Chapter 9
Chapter
Nine
All through dinner, Indigo’s phone had been vibrating on a consistent basis, but she ignored it. She wouldn’t be rude to the people who were employing her by constantly checking her phone.
They were likely only social media notifications. She should’ve realized that being on such a well-known location in her home country, there would be more people recognizing her and tagging her in posts.
Overseas it was a little easier to keep under the radar.
It would be fine, there was nothing she had to worry about, yet a little kernel of concern settled in her gut, something that she hadn’t felt in a long time.
It didn’t matter that the person who’d stalked her was far away from her, the experience had left a mark on her.
She sat a little straighter and almost gave in to the urge to check her phone.
“It gets a little annoying, doesn’t it?” Greta placed her empty coffee cup on the saucer in front of her. Indigo had settled on a chamomile tea, seeing as she needed to rest better than she had the previous night.
“The buzzing of my phone?” That had to be what she was talking about.
“Yes. I have mine set so I get a notification any time Jeffrey is mentioned. It’s been a lot recently with the announcement of his latest collection.” Her fingers touched a bracelet, a soft smile playing on her lips.
Without doubt, the piece of jewelry was from her husband and held a special place in Greta’s heart with the way she stroked it so reverently.
“It’s stunning.” Indigo nodded toward Greta’s wrist. “You must have quite the collection.”
Fudge, did that sound gauche?
“I do. But not as much as you might think. There are some very special pieces Jeffrey has given me. Pieces that have meaning only he and I understand.”
“You met when he released his last collection, didn’t you?” Indigo had wanted to know their backstory but hadn’t felt it her place to ask. Greta had cracked the door open with her comments.
“We did. My father’s company was bidding to doing the marketing for it.
But when I first met him, I had no idea who he was.
We met at a restaurant in Broome, and…” She glanced over to her husband, who must have sensed her scrutiny, because he met her gaze.
The look the couple shared was full of love, and Indigo felt like an interloper on a private moment between them.
She shifted her attention on the man next to Jeffrey, the one who had sat opposite her the whole meal and hadn’t said two words to her. Indigo had started to believe the moments they’d shared while on the walk to the restaurant, not to mention the hot kiss on the beach, had been a dream.
Wilt’s behavior toward her shouldn’t bother her–after this trip, she wasn’t likely to see him again–but it did. She always got on well with the people she worked with, even security. Wilt was making it hard to do that.
“Sorry, even after being married all these years, he still takes my breath away,” Greta said, bringing Indigo back to their conversation.
“It’s fine. One day I hope to have a relationship like the two of you.”
“It takes work, but when you find the right one, it’s easy.”
Indigo once again looked at Wilt. Did he have someone special?
Wait, he kissed her, surely he wouldn’t have done that if he was in a relationship with someone.
The ringing of her phone halted those thoughts. It was Zara’s ringtone, and as they’d already spoken while she was getting ready for dinner, her agent shouldn’t be ringing her again, especially considering it was much later in Sydney than it was on Rottnest Island.
“It’s okay if you want to answer it,” Greta assured her.
“It’s Zara, and I really should get it. Excuse me.” She collected her phone and pushed away from the table, finding a quiet spot to take the call. “Zara? Is everything okay?”
“I’m fine, I wanted to check with you. Are you alright?”
Now Indigo was even more confused. “Yes, why wouldn’t I be? I’m having dinner with Jeffrey, Greta, and a couple of others.”
“Which means you’ve been ignoring your phone.” There was no censure in her agent’s voice, perhaps even a hint of relief, which only heightened Indigo’s concern.
“Right. What’s going on?”
A hand cupped her elbow, warming her skin. The touch familiar. “We need to go.”
There was an urgency in Wilt’s tone.
“Is that Wilt?” Zara asked.
“Yes.”
“Good, do what he says.”
A bite of anger nipped at her. “Okay, enough. What is going on, because you’re acting weird Zara, and now you’re telling me to do what Wilt says?”
Indigo looked around and found that Jeffrey and Greta were looking at her with concern as well. Most of the other diners in the restaurant had gone. Vincent had left before dessert had even arrived, and Louella had left just before Zara called.
What the hell had happened?
Had there been an accident? But that didn’t make sense, because she didn’t have any family members left for anything to happen to them.
“Let him explain everything, Indigo. I know you’re safe with him.”
“I’ll call you back,” Indigo snapped and ended the call. “Will someone please tell me what the heck is going on?”
She didn’t care if she looked, or sounded, like the diva model she tried so hard not to be in front of the clients she was representing, but she’d had enough. She was being treated as if she was a piece of porcelain that would shatter with a bad news announcement.
Indigo was far from fragile, and Zara should know that.
“I’ll explain everything when we get to your bungalow. I promise.” Wilt cupped her elbow. She wanted to shake him off but didn’t want to seem petty in front of Jeffrey and Greta.
“You’ll let us know if we need to make any changes to the itinerary or anything.” Jeffrey looked at the both of them.
“Will do, but I don’t see any reason for anything to be changed.”
Wilt sounded so confident. If he was so certain that nothing would need to be changed, why was he acting as if the world was ending?
Indigo kept her question to herself while they left the restaurant and walked back to her bungalow. Or walk was a misnomer, considering Wilt was moving so swiftly she almost had to run to keep up.
His head movements were on a constant swivel, as if waiting for someone to jump out of the shadows and strike them down.
By the time they got to her place, she was breathless. She really needed to work some cardio into her workout routine. Although when she was punching that bag the other week, imagining it was Wilt’s face, it hadn’t winded her as quickly, or as much, as the short walk from the restaurant had.
Then again, she hadn’t been wearing heels either. It was lucky she hadn’t twisted her ankle with how swiftly they had been moving.
Once inside, she tossed her bag down on the love seat. “Right, how about you explain why we had to run as if a group of terrorists were behind us? And the reason for all of you to treat me as if I’m going to break at the slightest bit of bad news.”
“A death threat was made against you. It was sent to Zara via email,” Wilt said without any emotion, and his words slammed into her as if she was that punching bag she’d pummeled.
“What?” She plopped down on the love seat, grabbing her purse so she could pull her phone out.
“Can I have that please?” Wilt had covered the short distance between them and held out his hand.
“Why?”
“Because I heard it buzzing all night long, and I know you didn’t look at anything when Zara phoned. You answered her call and that was it.”
He was right. Her mind hadn’t been on seeing what had caused her phone to blow up; she’d been focused on why Zara was calling. “You did hear me say I wasn’t fragile, right? I’ve been through this before, I can take anything that’s directed at me.”
This couldn’t be happening again, could it?
“What do you mean you’ve been through it before?”
She looked up at him. He was standing over her, and in some circumstances, it would look as though he was being overbearing, but there wasn’t anger in his eyes, only a steely determination to get to the bottom of whatever was happening.
“I’m sure you ran a background check on me, and it would’ve come up that I had a stalker a year ago.”
Wilt sat in the lounge chair opposite her, a faint sheen of red coloring his cheeks. “We did, but I only gave it a cursory glance.”
She didn’t need to delve deeper into why he hadn’t bothered giving it a proper look like he should’ve done.
With the way he’d reacted to her when they first met, he’d already decided she was going to be high maintenance.
Not to mention he’d already stated he would rather be somewhere else than with her.
Indigo shouldn’t take offense, but she was hurt by his lack of due diligence.
“Well, that says everything, doesn’t it?
” She gripped her phone, even more sure that she didn’t want to hand it over to him.
“I thought Power Security were supposed to be the best of the best. What would your boss say if he knew you’d only given my background check a ‘cursory glance’?
I’m sure he’d be super happy about that. ”
Indigo had to give Wilt credit, he took her criticism on the chin. He didn’t look away. He kept his gaze on hers through it all.
“I’m sorry. What I did was unforgiveable, and I know what Steve will do to me when he finds out.”
“You’re planning on telling him?” Would he really risk his job by admitting he hadn’t done it properly?
“I will. I have to send a daily report, and with everything that’s happened tonight, he’ll need to know that I failed in doing what I was employed to do.”
“Will you lose your job?” she asked quietly, not liking the idea of him being unemployed, even though she was at the center of it all.
“Unlikely, but I will be reprimanded for it. And I deserve to be. I let you down, I let the company down, and I let myself down. It won’t happen again.” He looked up at her, and she almost drowned in the sincerity shining in the blue depths of his eyes. “Nothing is going to happen to you.”
“I believe you.” And she did, but belief didn’t always mean reality.