CHAPTER THREE
“Morning, Ziggy.”
“Morning, Miss Cooper.”
Giant-ass size mug of coffee in hand, I shuffled back into the spare bedroom, where an abundance of packing boxes awaited. “Are the hordes still downstairs?”
“Yes, they are.”
“Great. Must be a slow news week.”
And details of my gruesome bloody delivery had indeed spread everywhere.
Having been bombarded with messages and calls, I’d made the smart decision to mute my cell.
After first posting a behind-the-scenes picture from the recent shoot in New Orleans on Instagram and calling my mom, of course.
She’d been horrified and pressed to come stay with me.
I barely managed to convince her it wasn’t necessary.
I needed some space to deal with things right now and having Ziggy and all his hotness in my face was already more than I could handle.
I knew my mom would take over the place with a lot of good intentions but not much awareness of my slowly growing freak-out, barely being kept under control.
No, thank you.
Also, she had enough going on planning her wedding to Dr. Jane next month.
A wonderful woman, and they made a great couple.
Mom deserved much happiness after all those years of raising me on her own.
Teenage girls could be hellacious and I’d been no exception.
So many hormones bouncing around inside.
Besides which, girls could be mean. It had been a tough time for everyone.
And speaking of hotness getting all up in my face, my bodyguard looked as slick as ever in his obviously custom-tailored black suit.
Guess carrying a gun around in a holster necessitated the tailoring.
I, on the other hand, wore my favorite boyfriend jeans, an old Ramones tee, messy bun, and concealer to hide the sleep deprivation bruising beneath my eyes.
I had at least showered. Bonus points to me.
“Will you still be going to lunch with Mrs. Ferris?” he asked.
I cocked my head. “What’s your professional opinion? I’d been looking forward to it. There’s this cool new place we were going to try. But…”
“I won’t lie to you. Crowds massively increase the amount of moving parts in your environment. You never know who or what might be hiding in them. And right now, you’re bound to have people following wherever you go.”
“Hmm.”
“It’s my job to assess threats and keep you safe.
” His cell started to vibrate somewhere about his person.
He pulled it out of his back pants pocket, checked the screen, and dismissed the call with a slide of his thumb.
“But only you can decide what risk is important enough, for whatever reason, to be worth taking.”
“If they’re all still out there then I guess I might cancel my plans.
” I planted my ass on the carpet and picked up my cell, sending Lena a quick text to let her know.
Given the situation, I cancelled my appointment with my hairdresser in the afternoon as well.
“Looks like I’m spending the day at home.
You probably don’t need to hang around.”
“You won’t be leaving your apartment at all?”
“Only maybe to go down to the apartment building’s gym later.”
“Then I’ll stay. There’re some other tasks I have to do while you’re busy here.”
I opened my mouth to argue, but then changed my mind.
After a long night of jumping at every little noise, keeping the bodyguard around might be for the best. Calm the savage nerves and all that.
If it was a choice between annoying hotness and crippling fear, then I’ll go for the heat every time. “Okay.”
“Any update from Detective Ortega?”
“No. Not a word.” I sighed. “I tried going through some of my emails and messages last night, to see if they mentioned hearts or knives or anything like that. There’s some seriously deranged people out there.
I mean, can you imagine sending a message to a complete stranger saying that baby Jesus was going to strike them down dead and send them to hell?
Or that you wanted to strangle them and have sex with their corpse?
Who the hell says that sort of thing? Just because they can hide behind a bullshit email address or fake avatar they think they can let all of their ugly out to play and inflict it on other people. ”
His gaze narrowed, lines furrowing his brow. “Why don’t you let the police deal with that in the future, Miss Cooper? You don’t need that sort of shit getting into your head. Excuse my language.”
I attempted a smile. “It’s fine. Swear all you like. This situation makes me want to swear too.”
“There’s a lot of sick and cruel people out there. It doesn’t mean you need to give them a moment of your time.”
“True,” I said. “I guess you’ve seen a lot of this sort of stuff before.”
“Enough to know you’re better off staying away from it and leaving the detective work to the professionals.”
“I know, I know.” My shoulders slumped, my back bowed. My bones felt hollow and weak. Tonight I’d take some Melatonin and try to knock myself out. Actually get some decent sleep. “I just hate being so out of control. Having to put my life on pause because of this asshole.”
“Understandable.”
Around me were towers of books waiting to be shelved.
Romance mostly. Since I had the time, I might as well place them in alphabetical order.
His gaze wandered over them with something close to interest. Made me curious about his hobbies.
Apart from being a fulltime card-carrying member of the badass club, of course.
He probably kick boxed and scaled tall buildings and saved kittens from burning trees.
I really shouldn’t have sat down. From this height, he seemed even more imposing.
Like a mountain towering over me, taking up all of the view.
I’d been around plenty of big shot actors, sports stars, and business tycoons over the years, courtesy of various events and V.I.P.
lounges. Ziggy Thayer had more presence than all of them put together.
It’s like he sucked the air out of a room just by generally being cool and existing.
Or maybe he only had that effect on me. If so, I could seriously do without the complication. Dammit.
“Miss?”
And I’d been staring at the man again. “I’m sorry, Ziggy. I kind of zoned out there for a minute. Were you saying something?”
“Only that I better get on with it. I’ll be down in the garage. If you need me, just contact me on my cell.”
“Why the garage?” I asked, curious.
“I’d like to give your vehicle a quick check over, followed by your apartment.”
His phone started to vibrate again.
“Do you need to take that call?”
“No, miss.”
“What are you looking for in my car and apartment?”
“Anything that shouldn’t be there. Listening devices, mostly.”
“You think that the crazy person who mailed me a skewered heart might be bugging my car? Psycho nut does Mission Impossible?”
“No. My concern is with the press.”
I paused. “You think someone might have been listening into my conversations and that’s how the story got leaked?”
“It’s highly unlikely,” he said. “But I’d feel better if I checked and since I have the time…”
“All right. And thank you for listening to me moan before.”
“Anytime, miss. It’s all part of the service.” The skin around his eyes crinkled a little. It might be the closest thing to a grin I’d ever see on his face.
It made me smile for real.
He nodded as if pleased, then stalked off.
The man was like a big jungle cat. I’d sauntered and strutted down plenty of walkways.
But away from that world, I was more likely to stub my toe on a coffee table than move with any particular grace.
Ziggy’s movements seemed innate. A quintessential part of him.
Guess they probably trained you in the military to stand tall and walk like you mean it and everything.
Kind of made me wonder how he did other things.
Private things I had no business thinking about.
I needed to stop sexually harassing the man inside my head.
It was bad and wrong and I should know better. I really should.
A couple of hours later, Ziggy stood in front of my kitchen island, taking in the array of food on display.
His eyes were the size of plates. Guess I’d impressed him.
My chocolate cake, brownies, and chocolate chip cookies sure impressed me.
And chocolate was important for any sort of balanced diet.
After all, I was a growing girl (spiritual growth mattered) who needed to keep her strength up to deal with the harsh realities of life and douchebags on the internet.
After half an hour or so of book sorting, I needed to change activities.
Maybe I had a case of the overtired freaked-out hysterics.
But I had to be up and on my feet doing something and moving around.
I had a killer of a sweet tooth so that made the decision easy.
“I stress bake. It’s kind of my thing,” I explained, wiping my hands on my apron. “Are you hungry? Do you like sweet things?”
“I love sweet things.”
“Excellent. Take a seat.”
He sat on one of the stools on the opposite side of the island, watching me serve him a fork along with a plate containing one of everything. The small walkie talkie looking type thing he’d been using to search for listening devices lay in front of him.
“Did you find anything?” I asked.
“No.”
“That’s good to know. Did you know desserts taste better when eaten with a fork?”
“Is that a fact?”
“Absolutely. Try it and see. The only caveat is to not attempt it with ice cream or pudding. That can get messy,” I said. “Milk or coffee?”
“Water will be fine. Thank you, Miss Cooper.”