Rancher Daddy

by Lexi Whitlow

  “The beach? Seriously?”

  She gives me a teasing look, her eyes dancing. “I study there. It’s quiet during the day like this. And it’s finally warm outside. We should go. If you’re up to the challenge of body guarding at the beach.”

  There are a few other things I’d like to do to her body, but I’m well aware of how Avery feels—and what my contract says.

  “And you want me to come with you?”

  “No. Not really. But you can drive me. I’m not supposed to drive, remember? Not for a few days. So, you can take me and creepily watch me study. And you can tick off all the boxes my parents have for you.”

  “Fine. We’ll take your Range Rover. Your parents gave me the keys.”

  “Of course they did,” she says quietly. She hands me her laptop bag, and we head out. “Why don’t we take your bike?”

  “Out of the question,” I say, moving towards the parking garage. “Today was an emergency. We won’t be doing that anymore.”

  She stops me with a touch on the arm, peering at me with those wide blue eyes. “Come on.”

  “Fine. It’s closer anyway.”

  “And it’s like five minutes to the beach. We’ll be fine.”

  I sigh, but I like riding. When she hops on behind me, I like the feeling of her pressed against me too.

  Were there a list of things I shouldn't be thinking about as I take the woman I'm supposed to be protecting to the beach, then how good her arms feel wrapped around me would be pretty high on it. She holds on tight, her small hands clutched to my chest.

  "Man, you've got some muscles," she breathes, half to herself.

  "Thanks."

  "I don't really like muscles."

  I roll my eyes. The way her hands hold onto me, I would never have guessed it.

  I feel her breasts pressed against my back, tight enough to feel each excited breath. When we arrive she sits back, her eyes gleaming her chest still heaving.

  "That was quite a ride,” she says.

  On the beach she strips off her dress to reveal a bikini that’s not skimpy—it’s more classic. Like something Marilyn Monroe might have worn for a photo shoot. High-waisted red shorts, and a red and white striped top that was molded to fit her.

  Of course it was. It was custom made. I’d bet anything.

  I swallow through the dryness of my mouth and try not to stare.

  "What do you think?" She does a little twirl, and then her cheeks turn red. She isn’t supposed to be flirting with me—she catches herself. This is the girl I knew years ago, and I smile for just a second.

  “It’s your color.”

  “Thanks,” she says, a little shy.

  I watch as she lays down on her belly with a book open in front of her. She looks back at me, her gaze meeting mine for a little longer than it should. “You can sit wherever.”

  She doesn’t care—or doesn’t notice—that the several men on the beach are watching her. It makes my fists itch. But I sit on the sand and take off my shirt, stretching out, watching Avery.

  She’s reading an advanced text on the history and historiography of political science. For something to do with her book she’s writing or her dissertation or whatever the hell it is. From the deal her parents made, she doesn’t have to do anything. She’s doing it because she wants to. Because it’s fun for her to get ahead.

  It's no effort for her to be better than everyone else. Just like in school. Maybe she wouldn't have acted out so much if she had been remotely challenged. She switches to lying on her back, toes pointed to the water. She also switches books, taking out a text on politics and religion in early America.

  Nothing seems to be happening to warrant my attention and I let my mind drift. When I got out of the Marines, I was struggling to make ends meet. Avery has no idea what that’s like. It’s not her fault.

  Avery could guess how much I’m getting paid, but she knows nothing about my mother. Nothing about the fact that I was living in a shack in Los Angeles when I got out of the hospital. Unable to find a job because I could barely walk. Still, I was visiting my mother every day, sitting with her through chemo treatments, funneling every dime I had from my stipend to her home care.

  Now it’s all taken care of.

  And I can figure out what I want with my life, after I get this job done and say goodbye to Avery Thomas forever.

  What do I really want in life?

  Without meaning it to, my gaze has drifted back to the woman on the beach. The one with the cherry red bikini and the hair that almost matches it, lying back lazily, and reading about politics and religion.

  Chapter Six

  Avery

  Maddox hasn’t exactly been pleasant since that afternoon at the beach. I have a sinking feeling every time I think about it, like I must have glanced at him too many times.

  Sculpted body, outlined against a perfectly blue sky. Leaning back on the sand, sun reflecting off of each strong, fierce line of his body.

  He’s been somehow more intense since then, less likely to glance in my direction when he’s speaking to me. He’s followed at a distance, letting me attend class and wrap things up with my professors for the end of the semester. The thinly veiled insults and things he said to shock me—they’ve stopped coming too.

  Call me fucking crazy, but I miss it.

  He even let me get away to see my friend Ella today. Alone.

  I’d just started getting used to the idea of letting Maddox guard me, at least until the end of the election. But then he goes silent, cold. More distant than he was to begin with.

  It’s confusing as fuck.

  I stir my drink and look over at Ella. She’s scrolling through her phone. We’re sitting outside of a little cafe in Berkeley, and I look around, wondering if Maddox might be watching me. He could be. It is his job.

  “Looking for him?” Ella says without taking her eyes away from her phone. “You were talking about him the night before he appeared. Fucking creepy if you ask me.”

  “You brought him up,” I say. “You’re the creepy one.” I take a sip of my mojito. It’s refreshing, delicate. Full of citrus and mint and the promise of summer.

  “And where is he today, may I ask?” Ella puts her phone down and looks at me. Or I think she’s looking at me. She’s wearing sunglasses. It’s hard to tell what she’s looking at behind the lenses.

  “Dunno. Wandered off somewhere. Left me alone. It’s weird. He was on my ass about everything, and then he’s cooled it. We went to the beach—and then—” My voice trails off.

  “And then he saw you in your skivvies, and he couldn’t handle himself.”

  “Don’t be cute,” I say.

  “I’m not being cute. I’m being serious. He was in love with you back when we were kids.”

  I shrug, but I can feel my cheeks getting hot. I can still remember the feeling of his lips against mine. It wasn’t my first kiss, but it was my best kiss.

  “That was quite a while ago. And he disappeared.”

  “Yeah, but why?” Ella sips her drink and crosses one long leg over the other. “It’s always important to ask why when it comes to guys.”

  “He’s not a guy. He’s Maddox. He’s a hired bodyguard. He doesn’t see me that way. Not anymore.” I stir my drink again and take another sip.

  “Okay, Avery. What did you do to boys you liked when you were little? Like really little.”

  What did I do? I laugh. “Threw things at them in class, got them in trouble, teased them. That kind of thing. I’m not proud, but it’s true.”

  “And I’m going to guess you’re doing that to Maddox? I’ve seen you do it a thousand times. You’re so weird around men. They all follow you around like puppies, but you don’t know whether to take them home or slap them in the face.”

  “No—I’m just trying to figure out what to do with him in my life,” I sputter. “So I mean, I guess I’ve been a little bit—prickly.”

  She laughs. “And then you took him to the beach with
you? And stripped down to your bikini.”

  “It’s a conservative bikini.”

  “Your body is not conservative. And I can guarantee Maddox noticed.”

  “But he doesn’t see me that way.” I swallow hard and watch the beads of water gathering on my glass. He doesn’t see me that way, right?

  “Yeah, okay, sure. But you know, those first loves? We don’t forget them. Even if he thought he could forget you, I’m willing to bet he didn’t.”

  I sigh and sit back in my chair.

  “So what if he does think of me that way? He’s in this annoying, superfluous position.”

  “It’s not superfluous when your mom is a swing vote in a highly contested area. And it shouldn’t be annoying that someone is trying to protect you from your stalker. Or whoever else is out there.”

  “Muggings usually aren’t political,” I say. “No one knows if it was my stalker for sure. That’s what my parents told me.”

  “Okay, that’s all beside the point. What I’m telling you is that you have a thing for Maddox. And I’m guessing it’s more than reciprocated. That’s why he’s acting weird as fuck.”

  “What?”

  Several people turn their heads and look at me. I didn’t realize how loud my voice had gotten. Demurely, I sip more of my drink.

  "I do not like Maddox," I hiss under my breath. “He left a long time ago. I did care about him. But this is now. That was then. He’s irritating. All he cares about is following my parents’ rules.”

  “And keeping you safe. And—again—why did he leave?”

  “I don’t know. He won’t say. And he’s tight-lipped about why he took this stupid fucking job, too. I know there’s more going on there—but it couldn’t have anything to do with me.” I chew my lip, thinking. There’s a nervous jolt in the base of my spine. I hate that he makes me feel that way, after all this time. Like he’s a cute boy in my class, and I’m trying to figure him out. “Maybe I’m reading too much into it.”

  “You’re not,” Ella says quickly. “Something weird happened there. I heard his mom didn’t even know where he was for a while after he left, and then she disappeared too. And he’s back, just for a job with you?” She shrugs.

  “That all seems too weird. Like conspiracy theory weird.”

  Ella throws up her hands and laughs. “Probably aliens, man. But if it wasn’t aliens, it was probably someone making him leave town. That’s my thought on it, now that he’s back. Just a hunch.”

  “No,” I say, absently looking at the TV over on the wall. “I doubt that. I think he just left. Like some people leave—”

  “Well if you want my opinion on it—which you clearly do—you should fuck him and get it out of your system.”

  I nearly choke on my drink and disappear into my seat all at once. I usually tell Ella everything, but I don’t want to let her know that that’s the exact thing I’ve been thinking of doing since I woke up and realized it was Maddox in the hospital room.

  “Shit, look,” I say.

  Ella turns to the TV too.

  I've never been more grateful to see my mother than at that moment. She appears on the TV screen behind the bar, providing enough of a distraction for Ella to abandon her train of thought before saying something I don't want to hear. But, as ever with my mother, my gratitude at seeing her does not last long.

  "Senator Thomas," the reporter says, "the way you've run this campaign seems focused on national issues as much as local ones."

  Mother nods sagely—a look I've seen her practicing in the mirror before important interviews. "Well Mary, local issues affect national issues. If a politician in my position isn't trying to address those things her constituents need then her ability to do good is compromised. I don't apologize for seeing things from a local—and a national—perspective."

  A sinking feeling starts to claim my stomach. Surely she wasn't thinking about... No. She wouldn't. Not at this stage in the election. Not without meeting with me and Dad. There’s been talk about it, sure. But it isn’t something I thought she’d entertain so soon.

  "It's a tactic that has led some commentators to wonder," the interviewer continues, "if you are perhaps looking forward to a higher office in the future."

  "I can't comment on other people's wild speculation," she says. She’s carefully failing to answer the question and doing nothing to silence the alarm bells ringing at the back of my head.

  "Are you considering running for president in the next election?” asks the interviewer.

  My mother smiles. "I have no ambitions in that direction, unless my state and country call for me to do so. Then—we’ll see. I have a great team supporting me, so we would be prepared for a national run.”

  “Ladies and gentleman,” the reporter concludes, “I do believe that means yes.”

  Apparently the interview is not live as the program switches to the reporter being interviewed by a news anchor.

  'Do you think she's going to run, Mary?', 'Yes I do Bob' and so on. They bring up graphs and charts showing my mother's support base broken down by demographic, statistics showing how the gender issue might affect the outcome and endless analysis of my mother's positives and negatives. I could give them a few negatives. And just as I think that, there in a list of her positive personality traits is the word “family.” That means my father. And me. I nearly spit up my drink laughing.

  What a wonderful family woman she is, I think.

  A lump forms in my throat, and I taste salt and metal. The taste of fear. This means that the next two years won’t give me any kind of break. My life is just going to get worse. More and more like a damn cage.

  "No. She can’t run,” I moan.

  Ella looks at me, confused. "I don't think you get a whole lot of say. Your mother is a pretty determined woman. Once she makes up her mind, that's it. And she didn’t say she was going to for sure —”

  “She did. That’s what politicians have to say.” I down another few sips of my drink and groan again. “I can't stop her from running. But I don't have to be there when she does run. I can get out of here for the rest of the election—”

  “Avery, what are you talking about?”

  I close my eyes and think about all the times I tried to run away when I was a teenager. I’d walk down the street with my backpack. Just a change of clothes, a Diet Coke, and a few snacks. The cash I’d saved from babysitting. It seemed so possible then.

  It’s immature and brash, and it’s stupid. But the mere thought of sitting on my mother’s jet, hitting every spot in Northern California, making small talk about how amazing my mother is, letting old men leer at me, putting myself on parade — it makes my whole body seize up with rage and heart-pounding anxiety.

  All for them.

  No one has ever stopped to ask me what I believe. Hell, my parents didn’t even ever ask me what I wanted to be when I grew up.

  “There’s a place in St. Croix,” I start.

  “Avery, come on. How would you finish school?”

  “All I need after this term is an oral exam. After that, it’s my dissertation. Professor Chou will work with me on the first part. And my laptop is all I need for the next. If I’m out of the country — maybe that’ll send a strong enough message.”

  “You can’t just do that. Like just leave your whole life.”

  “I was going to once with Maddox. There’s no reason I can’t do it now.”

  “Avery, no.”

  “I’m twenty-five, Ella. It’s about time I started living life for myself.”

  I let that hang in the air, and then I quickly change the topic. Ella lets it drop, and I pretend like I didn’t say any of it.

  But my mind is working, and I’ll figure out where to go from here.

  Later, when Maddox comes to pick me up, the sun has gone down, and the air is chilly again. I wrap my long cardigan around me and let Maddox walk me home. I’m tired, and I look out at the city, wondering if I could leave it. Wondering if I could leave everyt
hing.

  Is it my home, or is it just a cage?

  "I saw your mother on TV tonight," says Maddox, as we walk home.

  “When?” My emotions are blank when I say it.

  "On my phone. Amazing what they can do with technology these days."

  "Sure is, Grandad."

  "You must be grateful she's not running for president,” Maddox says, utterly oblivious.

  I turn to look at him. "Are you trying to be funny?”

  He looks bewildered, which only makes me angrier for some reason.

  “Maddox, come on.”

  "She said..."

  “It's a politician's answer,” I say. “She's going to run. She’s been talking about it for the past fifteen years.”

  Maddox takes this in, and he doesn’t speak for a few minutes. We just walk in silence. I feel like I want to take his arm, but that’s stupid. And I won’t do it.

  “That is going to suck for you,” he says, finally. “I’m sorry.” He seems to mean it.

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” I snap back.

  "You're in a nice mood tonight, aren’t you?”

  “I am indeed,” I say. The streets are misty and cold. I think of St. Croix. It’s never cold there.

  He shrugs. "I can't imagine what it would be like to be in that position. I'm sure I wouldn't like it. Look, it's not my place, but if you ever need someone to talk to about this stuff then..."

  "Sure, and have you report back to my mother, I suppose?"

  "I would never—”

  "She's the one who pays you. You made it very clear who you work for."

  Maddox looks at his feet. "Well that's true, but..."

  "Oh don't give me the 'aw shucks' bit. It's wearing thin." My voice is angrier than I intend it to be.

  I can see him starting to get irritable now. "I get you've had a bad night but you don't have to take it out on me."

  “You’re the one who’s bringing it up. Badgering me.” I pull my cardigan tighter and try to walk a few steps ahead.

  Maddox catches up and takes me by the arm. “I’m here to protect you, and that includes anticipating your needs.”

  My heart thrums when he says that, and I’m silent for a moment. His eyes meet mine. He looks somehow older than he should be, and I remind myself what he’s been through. When I’m gone, I’ll make sure he gets whatever my parents offered to pay him. Somehow.