Page 17 of You Found Me

He nodded and vanished around the side of the house.

She was going to lose her mind if this quarantine didn’t end soon.

She glanced over her shoulder at the house. The reason for this week of torture was in there somewhere. Donovan Ward, killer of fun. Her warden.

His favorite word wasnoand his favorite color was notice-me-not navy. His goal in life was to blend in, which was oddfor a man who could have been Mr. December on a brooding heroes calendar. He was designed to stick out. He was tall and broad, and he had an I-can-bench-press-your-car body. When he’d unfolded out of the car that first day like the underwear-model version of GI Joe, she’d thought things were about to get a lot more interesting.

Then he’d opened his mouth.

She’d promised her sisters that she’d be “sensible” and “safe” so they wouldn’t have to worry.

Someone should have told her that “sensible” and “safe” meant stay away from all human contact for weeks on end. She’d have refused on sheer principle.

It had been a week and nothing had happened. Nothing wasgoingto happen either. The longer she stayed here, the clearer that was.

“Enough of this,” she told the pool.

She stood and stalked into the house.

She found her warden staring at his computer in what used to be the formal living room. Piper had converted it into her social media streaming room by enclosing the open space with walls and a door and filling it with enough equipment to run a TV studio.

Her sister was a tech geek at heart.

To the left, the desk was surrounded by monitors and cameras and lights. To the right, a wall of white shelves filled with books and awards and Bellamy Sisters memorabilia formed a backdrop, along with a cozy couch and Piper’s ever-present guitar.

“I want to go out,” Della announced in a loud voice designed to make him jump.

He didn’t even flinch. “You already did.”

He flicked a hand at the monitors. All six of them were filled with images of various sides of the house, including the pool area.

She’d been sulking like a teenager, and he’d been watching.

Her skin prickled with embarrassed annoyance.

“I don’t mean the backyard. I mean out, as in where people are.” She resisted the urge to start singing fromThe Little Mermaid. Barely. “It doesn’t have to be much. We could go for a walk around the neighborhood. Or a drive. Oh! Or we could go for ice cream. There’s a great place not far from here that makes it all fresh in house.”

“No.”

“No?” She stepped further into the room and put her hands on her hips. “I’m not actually a prisoner. Am I?”

His shoulders stiffened, but he didn’t look away from his laptop. “This is a sanctuary, Ms. Bellamy, not a prison. The sooner we find your stalker, the sooner you can go back to your…life.”

She didn’t miss the judgment he’d inflected into the wordlife. Her annoyance deepened to irritation. She was allowed to question her own life choices, but her warden wasn’t. “I said I’d be reasonable but this…this…sitting here all day, all night with nobody to talk to and nothing to do isnotreasonable. I’m tired of being stuck here. Alone. With nothing to do but watch TV and be ignored.”

“If you’re so bored, you can read a book. You can swim laps, if that suit works for something other than decoration. Or you can write a song. Surely even pop stars have work to do?”

She ignored the derision inpop stars. “I spent the past yearworkingand traveling nonstop and performing to hundreds of thousands of people who actually like me. It takes a lot of real effort from a lot of real people, including meandmy sisters, to pull off a tour like that. This is supposed to be my break. You getthat, right? This is my vacation. And instead of helping Lizzie get ready for a baby or hanging out with Mattie while she plans her wedding, I’m here. Withyou.”

She put as much contempt into that as he had intopop stars.

He looked as thrilled as she felt about that. “Your point?”

“I need people! I need to talk to someone. You know, interaction? Distraction? Connection?”

“I’m not your babysitter, Ms. Bellamy. I’m your protection. I’m here to keep you safe, not entertained.”

“Trust me, I’m not expecting anything even remotely resembling entertainment from you. And there’s nothing to keep me safefrom. Come on, you know whoever wrote that letter has probably moved on to someone else by now. There’s no reason to stick me in a cage.”

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