Bodyguard, Not Boyfriend

by Elana Johnson

  The couple looked up, and Sheryl recognized the women. Lisa Talley, another Carter’s Cove local.

  Gage’s eyes met hers, and he froze too.

  Sheryl spun away from him, everything from her past crashing through her memory.

  “Sheryl,” he called, but she didn’t wait, turn, or go back. She couldn’t face him right now, and she needed to get out of the crowd before she started crying.

  Chapter Sixteen

  “Hey, I need a minute,” Gage said, tracking Sheryl as she moved through the crowd. Dang, the woman could move fast when she wanted to.

  Lisa looked up at him. “All right. Who’s Sheryl?’

  “My real girlfriend,” he said, slipping his arm out hers. “Can I have a minute? You’ll be okay?”

  “Oh, my heck, yes. Go.”

  And Gage went, jogging through the crowd, easily keeping Sheryl’s ponytail in sight. “Sheryl,” he said again when he got close to her, and this time, she turned back to him. “Wait a second.”

  “Are you seeing Lisa Talley?”

  “She’s my new client,” he said, his chest heaving though he hadn’t been running particularly fast or for very long. “Her old boyfriend is giving her trouble. She asked me to pretend to be her new boyfriend.”

  “How convenient.”

  “It’s not what you think.” He looked at her, so many emotions storming inside his chest. She was so beautiful, and so upset. “I’m not cheating on you.” How could he tell her that he’d fallen in love with her now? She’d cut him out of her life for the past four days, and a river of hurt flowed through him.

  She swiped at her eyes and lifted her chin. “You’re not?”

  “Of course not.” He shook his head. “I can’t believe you’d think I would.”

  “Yeah, well, you thought I’d let Rudy and Teddy take me from my office.”

  Anger joined his hurt feelings. “I didn’t mean that.”

  “You’re just ‘doing the best you can,’ right?”

  “Yes,” he said, barking the word. “And you’re the one who couldn’t even introduce me as your boyfriend to your sister.”

  “I did,” she said, though Gage’s recollection of those awkward moments in the hall was that Sheryl had just stood there—at least until she felt the need to remind him of what he was to her.

  Subservient.

  Her bodyguard.

  He’d been wrestling with his feelings of inadequacy alone for days, and they all reared up and started shouting at him.

  “If I’m not good enough for you, you should just say it,” he said, not bothering to make his voice quiet or kind.

  “I’ve never said that.”

  “No, you just act like it every time we’re together in front of someone you care about. You’re worried about me making you look bad.”

  Sheryl shook her head. “I thought we were past that.”

  “We were, until you couldn’t tell Celeste who I was. And you won’t go to South Port with me. Instead, you’re up here at this hoity toity farmer’s market. We never go to my place; always yours.” He shook his head, because all of these poisonous thoughts had been festering inside for days. He hated them and wanted them gone, but saying them out loud to Sheryl wouldn’t fix anything.

  In fact, he felt like he was breaking their relationship.

  “Look, Lisa’s paying me for two weeks of a fake relationship,” he said. “It’s good money, and I took the job.”

  “Good for you,” she said.

  “You’re lucky you don’t need two jobs, Sheryl,” he said, wishing she’d at least try to see how everyone else lived, recognize the problems they dealt with. “Some of us aren’t Heartwoods, you know.”

  Pure fury crossed her face. “Go back to your other girlfriend. And I don’t need you to come over tonight.”

  “Are we breaking up?” he asked. It would almost be a relief. Maybe then, he could stop thinking about her. Wondering if he should call or stop by the inn. Losing sleep.

  “Yes,” she said. “We’re breaking up.” She turned and strode away, her designer purse swaying violently on her arm.

  Gage watched her go, part of his heart withering to dust. Several moments later, Lisa joined him. “Looks like it didn’t go well.”

  “No,” he said. “It didn’t.”

  By that evening, Gage realized that not just part of his heart had turned to dust, but the whole thing. He slumped on the couch, staring at the TV while Michael talked about something. He honestly wasn’t listening, because if he did, he’d only be annoyed on top of angry and broken-hearted. He just wanted to be alone. Have his kitchen and his bathroom to himself again. His afternoons to bake something, make a mess, throw a ball to Britta.

  Ever since he’d gotten that text from Tyler, everything in his life had changed. He’d changed.

  “Gage?”

  He finally turned and looked at his brother. “Hmm?”

  “Did you hear what I said? I’ll be out of your hair soon.”

  He straightened, part of him not wanting his brother to go, when literally ten seconds ago, that was all he wanted. “You will? Why? Did you talk to Marie?”

  “I did, and we’re going to try to make things work.” Michael smiled at him. “So I’ll get packed up tonight and tomorrow. Take the ferry back in the evening.”

  “That’s great,” he said, and he meant it. “I’m glad, Michael. You and Marie have always been so good together.”

  “Like you and Sheryl.”

  Gage gave a short, barking laugh. “She broke up with me.”

  “What?” Michael looked truly shocked. “When?”

  “Tuesday,” he said though today was Saturday. “I don’t know. We’re from two different worlds.” He didn’t want to look around his tiny beach house and compare it to hers. He paid for his. Hers belonged to her family. He shouldn’t be bitter that she had more than him. The Heartwoods had obviously worked for a lot of years to have what they had. He didn’t begrudge anyone for having things, especially when they’d worked hard.

  And Sheryl worked hard, so he wasn’t sure why he was so annoyed with her.

  “I’m sorry,” Michael said, turning off the TV. “Maybe it’ll be like me and Marie. Maybe she just needs some time to think through things.”

  “Maybe.” Gage watched Michael stand up and head for the bedrooms.

  “I’m going to go pack.”

  “Okay.” Gage leaned back into the couch again, his mind constantly rotating around Sheryl. He didn’t think she needed time to think through anything. What she needed time to do was overcome her embarrassment of him.

  She’d never had a problem with him when he was just her bodyguard. Or when they kissed in the privacy of her office. Or hung out at her house. Other than those times, the only time she was comfortable around him was with her mother and grandmother. He still hadn’t met her father yet, and that was probably a good thing.

  He sighed, and Britta perked up. “Yeah?” he asked, though he wasn’t sure what the dog was trying to say. “Should we take a walk down the beach?”

  Britta got up, an earnest look on her face, and took a few steps toward the back door. That was definitely her doggy version of Yes, please. Walk.

  Gage got up too and followed her. He left her leash in the house, because she wouldn’t go too far from him. Very few people used this beach in the evenings. Only locals, and while his house did sit two hundred yards from the waves, it wasn’t a ritzy or a well-kept beach.

  “Let’s go then. Mike, I’m going for a walk.”

  “Okay,” his brother called from inside the house. Gage left, pulling the door closed behind him and making sure he had his phone. He did, and he went down the steps, feeling an ache in his muscles he wished would go away.

  He probably shouldn’t have taken that job with Lisa Talley. The money was good, but he could’ve dipped into his pension, which he’d been saving. But he’d been so upset with Sheryl. Regret filled him as the sky continued to darken by degrees.<
br />
  “I need to take some time off,” he said to himself, only the wind for a companion. Britta had taken off down the beach, chasing a gull. He whistled to her, and she came running back, a huge grin on her face.

  “Stay by me,” he said, squishing his way through the softer sand toward the wetter, more packed stuff closer to the water’s edge. Once he reached it, he turned north and started walking. If he went all the way around the horn of the island and back down the east side, he’d run into Sheryl’s place. He’d mapped it once, and it was just over three miles, and certainly not something he’d do on a nightly stroll.

  He breathed in the night air, wishing the rising moon would give him some advice. The thought that he didn’t need to work as much came to him again, and he swiped on his phone. After navigating to his bank app, he pulled up his accounts and paused.

  “Brit, wait,” he said, and the dog slowed and trotted back to him. He scanned the numbers in his two accounts, one savings and one checking. He wasn’t an extravagant man, and he could get by with just the ferry job.

  Looking up, the night seemed so much darker as his adjusted away from the phone screen. “Okay, girl,” he told the dog. “No more extra jobs. Just the ferry in the morning. You’ll have to stop pigging out on my leftovers.”

  And he might have to cut back on his baking. He hadn’t been doing that since he’d started dating Sheryl, and his grocery budget had been much smaller.

  Problem was, if he didn’t have another job in the afternoon, and no girlfriend, baking was all he had left to fill his time.

  “So you’ll find another hobby,” he said. “A free one. Walking on the beach. Painting at South Port.”

  Something. He’d figure out something, because he didn’t particularly enjoy being someone’s fake boyfriend, even in the money was good.

  Except for Sheryl. He’d be her fake anything, for free.

  He sighed again and started walking. Britta went with him, her nose touching his hand as if she understood what he was feeling. He wasn’t sure she did, because he could barely identify the emotions streaming through him.

  “I know,” he said. “I miss her so much.”

  The last few days had been brutal, and Gage had texted everyone he’d ever done a job for, even a small one. He’d drummed up Lisa pretty quickly after that, and he’d only had to spend one afternoon with himself.

  There was a marked difference between Lisa and Sheryl, and there had been from the get-go. Sheryl made his blood run hot and his heart pound in a way no other woman had. Lisa was pretty, but she wasn’t his type.

  “Sheryl’s not either,” he muttered, but it simply wasn’t true. Just because she was soft where he was hard didn’t make them incompatible.

  Maybe Michael was right. Maybe Gage just needed to give her some time to cool off, and then he could try to win her back.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Sheryl weeded with a vengeance, determined to clear the overlooked bed that hadn’t been tended to in weeks. The inn’s three swimming pools sat down the sidewalk a ways, and this area of the grounds wasn’t used by guests. But it should still look pristine, and Sheryl wiped the sweat off her forehead and reached a gloved hand for another weed.

  Javier hadn’t been to work in days as he dealt with becoming a new father. Sheryl had gone to visit him and Melinda and their new baby boy in the hospital, and she was going again that night.

  She had to have something scheduled in the evenings so she wouldn’t go crazy. Or go find Gage and beg him to come back to her. Which was also crazy. She’d sat down with a pen and a paper—no computer. No phone—and she’d made a list of all the reasons they weren’t right for each other.

  She read it every day when she got to work, just to remind herself that she could make it through the hours that came after two p.m. without him.

  She’d done it for four days now, and each one had been excruciating. The time moved so slowly, and the activities around the island didn’t hold the same magic without him at her side. So she’d stayed home, but being caged by walls had been terrible.

  After eating one dinner with her parents and grandmother, she’d decided she couldn’t stomach doing that more than once or twice a week. Three times, if she was desperate. She loved her parents, but her mother asked a lot of questions, and her father kept inviting her to go fishing. And without Gage occupying her time, Sheryl had actually considered going.

  That was when she’d realized she’d hit rock bottom.

  Last night, she’d invited Tyler and Abby over for dinner, and it had been the first time she didn’t feel like suffocating inside her own house.

  So tonight, she’d take Melinda dinner and spend time with her friends. She wouldn’t be alone, and everything would be fine.

  Except Sheryl knew it wouldn’t be. Somehow, in the short time she’d known Gage Sanders, he’d embedded himself in her heart. Sheryl had considerable access to the gossip circles around the island, and while she never wanted to be featured on them, she’d been able to find out about Lisa Talley and her ex-boyfriend with two texts and ten minutes of her time.

  She hired someone to be her boyfriend, Victoria had texted. Between you and me, of course. It’s a secret, so Rob won’t know. Shh.

  Sheryl wasn’t going to tell anyone. In fact, she hated herself a little bit for even texting the former homecoming queen that had never left the island and still acted like they were in high school. But Victoria Gibson knew all the gossip, and she’d given it to Sheryl easily.

  How her relationship with Gage had stayed off Victoria’s radar, she wasn’t sure. Probably because Sheryl worked seven days a week, and Gage was an unknown on the island.

  He’d always accused her of thinking him beneath her, and the moment she thought it, her blood turned hot. She didn’t care if they went to her beach cottage or his. She never had.

  No, she hadn’t been to South Port, and the idea to spend one of her now-free afternoons down there entered her mind again. It wasn’t the first time the thought had come to her, and she was starting to think someone was prompting her.

  She groaned as she stretched her back and looked up into the sky. “Is that what You want me to do?” she asked, as if she had a relationship with God and He’d tell her.

  “Fine,” she said when she felt nothing, and no one answered. “I’ll go to South Port.”

  A few more days passed before Sheryl actually went through with her promise to herself. But Sunday afternoon found her tipping the pedicab driver and turning toward the beach in South Port. Somewhere along the boardwalk, a band played, and she started walking toward the sound.

  This area of the island did have a unique feel. It was older, and it used to be the vibrant, lively part of the island, before one of the major hurricanes had wiped it out. Main Street had been moved inland a bit, and father east, toward the inn.

  Her family had benefitted from that move greatly, and she didn’t have to be ashamed of that. She wasn’t. But she could acknowledge it.

  The boardwalk along the beach here led right down to the sand, where groups of people had gathered to enjoy the sun and the surf. One group listened to a teenage boy plucking on his guitar, and Sheryl found herself smiling in that direction. She would’ve loved to have come to South Port when she was a teen. Her father wouldn’t have approved, and as one of the younger sisters, such an act—even in the middle of a Sunday afternoon like today—would’ve gotten her some attention.

  As it was, Sheryl had learned to follow and obey rules. She loved gardening, and it just worked out that the inn needed someone with her green thumbs to run the landscaping and grounds crew.

  “One dollar sliders,” a man said, handing her a flyer. “Down the boardwalk at the food truck.”

  Sheryl wondered if this was the same truck where Gage got his beloved hot dogs. Her stubborn streak reared its ugly head, and she squashed it down. She’d come to South Port to enjoy herself, not obsess about Gage.

  But this place screamed his name
, and she could imagine an evening here with him. It would be romantic and wonderful, and Sheryl’s chest pinched. She felt like she hadn’t drawn a full, proper breath since the farmer’s market just over a week ago, and the only person who could help her get the oxygen she needed was Gage.

  She continued down the boardwalk toward the band and found half a dozen food trucks set up in a semi-circle. The beach spread before them, and easily twice as many people dotted this beach as the one she’d left behind.

  The long storm wall filled with murals stretched down the other way, past the food trucks, and Sheryl determined she’d get something to eat and then admire the art on the beach. Food. Art. Beach. No wonder Gage loved this place.

  She spotted the truck where she could get the footlong, and she joined the line there. She’d only eaten from food truck like this a couple of other times, and she hoped she wouldn’t embarrass herself too badly.

  After managing to order and pay, she got her hot dog and walked down into the sand. It was hot and covered her sandaled feet. The wall ran before her on the left, and it was filled with vibrant colors and pieces of art that overlapped each other in various messages of hope and love.

  She saw things like Soda Snake and Burgers and Birds, two places she’d loved as a little girl. She hadn’t thought about them in a long time, and a sense of nostalgia hit her when she hadn’t been expecting it.

  All the benches were full, so she found a spot on the boardwalk and sat down to eat her footlong. She smiled as she squeezed ketchup and mustard out of little packets to go with the sautéed onions she’d requested.

  “Here we go,” she said, wishing with everything in her that Gage was there with her. It felt like a moment that would bond them forever, and Sheryl paused.

  “I’m in love with him,” she whispered, feeling it and knowing what she’d just admitted to herself was true.

  Then she took a bite of her footlong, the heat of the dog almost burning her mouth. “Oh, my heck,” she said, her mouth still full. That was the most delicious thing she’d eaten in a long time. As she ate the twelve inches of meaty goodness, all she could think about was how she could get Gage back into her life.