I watch him disappear into the crowd and feel that ache get worse. I wish that he and I could be like Anna and me, friends, siblings. Porter would make a great brother. But I've got a sinking feeling that he doesn't think of me that way at all. Getting married and having kids is the last thing I want to do with my life. That's my mother's life, not mine. Porter will probably grow up to be a rich and successful lawyer just like his dad and be disgustingly happy with a gorgeous wife and four brilliant kids, while I'll be a disenfranchised writer who lives all by myself or with a cat.
I just hope I don't live to regret this day.
“Welcome to the winter break Trigonometry course.”
I yawn, not from boredom, but because Anna and I were up half the night discussing Robert Lansky and the myriad reasons she has for not liking him, all the while both of us knowing she does. If ever there was someone who protesteth too much, geesh!
“We'll cover our normal three months’ worth of information in one month,” Mr. Massey goes on, “but I know you're all up to it.”
Even though everyone in the class knew what they were in for, sighs fill the room.
“Since this is the only course most of you are taking, it should be no problem.”
An hour and forty-five minutes later, I close my book, pinching the bridge of my nose. I can feel one of my bad headaches coming on. My hand is cramping. My stomach growls since I skipped breakfast this morning, not on purpose, but because I was running late.
Everyone pours out of the door like the prison gates have been sprung.
Anna is standing there in the hallway, looking dejected, waiting for me.
“What happened?” I say. “You're supposed to be at home by now.”
“I missed the train.”
“You said you were taking a plane home.”
“I was. I missed that too.”
I shake my head, but I'm not sorry to see her there.
“What are you going to do now?”
Anna plunks her bags down on her bed and goes to the window. “My parents are already in Colorado. And flights out there are canceled because of all the snow.”
“I have to say, I'm relieved.” Even though the prospect of spending the next two weeks alone in our dorm room didn't really bother me. I’m fine with that kind of alone. I like being by myself as long as there are other people nearby. “What are you going to do?”
“Wait for another flight, I guess.”
“At least this way, we'll have a few more days together.”
“Have you talked to Porter since last night?” Anna says.
“No. Is he stuck here too?”
“I talked to Robert after we left the coffee house last night. He says Porter told him that his dad is sick. They don't expect him to die or anything, but they don't know what's wrong with him, and Porter's pretty torn up about it.”
So that's what was really bothering him. I should've asked. What kind of friend am I? Now that ache is even worse.
“What did you and Robert talk about last night?” I flop down on my bed and open my laptop, trying to distract myself from how lousy I feel. Maybe I’ll finally contact an alien race today who can transport me off this rock.
Anna grins and looks away, opening the blinds above my desk. I can tell that she definitely likes Robert but doesn't want to say. Then, as if to get me off the subject of Robert, she grabs hold of my arm and stares out the window, eyes wide like she's seeing a monster. “That guy's still out there.”
“Where?” I can't see anything from where I'm sitting. “I can't see his car.”
“That's because he's not in it. He's right there.”
I stand and follow Anna's finger to where it points down at the old oak tree in front of our building that separates the sidewalk from the parking lot.
He's there alright, all six and a half feet of him, staring up at us. Most people, when caught in a blatant stare, look away. It's just what you do. It's expected even. But this guy doesn't look away, not even for a second. In fact, he pushes off the tree trunk he's leaning against and comes towards the building.
Who is this guy? And who does he think he is?
I don't feel so lousy anymore. I'm mad now.
Chapter 2
∞
I run from our room and down the stairs. I can hear Anna's footsteps behind me. Maybe it's because the campus is deserted, and if I make a scene no one will be around to witness it, or maybe it's because I'm sick and tired of being followed, but something inside me just snapped, and this guy is finally going to answer for his stalking ways.
When I reach him, I'm still catching my breath from my sprint.
Though his tall, black-clad figure stiffens, I don't manage to surprise him. He stands his ground.
“What are you doing following me around everywhere I go?” I pant.
He's standing with his back to the wall beside the exit door. He's wearing a hooded coat with the hood up. The jacket's got patches on it. Most of them I don't recognize except for one, the symbol for infinity, the sideways number eight. I can't see his face yet.
Then without looking up at me, his deep voice drawls, “Doing my job.”
My fists fly to my hips. “And what, I pray, sir, tell me, is that?”
He pulls the hood back and looks at me now. In fact, he glares at me as if I've insulted him. His hard set eyes are like blue glowing nightlights in the dark. His ruggedly handsome face looks so familiar to me. I know I've seen him before, but I can't place him. “Shakespeare?” he asks.
I nod without thinking.
How strange he is! What planet is he from?
“Who are you?” I say.
When he straightens to his full height, he towers over me. He's got to be a full eight inches above every other guy here. “I am your bodyguard,” he says flatly as if it's the most natural thing in the world.
Behind me, Anna gasps.
I try not to let bad news like this surprise me anymore, but this is big. This is school-career-ending big.
“My what?” I sputter.
He doesn't answer again just looks at me with an icy stare that chills my entire body.
The next thing that happens is the same thing that happens every time I get scared—I get angry, or in this case, angrier. My hands clench into fists at my sides. “I don't need a bodyguard.”
Dark brows lift over brilliant blue eyes. “The powers that be think differently.”
I don't have to ask to know who those powers are. The fact that I have not been told that I in fact possess a bodyguard is merely par for the course. My stepfather operates on a need to know basis. What I don't need to know, I'm not told. But it works both ways. In my years with him, I've learned a thing or two from the Major General Warren Hollins about personal relations—chiefly, how to avoid them.
“Well, you can stop now,” I say, and I mean business.
He shakes his head in utter disbelief. “I can what?”
“You can stop being my bodyguard now. I don't need one. I've got pepper spray.”
His brows draw together in an agonized expression. “That is not for either of us to decide,” he says.
“Look, whatever-your-name-is, I'm going inside now to make a phone call, and you can quit now and have the rest of the day to yourself to do whatever it is you do, or you can quit later. It makes no difference to me. But it will happen either way.”
“Mike Donovan. Or if you wish, you may call me Van.”
If I wish?
Where is this guy from?
“Van,” I say, trying my best to keep my temper in check, (If there's one thing the M.G. has taught me, it's that people can only hear you when your voice is calm. The moment you start yelling, they stop listening.) “will you do me a favor and get out of here before any more students see you. I promise not to tell my father anything. If he asks,” (which I know he won't) “I'll tell him you're here.”
“I cannot do that,” he says in an odd but gentle tone. “My orders are to stay with
you.”
I fight the urge to scream. If this guy is anything like the M.G., he takes orders very seriously, and that's an understatement.
I sigh, a big heavy one, the kind I learned from my mother. It's a tension reliever. Whenever there's something wrong, you can always gage how bad it is by her sighs. The longer and more drawn out they are, the worse the problem is.
I take Anna by the arm and toss my hair over my shoulder. With my head held high, I walk back to our dorm.
He follows us.
At the door to our dorm, I turn, ready to tell him where to go, but something stops me. I've got a better idea. I'll lose him, and then the M.G. will have no choice but to fire him.
Inside our dorm room is the only place I know for sure Van can't hear me and Anna. I close and lock the door just to be sure he can't get in.
I turn to Anna. “Want to go for a hike?”
“To the mine?”
“Sure. And let's go to the tower first.”
“Okay.” Anna sounds excited.
“Let's go out the back.”
“Why?”
“I don't want anybody following us.”
“You mean him,” she says. “Why don't you just call your stepfather?”
“And say what? Why do I have a bodyguard? The Major General won't give me a straight answer. Besides, he doesn't hear me when I speak.”
“You have every right to make your voice heard and to live your life without someone looking over your shoulder at every move you make.”
Anna's belief in the rights of all is one of the things I like about her. But she doesn't know the Major General the way I know the Major General. “I know that. And you know that. But that's not part of the M.G.'s reality. He sees me as an extension of himself, not as a whole other person with thoughts and feelings of my own. Whenever I speak to him, I can almost hear him thinking about how to argue with me.”
“What are you going to do?”
“What can I do? If my idea works, I’ll be rid of my bodyguard in a couple of hours. If it doesn't, the major general gets a phone call.”
“Why do you think he sent a bodyguard to look after you?”
“My thoughts exactly.”
“Do you think there's been some kind of threat made to the school that only he knows about?”
I shrug. “Have you heard anything?”
“No.”
“Then there must not be anything wrong, or else we would've heard about it by now.”
“Let's go. A walk will clear our heads.”
Anna's right. No matter how bad things get at home or at school, I can always think better after a walk. Most of the time, the solution to whatever problem I'm having comes while I'm walking.
I push the mini-blinds back to peer down at the parking lot where we left Van.
“You know, he's not half-bad,” Anna says. “And I saw him looking at you when we left. I think he likes you.”
“Ugh! He's old. He's got to be at least twenty-one. And I don't like older men.”
Still. I sigh. There is something about him that makes me wonder what it would be like.
He's still there, where he's been for the past week and a half. At least now I know what he's doing here. I don't have to worry that he'll murder me and Anna in our sleep like Ted Bundy did. But I’ve got a whole other problem on my hands now. I’ve got two men who I'll be forced to deal with in the foreseeable future, both of whom won't hear my side of things no matter what.
Anna is lacing up her hiking boots.
I follow suit, adding a heavy coat to the sweater I'm already wearing. It gets cold in the South in winter, but the coat will also serve another purpose. I slide the pepper spray my mom bought me, the one that looks like a lipstick, into my coat pocket. A lot of young woman have been assaulted in the woods, and I don't plan to be one of them.
“Did you notice how he smells?” Anna says.
“You mean like maybe... cheese or something?” I laugh.
Anna rolls her eyes.
“What type? Gorgonzola? Cheddar? Cause I thought you said Robert smelled like swiss cheese. If Van smells the same, I'm going to get the two of them mixed up.”
She shakes her head and laughs at me. “I was wrong. Robert doesn't smell like cheese.”
“Not anymore, you mean.”
“Cut it out.” Anna laughs again. “I think he smells like men's soap, you know, like cologne.”
“Well, if you don't mind, I'll reserve judgment until I can sniff him myself.”
But I hope I never get that chance. I hope I never see that man again.
We reach the tower ruins in time for the rain to start.
I'm glad I'm wearing my coat now, and not just because it hides my pepper spray. I look around us. Nothing, not a sign of him. If my plan worked and I've ditched Van, he'll have to call the major general and tell him he doesn't know where I am. I could be rid of my bodyguard by the end of the day.
Now that I’m gloating, I turn my attention back to the tower. The hieroglyphs carved into the tower walls always give me goosebumps. Whether they're fake or not doesn't seem to factor into it. I react to them regardless.
“What do you think of Van?” Anna says, her breath coming out in smoky puffs.
What do I think of him? That's a good question, one I don't have an answer for.
“Apparently,” I say with a wry smile, “he smells good.”
Anna laughs. “I mean what do you think of him.”
“To tell you the truth, I'm trying not to.”
Anna nods knowingly.
“No, I don't mean that way. It's because he's a little old.”
“He's no older than my brother. He's in college.”
“How old is Brian?”
“Twenty-one.”
“That's old.”
Saying Van's name must have conjured him because I can sense him again. He's definitely out there somewhere in the woods, watching us, following us. I know it. I can't see him, and I can't hear him, but I can feel his presence. The feeling's a little like when you're a kid and you're being chased playing tag. You just know when you're about to get tagged from behind because all the muscles in your back tense up right before it happens, and you hold your breath, then wham! You're it.
We climb to the top of the crumbling stairs. Looking up from where we stand is a surreal feeling. All you can see is the sky above your head, this time, with the added drops of rain splattering our faces, but that doesn't stop us. We both start to laugh.
“There's monsters in the woods—goblins.” Anna's voice is calm, like she's reciting a children's poem.
“I know.” I also know Anna's not trying to scare me, not that stuff like that does anyway.
“Robert said he saw Big Foot in the woods not far from here.”
“Porter said that they watched him get out of a space ship. I guess I can see that—they wouldn't be from around here.”
“Have you been out to the standing stones near your house?” Anna asks.
“Of course.” The hairs on the back of my neck and arms stand up. “They're not what I was expecting though. They're not any taller than we are. Still, it's fun to watch the sheep graze around them.”
A high-pitched sound catches out attention, and we get quiet.
“What was that?” Anna whispers.
“Sounds like crying.”
We look around. The sound is getting closer.
“I've heard that right before people see a big foot,” I whisper, “they hear a cry that sounds like a baby.”
We look down the winding staircase, and there stands a tiny kitten.
“There's your big foot,” Anna says.
I lift the surprisingly lightweight ball of fluff. It couldn't weigh more than a pound. It meows and meows like it desperately wants to tell me something.
“It's a boy,” Anna declares.
He burrows his head against my neck.
Anna strokes his back, but he doesn't react. He actually looks up at
my face and meows, this time with even more determination.
“He must be hungry.” All I’ve got in my pocket is the wrapper from a protein bar and half of my bottle of water. I unscrew the lid and pour some water into it, holding it out for him to drink.
He does.
I refill it, and he empties it again. “Slow down,” I say.
“Poor fellow,” Anna says, “he must be starved.”
Tiny droplets of rain escape the branches over our heads and splatter onto the arms of my coat, letting me know that the weather's turning. “We better get back,” I say. “Get this little guy someplace warm.” I hold him up to look at him and we touch noses.
I try to keep the water from splashing George as we walk—that's his name, I decide. It suits him. He's got white fur with big patches of black on his sides that remind me of the heard of Holsteins we pass on the highway on our way to and from school. I want to wrap him up in my coat and keep him dry. But he squirms so much, I’m pretty sure he's gonna hate being trapped. I open the wide pocket on the outside of the coat. But before I can put him inside, I have to take out the pepper spray. “Let's take him to the cave with us until the rain stops.”
Anna agrees.
As we begin to walk, footsteps crunch in the woods below us. I can't see outside the tower without poking my head out, still, I know who's out there.
Van!
How could I forget about my bodyguard?
The kitten is so tiny, so helpless, that all of my attention was so focused on him, I’ve forgotten all about my plan to lose Van.
I put George safely inside the outer pocket and surprisingly, he's still. I pop the top on my pepper spray.
The footsteps get closer.
My hand is poised on the trigger. I’m ready.
As we duck into the entrance to the cave, I can hear him coming. And the moment he appears, I press the button.
He cries out in pain, but his fingers take my arm with gentle authority.
I try to take a step back to get away from him and stumble on a loose timber from the old mine's entrance.
His protective grip tightens on my upper arms with hands like steel that press me closer to him to keep me from falling.
The Bodyguard: an alien romance Page 2
