Page 38 of Keep Her from Them

“Leo who? Do I know him?”

“Banks. He’s a musician. Currently on album-writing duty, so work is quiet.” I posed my own question, just as loaded as hershad been. “Back when we were at university, did ye think I had something to do with the photographer who took our picture? The one?—”

“I know exactly which you mean.” Alex rested the oars in the plastic loops on the sides of the boat and reached for her phone. The screen lit up her perfectly lovely features as she searched for something. She held it out for me to see.

Onscreen was the photo in question, but not just that. Alongside was the newer one from outside the nightclub. They were oddly similar in the poses, and paired like this, seemed to show a relationship that had persisted for years, though nothing could be further from the truth. The reality was this was almost the sum of our knowing each other.

I gazed between them. “I didn’t see the parallel until now.”

Alex accepted the phone back. “Dori did. He was delighted to work out that it was you I’d told him about, all those years ago. He calls you Hot Bodyguard.”

“Ye never gave up my identity, then?”

“No. Not to anyone. I didn’t even discuss it with the friend I went to that party with. Not that she stayed my friend for long. That night changed a lot of things for me. But to answer your question, I didn’t suspect you of having anything to do with it.”

I watched her. “When I joined your team last week, I got the sense that ye did.”

Collecting the oars, I took my turn rowing, as a minimum so I had something to do with my hands and to dislodge a strange ache in my chest.

Alex unpinned her blonde wig and shook out her hair, then leaned forward and wrapped her arms around her knees. Even on the water, there was no breeze, so it wasn’t cold that affected her. “If you’re such a fan of honesty, I’ll tell you. You might not like it, though.” At my gesture for her to proceed, she did. “That teenage photograph of us changed the way the media talkedabout me. According to them, I was running with boys, and my sex life became fair game, regardless of the fact it was non-existent. My reputation as a party princess began the night that picture was taken and shared.”

Well, shite. “I had no idea.”

“Why would you? And don’t you dare apologise. You didn’t cause it. You were being kind to me. It’s not your fault it turned sour.” She sniffed. “Though in full confession, I blamed you for challenging the photographer. I know now that it didn’t make a difference. He was going to sell the shot regardless.”

A moment passed where we fell silent. My mind churned over what experiences she must have had, seeing herself talked about in the way the press loved to do. The effect that must have had on her.

A darker corner of my mind was hooked on how she’d referred to her sex life and me in the same breath. As if I was part of that life. As if we had a history where we’d been alone together and naked. Where her wandering hands had found their way far beyond the soft touch from our dance.

Christ, but that image was strong.

If she was any other girl, I’d be figuring out ways to ask if I could kiss her. Not that I’d ever wanted anyone as badly as I did Alex. Need burned inside me. I flexed my hands on the oars though I’d stopped rowing.

She raised her focus to me, her lips quirked as if poised to speak. She could ask me anything right now. Any fucking thing and I’d do it.

Instead, she clambered to her feet, toed out of her sandals, tossed her phone to the deck, then dived into the goddamned lake.

“Fuck,” I bit out.

It was all I could do to kick off my boots, drop my phone, and jump in after her.

I submerged, leaving the boat rocking. The shock of the cool water displaced the heaviness that had claimed me, and I surfaced to a cackle from Alex.

“God! I never expected you to follow,” she crowed, her hair slicked back.

“And leave ye to get a disease all by yourself? What kind of bodyguard would I be?”

She laughed and floated on her back. “I’d tell you I’d been doing this for years, too, but it would be a lie.”

“Impulse of the moment?”

“I was overheating. Felt like the right thing to do.”

Oddly, I agreed. I had no clue if she felt any degree of the draw that I did for her, but we’d got heavy quickly.

Alex coasted about. When she was ready, we swam to the lake edge and climbed out, dripping but grinning at each other. I’d kept the boat close to us and reclaimed our shoes, phones, and importantly, the wig that was her disguise to get home.

My sodden jeans clung to me. I stripped my shirt and wrung it out.

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