Page 76 of The Challenger

“I’m good,” he insists. “And this is my battle to fight."

Yes, but.

“Do you want to go through anything?”

He reflects on that before answering. “Nope. I have it all in my head.”

“You better call me right after,” I warn.

“You might be my one phone call from jail, so you better pick up.”

I swat his thigh. “Don’t say that!”

He kisses me on the tip of my nose. “I do have some good news, Mamacita.”

Sensing something big, my heart rate picks up. There has been nothing from the ITIA since we got home. “Are you cleared?”

“Not a hundred-percent, but they emailed me and said they found nothing suspicious on my phone or laptop.”

“Why aren't they calling it a day?” I ask. “You need to tell them about the stalker. Make them understand what’s going on.”

“I did,” he stresses. “And I asked for the name of the person who made the bets, but they wouldn't tell me. Confidential. They still have to sort through everything.”

I run a hand through my hair, agitated. Bureaucracy can turn the most patient person into a raging lunatic. I reopened the case with the police the day after we arrived home, but it’s too early for any momentum. If there was some way to connect the dots, we could end this betting debacle and put the stalker behind bars in one fell swoop.

To distract me, Chavez swings the breakfast tray onto my lap. “Eat up, Miss Flynn, and don’t worry. You and I are going to be fine.” He lifts the folded napkin off the tray, and my eyes widen at what he slides out from under it. “This is for you,” he says. “A good luck charm.”

I swallow past the knot in my throat. A yellow ribbon hangs through the punched hole at the top of El Corazon. During his Paris interrogation, I explained my checkered past with this card. If this is his idea of a joke, it’s a grand stinker.

“Is this yours?” I ask.

“No, I made it for you. Mine’s in the car. I never told you this, but I kept the card in here for the longest time. You know, thinking it might bring me some luck.” He chuckles at his lame strategy. “The day I put it in my car is the day we met. Best damn move, ever. So from now on, this card is good, all right? It brought us together. Abuela is looking out for us.”

He wraps me in his arms, and I dissolve into the shelter of his body. Chavez has always been specific about his desires, right from the first time. He loves kissing, and he is so fucking good at it. The electric thrill leaves me breathless, how he undoes me with his tongue. And the only thing he loves more than kissing, is leaving me in a permanent state of wanting.

He untangles himself from my embrace despite my clingy protests and says, “Time to hit the shower so I can drive you to the airport. Be back soon.” On his way to the bathroom, he pauses, and with a coy look over his shoulder, wiggles his ass. “If you’re lucky maybe I’ll give you another dance.”

My eyes roam over his body framed in sunlight, and damn that sweet curve of his butt. He is a living statue of physical perfection. “Just stand like that for a minute, please.”

When my admiring goes on and on, he throws up his hands in mock defeat. “How much longer are you gonna stare? There is not much mystery left on this body. You’ve been everywhere, including places you shouldn’t have access to.”

I smile at his accusing finger with wide-eyed innocence. “Once.”

“And only once,” he warns.

After that first night at the Airbnb in Bendigo, I received a pleasant but firm lecture about where my fingers could and could not roam on his body. I apologized, heat of the moment and all, but to be honest…

“I think you liked it just fine,” I say.

“Oh yeah?” He wags his finger at me a second time. “That smirk better be gone when I come out of the shower.”

Chavez struts into the bathroom, and I reach for my coffee with the sensation of contented wonder swelling my heart. I shared the worst of me, and he’s standing by my side. If our stars never aligned in Beverly Hills, where would I be? Not safely tucked away in his bedroom, stupidly in love and awash in sunbeams. I lean against the headboard and relish the quiet for as long as it lasts. The gentle patter of a rain shower filters in, and, sure enough, the Chavez show begins. I take a sip of coffee, cringing a little. I overheard him singing once in our suite in Italy, although I use the termsinginglightly. Tin cans dangling from a truck on a gravel road sound better than his voice, but he gives it his all.

Bless him.

The boy band world is safe for now.

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