Chapter 2
CHAPTER TWO
DELILAH
Men think we don’t notice them staring, but I can always tell what’s behind their eyes—hunger, boredom, calculation—especially when I’m being myself.
Cade Walker isn’t like most men, but right now he’s scanning the pool behind his Ray-Bans, pretending I’m invisible as I pull myself up from a tumble turn.
He’s only been at my parents’ estate for three days, but he already knows my routine better than my mother ever did.
No matter where I go—tennis courts, paddocks, art studio, library—he’s always there, just out of sight, quietly noting every threat, weakness, and my mood.
He’s efficient in a way that almost feels respectful.
He’s open about his job, which I should appreciate.
Still, there’s something about a man who stands like a fortress that makes me want to find the cracks.
I don’t need to break in; I just want to see if those walls can shake.
I start another lap, the first ten meters a careful breaststroke, just enough to stay afloat while I split my focus.
Part of me notices the light breaking through the water, the cold on my skin, and the sting of chlorine in my ears, but most of me is focused on Cade, tracking him closely.
I watch not for his glances, but for the pauses, the slight tightening of his jaw each time I come up for air.
I could show off if I wanted, but it’s more fun not to.
At the far end of the pool, I rest my forearms on the deck and fix him with the look I reserve for men too disciplined to unwind.
“You don’t have to stand at attention,” I call, smiling without teeth.
“Pretty sure if anyone was going to kill me, they’d wait until after I finished swimming. Less of a mess in the papers.”
Cade doesn’t smile, but his eyebrows notch up half a degree. “Not in my job description to speculate on the creative habits of assassins, Ms. Munro.”
“One, now you’ve jinxed us. And two, do you always call people by their last names, or is that just an affectation?”
He shrugs, just enough to concede the point. “It’s about respect.”
“Well, given I’m currently broadcasting like a lighthouse in this bikini, you’re allowed to call me Delilah. Or just ‘ma’am,’ if you’re feeling especially Texan.”
The Ray-Bans tilt. I realize his eyes aren’t just green, they’re an obscene shade—verging on gold around the pupils, sharp in a way that would make a lesser woman self-conscious. “Noted,” he says. Then, “You’re on lap thirty-eight.”
If I didn’t know better, I’d call that a soft flex. “Are you counting, or is that something Special Forces teaches you by osmosis?”
He’s silent for a beat, just the staccato rhythm of cicadas filling the gap. Then: “Counting’s how you know when to expect someone to go under and not come up again.”
The obvious joke would be to ask if he planned on diving in to rescue me.
But the look he’s giving isn’t about heroics.
It’s about facts—about how he’s logged every possible scenario in which I might “go under,” and can’t, even for a moment, switch off that vigilance.
I know the type. Raised on discipline and worst-case hypotheticals, unable to believe the world isn’t out to kill you even when it’s your job to sit poolside and watch a trust-fund brat do laps.
I let myself float, arms spreading, palms up. “That’s bleak, Walker.”
He inclines his head. “It’s accurate.”
“Well, I’m not suicidal. Or homicidal, for that matter. You can relax.”
I watch his mouth, expecting a reply, but he says nothing.
Instead, he scans the horizon, taking in the tall hedges, the wide stretch of grass, and the clear blue sky over the estate.
Only the staff are around, and right now the kitchen is busy with dinner.
We both know this. Still, Cade Walker gives off a kind of heat that feels more like tension than sunlight.
I kick off for another lap, and for two and a half lengths I experiment: tightening my turns, letting my body torque with more power, just to see if he’ll blink.
If his uniform tics will waver. They don’t.
He’s professional, unyielding, but hyperaware, registering off the charts.
He’s watching, yes, but not like the others.
Not like he wants to own me or fuck me or lecture me.
He’s watching because the world is dangerous, and I am suddenly inside his perimeter.
I find that I like it.
After another ten laps, I haul myself out, water streaming off me in rivulets. I wrap a towel around my torso and plant myself on the coping opposite him, legs dangling in. He doesn’t flinch or look away. Instead, he angles his head, thinks, then speaks. “You swim to exhaust yourself.”
It’s not a question, but I answer anyway. “There are worse reasons.”
“Not many.”
There’s a softness, then. Nearly imperceptible, but I catch it. I pull my knees to my chest, chin propped on them. “You were military.”
“Was.”
“Why’d you stop?”
His answer is a second too slow, like he hasn’t had to give it in a long time. “I wanted to sleep more than I wanted to serve. Needed to be in control of my own time. Turns out, private security’s just a slower kind of deployment.”
“And yet here you are, babysitting a grown woman who, by all accounts, can set her own alarms and dial 9-1-1.”
He doesn’t bristle at the word babysit, which I appreciate. “Apparently, it’s a growth industry.”
I stretch my legs, flexing my toes. “You’re not like the others.”
He looks wary. “What others?”
“My mother’s endless parade of bodyguards, detectives, and ex-cops. They all had something to prove.” I tip my head back, squinting at the sun. “You have nothing to prove. That’s why you make everyone nervous.”
He stands, steps to the edge of the flagstone, and for a moment, I wonder if he’s going to walk. Instead, he crouches—close, but not close enough to invade my space. “Why do you swim so hard, Delilah?”
The shift in his tone scrapes something raw. “It’s the one place where nobody can follow. Not even you.”
“Not my intention to interfere.”
“But you do it anyway.”
He waits. The longer he holds the pause, the more exposed I feel. Finally, I say, “You don’t have a girlfriend or a secret wife tucked away somewhere, do you?”
He stiffens, but only just. “No.”
“Why not?”
He’s quiet. Then: “I used to have someone. Didn’t end well.”
For once, I drop the tease. “Sorry.”
He shrugs, and the gesture is so practiced I sense it’s his shield. “It was a long time ago.”
“My last relationship ended last year. He cheated. Everyone cheats, eventually,” I say, and the words come out harder than intended, flat and empty. “It’s the most predictable thing about people.”
He doesn’t blink. “A man doesn’t cheat on a woman he loves and respects.”
I stare at him, water beading on my knees, glittering in the sun, and feel something tighten behind my sternum. “You really believe that?”
“It’s a choice,” he says. “Not a disease.”
I want to laugh, but I don’t. “And if he does cheat?” I ask. “Is that just a lack of respect?”
He holds my gaze. “It’s cowardice. Or boredom. Sometimes both, but never love. Not real love.”
I look away, suddenly exhausted. “He said it was my fault for being too much.”
Cade’s mouth twists, just enough to register. “That’s a line for people who want to feel blameless.”
I wait for the lecture, but he doesn’t deliver one. Instead: “You deserve someone whose attention doesn’t drift.”
I almost say, “Like you?” but bite it back. That would make things far too awkward so soon.
The silence stretches, and for a second, it’s not uncomfortable. I find myself wanting to drown in it, to let it coil around me like the pressure of deep water.
He rises to his feet, towering, then turns away—half-dismissed, half-dismissing. “You’ve been exposed long enough. The UV index is high today. You’ll burn.”
It should sound patronizing, but somehow it doesn’t.
I watch him walk the perimeter again, moving with purpose.
He doesn’t look back. He knows I’m still watching, and right now I’m not focused on his body, though he’s solid as stone, but on the discipline that drives him.
He won’t let himself be distracted, even as I find myself truly distracted for once.
I lie back on the stone, close my eyes, and laugh into the sky, letting the sound carry on the hot air. I don’t know if Cade hears it, but I suspect he does.
By seven, the estate surrenders to twilight, the pool's surface now a sheet of rippling mercury under heavens that shift from soft violet to bruised indigo. I head inside, hair still damp and skin stinging faintly from the sun and chlorine. My mother’s voice drifts from the solarium, brittle as ice cubes in expensive gin, and I pivot away, up the back stairs two at a time.
Even after three years of calling the Munro estate my home, I am reminded that there are spaces where I don’t belong.
On the second floor, I sit in front of my vanity and stare at the fading red line on my shoulder, evidence of Cade’s accuracy.
Of course, it wasn’t rocket science. A pale girl swimming under the Texas sun is bound to burn.
Still, for all his talk of respect and boundaries, he is the most invasive person I’ve met—the honest kind, the one who sees straight through any performance or provocation.
His presence alone makes it impossible to be performative, or seductive, or anything but aggressively myself.
And I hate that I like this.
My phone lights up with three notifications from my ex, Trevor, but I don’t open them.
Instead, I scroll through old photos and stop at my junior year yearbook picture: metal braces, dark circles under my eyes, flipping off the camera with practiced defiance.
The yearbook staff printed my quote underneath: "Break the rules, not yourself." I run my finger along the screen, wondering what that girl would think of me now—a woman who hides behind confidence, covering up old cracks, and who’s learned to use words as a shield because she’s tired of getting hurt.
From the window, I see Cade patrolling the outer fence.
He walks with the coiled restlessness of a man doing everything in his power not to think about the thing he’s actually thinking about.
Maybe that thing is me. Or maybe it’s just the ghost of an ex and the standard-issue loneliness they ration out in his line of work.
I wait until he’s made the circuit before slipping out, barefoot and braless and with nothing but a T-shirt and cutoffs.
The air smells like scorched grass and pool chemicals, and the sounds of the estate are muffled by the settling heat.
I find him at the edge of the garden, posted under the shadow of an eucalyptus, arms crossed, head up.
“What are you supposed to be guarding me from?” I ask, stepping into the gloom beside him.
He doesn’t move. “You’d be surprised.”
I look up. The first stars are out, flat and cold. “The only thing that scares me is becoming like her.”
Cade snorts quietly. “Then you’re nothing like her. Trust me.”
“You’ve known her three days.”
“Three days is enough.” He kicks at the dirt. “Some people advertise who they are before you even meet them.”
“And me?”
He studies me. “You want to be understood but don’t trust anyone with the job.”
I roll my eyes, but the read is uncomfortably close. “I just don’t want to be bored.”
He flashes a half-smile, the closest I’ve seen to a real one. “Then don’t.”
We stand that way for a long time, just leaning together in the dark, and I realize I’ve stopped trying to break his walls. I’m just letting myself be there, because he’s the first person in a year who hasn’t tried to fix me or pin me in place.
I break the quiet with a ridiculously awkward statement. "My mother claims white roses are her favorite flower, but I once overheard her tell a florist they're as exciting as unseasoned poultry.'"
“She says what people want to hear.” Not a question.
“Exactly.” I kick at a stray chunk of mulch, aiming for the same casualness. “What’s your favorite flower, Cade?”
He doesn’t answer right away. “Never thought about it.”
“That’s impossible.”
He’s working at something behind his eyes; I can hear the gears grinding, the restraint in every word. “I suppose I like anything that grows wild and manages not to die in this heat.”
“Even dandelions?”
“Especially those.” He glances down at me, and our eyes lock for a second too long. “They’re tougher than people think.”
I almost want to tell him that’s the most romantic thing I’ve ever heard, but I settle for snorting. “You’re such a cowboy under all that tactical gear.”
He huffs a laugh. “I prefer ‘hired muscle.’ Cowboy’s too much hat, not enough cattle.”
I tilt my head, feeling the corner of my mouth curl up. "So what you're telling me is you've got the substance without the showmanship? That's refreshing. I think I can work with that."