Tangled Like Us

by Krista Ritchie

  He’s also more professional in front of the families. Which I used to be.

  Until now.

  I fucked my client.

  Should regret that —I don’t.

  I push myself to add more while Jane is quiet. “Oscar isn’t someone I’d want to lose on the team. He’s one of the best we have.”

  Her brows jump. “Who else would you consider the best?”

  This isn’t ego-driven horseshit. When you’re in charge of a team, you better know what your men can and cannot do well. I wouldn’t put O’Malley, Kinney Hale’s bodyguard, behind the wheel in a fucking blizzard when I have guys who can drive ten times better under duress.

  I look to Jane. “The top three most vital bodyguards are currently all in Omega.”

  And I’m not naming my brother, even though I love Banks. Even though I believe he’s necessary and skilled in so many areas that I’m not—there are three men that he’d agree with me are irreplaceable.

  So I say, “Akara, Oscar, and Farrow.”

  Her lips part in a sudden, overwhelming realization. I understand why her eyes redden before she says the words. “They were all at the car crash.”

  I nod and cross my arms over my bare chest.

  By dumb luck, the three best men on the team had been on site at the wreck. Hell, Farrow had been in the wreck and came out with only a scratch.

  Alpha, Epsilon, and Omega have talked about what that night would’ve looked like if one of those three weren’t on the scene, and we all know it would’ve been a different picture.

  All of them had a hand in saving her family.

  I explain one detail further to Jane. How security learned that Farrow asked Oscar for a needle decompression kit to help Maximoff. No one but Oscar would’ve known what Farrow was requesting, and time had been critical.

  She takes a bigger breath. “I’m really grateful for all of you.”

  “I wasn’t there—”

  “You were with me that night, I remember. And Moffy needed the best to survive, but I needed you.” She sits up straighter in a jolt. “Professionally speaking. On a professional level, I needed you—and I also…I also still need you, which is also to say that you’re vital to me. Professionally.” Her eyes are huge.

  I nod a few times, my chest rising. “I didn’t want to be anywhere else that night but next to you.” I push myself to add, “As your bodyguard.”

  Jane taps her pen to her notebook. “So we’re in agreement that you’re the best bodyguard for me…” She trails off as I uncross my arms and climb further on the bed, leaning against the iron headboard. Right next to her.

  I nod in response, and the air boils somehow—I don’t fucking know how. We’ve already fucked. There should be no tension left, but we steal these glances that constrict my chest and scorch my veins.

  And then my eyes land on her open notebook. At the math equations scribbled in nearly illegible handwriting on pastel purple paper. “Before security texted, I asked if something is stressing you?”

  “Um.” Jane shakes out her jumbled thoughts. “Yes…” She takes a breath in preparation. “I suppose the idea that this was a one-time occurrence is weighing on me. I’m not used to one-night stands.” Her eyes drive into me, my chest burning.

  Fuck.

  “That’s not what this was,” I say and rub my lips. “That’s not what I wanted it to be.” I hate that what she thought we did here was something like a one-night stand. That didn’t even cross my mind.

  The notebook makes a hell of a lot more sense now.

  Her lips part a little. “You want to sleep with me again,” she realizes. “You want to take that risk…But if the Tri-Force finds out you’re having sex with me, they’ll fire you. Correct?”

  “Correct.” My voice is stricter, breath caged in my lungs. No one is covering my ass the way that Akara and I covered Farrow, and the leads are more protective of the girls in these families. “It would also do damage to the men on SFO.”

  She nods, understanding. “Because that’s two Omega bodyguards who’ve slept with their clients, and from your bosses’ vantage, that’s two too many.”

  “Exactly.” I nod. “But the fake dating op gives us more coverage to do what we want.” We can do this again. I want to do this again. I’m settled with this fact. It feels right. No indecision. No backtracking.

  Her eyes glimmer. “It gives us plausible deniability,” she says into a warm smile. “So we use the fake dating ruse as a way to keep having sex.” She closes her notebook and takes a lighter breath like something is rising off her shoulders. “I do think that this is the best thing to come out of the Cinderella ad. Wonderful, passionate sex. That no one can know about, of course.” She frowns. “Including Maximoff. I wouldn’t want him to have to keep a giant secret from all of security again.”

  “Then I won’t tell Banks.” It’s only fair. “For the same reason.”

  We shift nearer, her blue robe parts between her soft thighs and slips further open at her chest, her small breasts peeking out. My cock strains in my boxer-briefs, and my hand warms her thigh. She places her palm atop mine.

  Our eyes lock in an intense beat.

  “It’ll have to end eventually,” she says. “We can’t have sex, if we’re not fake dating. The risk of getting caught would increase tenfold.”

  I nod, more tense. She’s right. The end date has to be the breakup. A public breakup that security is choosing the date and time and details for. Then things return to the way they were.

  No touching.

  No kissing.

  Definitely not my cock in her pussy.

  These logistics aren’t the kind with a happily ever after for us. But at this point, I think we’re both willing to enjoy anything we can.

  “Sounds right,” I tell Jane.

  This is the only way I can keep Jane safe, the team safe, remain her bodyguard and fulfill a knockout desire we’ve both restrained ourselves from and hungered after.

  She begins to smile more brightly. “It seems we are dreadfully tangled, you and I.”

  Couldn’t agree more.

  22

  JANE COBALT

  “That is so unnecessary and categorically illegal,” I say aloud and adjust my clutch on the steering wheel, watching paparazzi drive on the shoulder of the bumpy two-lane highway.

  Reckless cars fight with each other to be closest to my blue Beetle and to Maximoff’s red Audi, my best friend driving in front of me.

  We stay in the right lane, and I concentrate and ride close to his bumper. Not letting anyone squeeze in between our cars.

  Thatcher and I would’ve just taken back roads and split up from Maximoff and Farrow, but with the sheer aggression and swarms of cameramen who like to play chicken and bumper cars, we would’ve been trapped in Center City for a troublesome decade. We’ve chosen a troublesome hour on a highway instead.

  As my brother Eliot would say, “Paparazzi are ravenous fiends out for flesh and blood.” That has never been truer.

  Especially since the Bed & Breakfast.

  The ploy worked as well as security planned. When we were checking out, I caught Oscar telling Thatcher, “Heard you almost all night. Incredibly believable. ”

  I’d hope so.

  At least Oscar, Donnelly, and Banks believe they just listened in on our pretend sex noises. We have no intention of ever telling them they overheard real grunts, real moans, real orgasms—I will most surely die with this secret.

  But Oscar’s predictions were right. The guests believed us. And so has the media and thusly, the world. Click-bait articles were trending for days.

  JANE COBALT AND HER BODYGUARD CAUGHT LEAVING A BED & BREAKFAST TOGETHER!

  And you’re not going to believe what the other guests overheard!

  I did swipe through some of the comments on posts.

  Vera K: Jane is living the dream!

  EarlyBird_4: Can’t believe she’s hooking up with her bodyguard. The crops are thriving.


  PrincessPeachez16: If my bodyguard looked like that, you best believe I’d be dating him too.

  HeyyyHey: Get it girl!!

  I glazed over most negativity and just basked in the positives for a while.

  These scandalous rumors incited the media, but the tipping point that caused paparazzi to drive in emergency lanes and feverishly crowd us—it came just yesterday.

  When I publicly confirmed the rumors.

  That I, Jane Eleanor Cobalt, am dating my handsome and oh-so-stern bodyguard. I wanted it to be more personal than a press release. So we became official via a Live Story on Instagram.

  Secretly overseen by security, of course. Their hand in everything reminds me this is a fake relationship.

  Totally, undeniably fake …

  I take a quick peek at Thatcher in the passenger seat. He’s surveying the rabid paparazzi and our extra security vehicles in tow. He clicks his mic, attached to the collar of his black button-down. Sleeves rolled up to his carved biceps.

  “You want to do a hand-off?” He’s radioing Farrow in the Audi. “…Copy.” When he drops his arm, his large hand just naturally rests on my thigh.

  Beneath my purple tulle skirt.

  I rub my lips together that rise. His touch sends electric jolts coursing through my veins. Reminding me that our sex has been overwhelmingly real.

  Every night since the Bed & Breakfast, Thatcher has snuck out of security’s townhouse and into my room. It feels illicit and clandestine, a covert mission that only we share, one that has scorched my bed with my eagerness and his strength and volcanic yearnings. Blazing strokes of skin to skin as we try to keep quiet, so no one overhears.

  And I’ve never been held against a man’s chest the way that he holds me.

  I’ve never had a friends-with-benefits ask how I felt. I was fully aware that they wanted me for fifteen minutes of fame or notoriety—to say they hooked up with the daughter of Connor Cobalt and Rose Calloway. But all I wanted from them was sex. I felt like I was using them too, and I chose these guys purposefully knowing I’d never fall for them.

  It was easier that way.

  But how Thatcher treats me is so catastrophically new from what I’ve experienced. I’ve never felt so appreciated before, during, and after sex.

  We’re very careful about being caught, and we have a routine. He must never fall asleep in my bed. As soon as the clock strikes 3 a.m., he must go back to security’s townhouse.

  I check my side mirrors, not able to smile or daze off for long. I’m incredibly wedged into the right lane by two silver SUVs and a four-door truck, and our extra security vehicles trail far behind us.

  The woes of not breaking the law when paparazzi do—they’ve lost an advantage. But as I check my rearview, I see our Range Rovers trying to catch up by driving in the emergency lanes.

  I stay fixed on the street and do my best to stand my ground.

  “I’m watching your left.” Thatcher eagle-eyes the truck that tries to creep in my lane. “You’re doing good, Jane.”

  I risk a glance his way, and our eyes catch for a sweltering beat. He looks deeper in me with a sort of powerful reassurance that makes me feel invincible. And safe.

  “Thank you,” I say, more breathless than I intend, and my cheeks heat while I crane my neck. My sight returning to the red Audi’s bumper. Stay with Moffy.

  Stay with Moffy.

  Stay with my best friend.

  I repeat my clear focus. Maximoff and I are en route to a costume shop. Since October is here, my best friend has a license again.

  Despite his speeding habit, it’s difficult to deny how skilled he is at offensive and defensive driving. He has maneuvered us through hoards of paparazzi since we left the townhouse, and if I didn’t follow him so closely, I would’ve been stuck long ago.

  I tap my brake a little, and an advance copy of Wildfire Heart slides on the dashboard of my car.

  Thatcher takes his hand off my thigh and grabs the romance book, slipping it in the glove compartment.

  I’ve already devoured the love story between a cocky firefighter and his best friend’s spunky sister. My second read-through, I’ve started taking notes. Just so I’m more prepared before I go in the studio.

  Thatcher adjusts his seat forward, bending his knees. “Are you okay with a hand-off in five?” He knows I’ve done them before, but not under these conditions. He adds, “It might be the only way to get off the highway.”

  Otherwise, the silver SUVs will continue to block us from the exits. I’ve realized this too. We could wait for police to pull them over, but that’s assuming they will.

  “Is a hand-off even possible at this speed?” I wonder.

  It involves bodyguards rolling down car windows and paying paparazzi to move out of the way, and if the cameramen are nice, they’ll even block other paparazzi vehicles for us.

  Thatcher explains, “Farrow is getting Maximoff to slow down to twenty.”

  I take a breath. “Then yes, I’m okay with one.” Sun crests the horizon, a harsh glare piercing the windshield, and I flip my car visor down, barely blocking the light.

  Thatcher hands me my cat-eye sunglasses and speaks into comms. “Jane is good to go in five.”

  After slipping on my sunglasses, I edge closer to the wheel. The Audi slowly decelerates, and I follow suit.

  I squint at another ray of light, and I shield my hand over my eyes. “How dangerously close am I to his bumper?”

  “A few inches.” He extends an arm over my seat and assesses our surroundings. “You’re still good, honey.”

  My eyes bug and lips part—he called me honey . So innately and instinctively and with such tenderness. I inhale without exhaling, and I can’t help but turn my head to Thatcher.

  His attention is plastered to the street. “Jane, brake. ”

  “Merde.” I slam on my brake.

  Thatcher plants a firm hand on the dashboard. I brake too late, and I crunch into Maximoff’s bumper. Both of our cars jerk forward from the light impact.

  My pulse has shot out of my butt, and I am a frozen chunk of ice. “Oh my God.”

  “It wasn’t bad. It’s alright, Jane,” Thatcher says, very huskily and seriously and not at all alarmed. I have a soldier in my car. He speaks lowly into comms, then checks back on me.

  “Oh my God,” I keep unhelpfully repeating, and I try to peer at the damage of Maximoff’s Audi. I use a phone voice-command. “Call Moffy . I can’t believe I rear-ended my best friend—”

  “It was my fault,” Thatcher cuts me off, looking down at me, then eyeing the road.

  “No, I should’ve been watching the street.” I do now. My eyeballs are attached to the concrete and the Audi and my mistake.

  Thatcher adds, “I distracted you.”

  I hear his voice in my head, You’re still good, honey.

  My heart skips. “Not on purpo—”

  “Janie?” Maximoff’s voice sounds through my car speakers. “Are you two okay?”

  “We’re fine,” I say, sitting straighter. Face on fire. “How are you and Farrow? How’s your collarbone?” Back in May, he broke the bone from the force of the seatbelt, and I feel sick at the thought of causing him any pain.

  “Totally shattered like a regular Humpty Dumpty,” Maximoff says with complete sarcasm. “I think I died back there.”

  I try not to smile. I need him to be serious about his injury. At least in this moment. Before I respond, I hear his fiancé.

  “You’re not dead; you’re breathing right next to me, wolf scout.”

  “Or maybe we all just died, and we’re in purgatory.”

  Farrow lets out a short laugh. “Or maybe you’re just a dork who wants to spend purgatory with me.”

  “Or maybe—”

  “Farrow,” I interject and instantly feel badly about cutting off my best friend, but I must. “How is he?”

  “He’s not hurt,” Farrow says very casually, as though we’re leisurely having a four-course meal in
the middle of nightmarish traffic. “You still want to do a hand-off?”

  I glance at Thatcher since he’s been watching the surrounding vehicles.

  He nods to me like it’s still possible.

  “Yes,” I answer.

  “I’m going twenty,” Maximoff tells me, his voice firm and more serious. “I can go slower if you need me to.”

  “This is perfect.”

  Thatcher takes out a few hundred-dollar bills from his wallet. “Three, Farrow.”

  “Eh, let’s do four. I don’t want to barter with these fuckers.”

  It sounds like code, but they’ve been doing this for years. Neither one needs to say three hundred dollars to understand they’re referring to cash.

  Thatcher instructs me to drift closer to the silver SUV, and the four of us work in unison, despite being in different cars.

  Our bodyguards roll down their windows, and paparazzi begin to roll down theirs. Camera lenses directed at our cars. Arms reaching out of the windows on either side, a few loud words exchanged, along with nods.

  The hand-off works, and the SUVs slow to clear a passage as we come upon our exit.

  * * *

  We have the costume shop to ourselves for a few hours. Darkly lit with black-painted walls and stocked to the brim with Halloween decorations, fog machines smoke the concrete floor and spooky laughter echoes from speakers.

  Maximoff and I rarely used to close down places, but lately, it’s been more necessary. Right now, over a hundred excitable teenagers are outside the glassed entrance, screaming our names and banging on the windows.

  If I do say so, I prefer this crowd to what the Cinderella ad initially roused.

  Maximoff and I browse a rack of steampunk costumes, and our bodyguards are in sight but out of earshot, standing at the locked glassed entrance and ensuring no one breaches.