further away from what happened. I hate to say it, but maybe you shouldn’t go to your sister’s for a while.” Even though it was a perfect opportunity for me to see her, and the only reason I would take another assignment at his place, but I didn’t think it was a healthy environment for her. Not her scene, for one, but a bad reminder of what had gone down.
“You don’t have to worry about that. I’m not interested in seeing Ricardo any time soon. My sister and I can hang out somewhere else if she wants to spend time with me.”
Comforting someone wasn’t my strong suit. This was even harder. This was dealing with the aftermath where Olivia was angry and frustrated. I had never figured out how to deal with my own anger and frustration. There was no way I could help her. So I stayed silent. My hand felt enormous holding hers and she did pull away, which confused me. She’d taken my hand in the first place and now she no longer wanted to touch me?
But she smiled when we walked into the bar where she worked. Everyone, staff and customers, greeted her with smiles and waves and it was clear she was well-liked. The bartender in particular seemed curious to see her with a guy and he grilled me for a good five minutes. After we each had a beer and went to a table, Olivia wrinkled her nose.
“Sorry about that. Ben likes to father everyone in here.”
“It’s cool. It’s nice he’s looking out for you.” Ben was in his fifties, beefy, friendly but firm. He didn’t seem overly impressed with me, but I couldn’t blame him. I wouldn’t be overly impressed with me for Olivia, either, if I were him.
“No one ever seems to get that I don’t need to be taken care of. That’s Eva, not me.”
“I don’t think you need to be taken care of. I think you’re pretty bad ass.” I did. She was strong and smart and that was sexy as hell. I shifted my stool around so I could be closer to her. “You’re too far away. I need to touch you.”
My comment seemed to fluster her. “What? We’re in public. No touching.”
“I didn’t mean sex on the table.” I grinned at her. “But anyway, you are definitely bad ass.”
“You know what, you’re right? I am bad ass most of the time,” she declared. “Just not when it comes to drug dealers.”
“You held your own. You did what you had to do. That’s bad ass.”
I wasn’t actually trying to reference us having sex, but that’s what she must have thought because her cheeks went pink and she looked irritated. “So bad ass. I got naked and wore a bikini.”
This wasn’t going the way I had intended. At all. “What else were you supposed to do? Attack an armed bodyguard with your bare hands, wearing nothing but a robe? You stayed calm and did what you had to, and you should be proud of that.”
She pursed her lips. “I guess.”
“No guessing. That’s fact.” I squeezed her knee. “Don’t be a stubborn ass like me.”
That made her laugh. “You are kind of stubborn, aren’t you?”
“I come by it honestly. My mother is as stubborn as a mule. She reaped what she sowed.”
“You’re not really selling yourself here, Wester.” She gave me a smile.
The bar was dim, but not dark or gloomy. It was filled with rich wood tables and kitschy signs on the walls. It was a dive, nothing glamorous. She was right—I was more comfortable here than I would have been at a fancy restaurant. This was my world. Dark corners, eccentric people and shady intentions. I wouldn’t have expected her to look like she belonged here, but she did.
“You’ve already seen my best assets.” Talking about myself made me uncomfortable.
She rolled her eyes. “Okay, hot shot.”
That made me laugh.
“Tell me why you became a bodyguard.”
The question was unexpected and one I didn’t like. I gave a flippant answer. “Because Sexiest Man Alive was already taken that year.”
Olivia stared at me. “Don’t do that. Seriously. Don’t do that.”
I shifted on my stool. She had called me out. No woman ever called me out as easily and vehemently as she did. And she was usually justified in doing so. “Do what?”
“Give me a non-answer. Feed me a bullshit line. If you don’t want to talk about it, I’d rather you just say so than give me the crap that just came out of your mouth. That’s not a conversation, that’s a one-man show.”
Ouch. “Fair enough. There is no hidden meaning or deep desire to be a bodyguard, but here’s the bottom line. I have no education, no money, no discernible talents other than bravery to the point of being stupid, and being a decent marksman. So, bodyguard it is.”
“Is there something else you’d rather do?”
I shrugged. “Not particularly. It’s a good fit for me.”
“Watching Ricardo’s dog is a good fit for you?” Her eyebrows rose.
Damn. She wasn’t pulling any punches. “Aside from that. It doesn’t matter. It’s not like I’m going to go to college or anything. Ask my mother. She suggests it once a week.”
“Does she worry about you?”
“Yes, but she would worry about me if I worked at Publix, which I don’t imagine is a dangerous job. That’s just how she’s wired.” I was all too aware of the fact that Olivia was intelligent and on the verge on an amazing career. This was it for me. I had no grand ambitions because my one dream had been to survive without turning to selling drugs or anything else illegal and I had succeeded in that. That was my pride. I’d already made it because I wasn’t making greenbacks over dead bodies.
“I think that’s nice she worries about you. Your job is dangerous. You have gotten shot. Twice.”
“Yeah. So tell me about chemistry. Why did you choose that?” Time to change the subject. I didn’t know what she wanted me to say. That I wanted to be a doctor or president? That I’d had a dream that had gone unfulfilled because life was harsh? It pissed me off. I wasn’t one of her college buddies. That wasn’t me and she should know that.
She didn’t speak passionately about chemistry, either. I got the distinct impression she was pursuing it because it was stable and had advancement potential. At one point she even said that.
“I mean, I had to be practical. I can do this, so it makes the most sense.”
I finished off my beer and gave her a look. “We have more in common than you think, then.”
“What do you mean?”
“We’re both practical. What you’re doing is no different from what I’m doing by being a bodyguard.”
For a second she looked confused then she said, “Huh. Maybe not.”
“So, what are you reading?” I asked, because I wanted to change the subject. For some reason, it felt like we had shattered some of the magic between us by talking about reality. I didn’t like that because I liked Olivia. I wanted nothing but hot kisses, sweet smiles, and open eyes from her.
I wanted to skip all of this and go from nothing to everything. I didn’t want to date. I wanted to take care of her, claim her, hold her to me. Let no other man touch her ever again.
The intensity of my emotions shocked the hell out of me. This was dangerous territory. More dangerous than any bullet from Benito’s bullshit bodyguards.
As she spoke, getting enthusiastic about a fantasy novel that under normal circumstances I would like to read, I knew that I could fall in love with Olivia if I let myself. Because she wouldn’t let me be a faker. She would dig and dig until she learned the truth—and the real me.
Part of me wanted that so goddamned much. The other part of me couldn’t imagine anything worse.
Being at my workplace made me nervous. I had been talking too much, really grilling Wester. I could see how he would think me criticizing his job choice was criticizing him, but that wasn’t what I had meant. I was aware of eyes watching us and I wanted to give Wester the right impression. That I was independent yet feminine. Which was a lot to ask about one conversation and I was running at the mouth from nerves.
It was impossible to do this—go from where we had been to pretending this was an actual first date. He had been right about the rules. They couldn’t and didn’t apply to us.
Instead the only impression I seemed to have given him was that I was practical. And maybe a bitch. Because I had pulled no punches when he had blown off my question about why he’d become a bodyguard. But if he wanted this to be anything real, he couldn’t give me the answers he gave to his random hook ups. I had been harsher than I had intended, though.
Everything was better when he asked me about reading. I felt more natural. On sure footing. He was smiling at me. It was an amazing thing to have Wester smile at me, a natural smile, not a flirtatious one. At one point I stopped speaking and asked him, “What?”
He shook his head. “Nothing. I’m just in awe of the fact that you would be sitting here, with me. I really like you, Olivia. I didn’t expect that.”
There was a lump in my throat without warning. “I like you, too.”
One of the waitresses chose right then to interrupt and laughingly drag me onto the floor for karaoke. “Do you mind?” I asked Wester. “It’s kind of tradition here.”
I was known for a really over-the-top ludicrous version of Piano Man. It was my claim to fame and one of the few ways in which I was totally willing to make an ass out of myself. I wasn’t nervous to sing it in front of Wester. I actually decided to add a little sexy. I figured he wanted real, this was it. But he surprised the hell out of me by making his way across the bar and coming in front of the microphone with me.
Wester could actually sing. His voice was way better than mine. It was strong and deep and sexy and I faltered just briefly, giving a startled laugh, handing him the microphone. “What the hell?” I mouthed to him. Out loud I yelled, “No talent? I call bullshit.”
He put his arm around me to pull me in so we could sing together and I leaned against his chest, liking the way that felt. We were in harmony, his voice powerful enough to smooth out mine. Everyone was clapping and singing along and it was the most fun I had had in a long time.
When the song ended, the host, Chris, gave me a stunned look and said, “Well, well, Olivia’s been holding out on us. Bring your man back again next week, Liv. The audience loves him.”
I expected Wester to be annoyed but he just gave a wave and a bow and took my hand and led me back to the table. He got close to my ear and murmured, “Can I kiss you yet? Is that allowed?”
“I think that you should do whatever feels right to you,” I breathed.
To my surprise, he pulled back. “Then I think I’ll wait. I don’t want to rush it.”
That would be him turning the tables on me. Damn it. I had no one to blame but myself. But it probably wasn’t cool to be kissing a guy at my workplace, anyway. So I gave him a wink. “That would be a start for us.”
Wester laughed. “I’m trying to mix it up. Keep you on your toes.”
When he grinned at me like that, it wasn’t hard to imagine that I could fall head over heels in love with him. He was the oddest mystery to me, yet at the same time so transparent. He was perhaps the most like me of any man I’d ever met. Falling in love with an emotionally unavailable bodyguard wasn’t in my life plan.
But I was doing it anyway.
After a few more drinks and a lot more laughs, when Wester took me home I invited him in. He shook his head.
“Sorry, Olivia. I can’t be trusted to keep my hands off you if I go inside.”
He was in my doorway, his eyes filled with lust. I wrapped my arms around his neck and watched those baby blues narrow with suspicion. “I don’t want you to keep your hands off of me.”
“Is this a test? A trap or something?”
“No.” I was never more sure of anything in my whole life. All night I had been watching him, wanting him. I needed to know what it was like to be with Wester on these terms—my apartment, nothing looming over us. No threat. No attempt at a goodbye. Just us. “I just want you. I don’t need you. I don’t have anything to prove. I just want to feel you.”
“Holy shit,” he muttered. “You’re destroying me, you know that?”
“Why is that?”
“Because I can’t say no to that. You know I can’t.” His hands were already around my waist, drawing my body in closer to his.
“I don’t want you to say no. I want you to be a yes-man.”
His answer was to lift me off the floor and carry me over the threshold. “Then yes. A thousand, fucking times, yes.”
Now that was sexy. I vowed to regret nothing I ever did with him ever. He had an ability to turn me on that was unprecedented. All I wanted was to lose myself inside his eyes. When he kissed me, everything made sense.
Once inside he kicked my front door shut behind us with his boot and he pushed me up against the wall. “Olivia.”
“Yes?” He was kissing my neck and I couldn’t think. Couldn’t breathe.
“What do you want from me? Tell me what you want,” he urged.
For a second I thought he was talking about something more than sex, and I was confused, but then he added, “Tell me where to touch you.”
“Anywhere. I like when you do whatever you want.”
“Oh, yeah? So I get to do whatever I want? I like the fucking sound of that.”
It might be insane to give a man like Wester free reign over me, but he made me lose my mind. “Go for it. Give me everything you have.”