Page 39 of Protecting Mr. Fine

I felt the heat of Zane’s anger on me as he spoke. “Easy for you to say when you have parents, a sister, two brothers, and four niblings back in Montana you can visit anytime. And let’s not even get started on all the extended Galloway and Hager families.”

I glanced at him in surprise. For the sake of professionalism, I tried not to share too much of my personal life. Zane knew my background, of course, but I’d had no idea he’d kept track of the details so well.

“Sorry,” I murmured.

He let out a huff. “Yeah. You’re good at sorries.”

I stared at him in time to see his cheeks flame. He buried his chin in his hoodie and kept his eyes on his plate. Lou shot me a questioning look, but I shook my head in dismissal. There was no way I could explain why our principal was angry at me without opening up a whole can of worms.

Lou cleared her throat and tried to dispel the tension she couldn’t have understood. “Niblings?” she asked.

“Nieces and nephews,” Zane muttered to his plate.

The rest of the evening was just as excruciating. As soon as politely possible, Zane disappeared into his room again. Lou asked me what was going on, but I fudged and said he was upset by the JKthing… which wasn’t exactly a lie. Zanewasupset about that and should be.

But his cousin wasn’t the only one who’d taken advantage of him that day.

As soon as Lou disappeared back to the gatehouse, I closed my computer and locked up the main house. I lingered in the main gathering room of the house in hopes Zane would reappear, but he never did.

The following day, after grabbing coffee and a premade smoothie, he disappeared back into the sunroom to work on his music. I might have followed him if I didn’t already have at least three urgent messages from Violet requiring my attention.

I hopped on a Zoom call with the European logistics team that lasted most of the morning. I passed on the information Zane had given me about Bodhi—that hehadbeen in the crowd at Shaky Knees, that he knew Zane’s private email address, and that he was conveniently playing gigs in Dublin and planned to meet up with Zane in Amsterdam. Violet agreed that he was our strongest suspect to date and tasked Boomer with finding and shadowing Bodhi. He agreed enthusiastically. “Trust me, boss. If that guy is the one messing with Zee he’s gonna be sorry.”

At least that one aspect of my day was going right.

At noon, Lou came into the house to spell me so I could take a long run on the roads. I needed some air. Some space. Some time to fucking think. My whole life, I’d leaned toward physicality. Whenever I was angry or frustrated or confused, I’d go outside and work it out by moving or pushing my body until all I could do was feel and not think.

It was how I’d become good at sports, how I’d ended up with the kind of discipline, strength, and focus to become an Olympic athlete.

Even now, when most of my time at work was spent standing or, god forbid, sitting, I made sure I had time to move and sweat. My job demanded peak physical performance. I had to be able to run and lift, hold off attackers or grab my principal and get them outof a bad situation. Lou, of all people, knew I needed time to keep up with my workouts, and that included at least one long run per week.

So I ran.

And ran. And ran.

I made my way down to the water’s edge and found the gravel footpath that wound its way along the shoreline. Only a few people were on it, and I pounded my way past them, arms swinging and muscles working. Eminem pumped through my earbuds. My workouts were the rare times each week I allowed myself to sacrifice situational awareness for the sake of indulging in fast-paced music. The lyrics from “Lose Yourself” mocked me. If my opportunity to shoot my shot only came once, then I was fucked.

Because I’d blown it.

I’d kissed him out of the blue. With no buildup or romance first. No way of determining whether he would accept my interest or not.

And clearly, he did not.

Zane’s reaction was exactly what I should have expected.

He’d seemed to be into it while it was happening, sure, but that might have been him getting caught up in the moment more than actual desire. In my worst imaginings, he’d simply been going along with it while telling himself it was “fine” that his bodyguard was basically assaulting him.

He hadn’t argued with me when I’d stopped the kiss, and that said a lot.

He hadn’t asked for more, or apologized himself, or even waved away my apology and told me it was no big deal that I’d crossed all kinds of professional boundaries.

Clearly, for him, itwasa big deal.

He’d been angry. And Zane Hendley was rarely angry at anyone. Ever.

Self-recrimination dogged me as my body pushed harder. Blood pumped through my muscles, and sweat poured from my skin. The worst part was, despite how guilty I felt, I wanted nothing more than to kiss Zane again. Now that I’d had a taste of him, now that I’d feltwhat it was like to cradle the back of his head in my palm while pressing my lips to his, I couldn’t even fathom the idea of never having it again.

But that way lay madness. I had to find a way to set aside my desire for him so I could do my job.

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