Page 13 of Passenger Princess

His jaw goes tight, and in that moment, I realize this will be so much fun.

“Yes, I’m done,” he says through gritted teeth.

“Perfect, great. So, here’s the deal: I don’t really like rules. In fact, the more rules people give me, the more I want to break them. I’m going to do my absolute best to make your job an easy one, but I’m going to be me, regardless. I won’t do anything crazy dangerous orstupid, but I’m not going to be some little subservient thing doing exactly what you say at any given moment.” He looks at me, then lets out a soul-deep sigh. “This is going to be a disaster,” he says under his breath.

I walk around the table towards the exit, stopping in front of him and smiling up at him. He's too handsome for his own good, that much I know.

And much, much too serious. I’ll have fun forcing him to relax a bit.

“One thing,” I say.

“What’s that?”

“Don’t fall in love with me, big guy, okay?” I ask, reaching up and patting his cheek. His jaw goes tight.

“I promise that won’t be a problem.”

“Is that a challenge?”

For the first time, he smiles back. From here, I see one dent in his cheek. A dimple.

“Do your worst, Princess.”

“God, you don’t even know what you just did, do you?” I ask, my smile spreading as I shake my head in disbelief, moving my purse over my shoulder. “If there’s one thing I love, it’s a challenge. Literally won an entire pageant just to see if I could. But you? You might become my favorite challenge yet.”

I almost don’t hear him mumble under his breath as I walk out “And you might just be mine.”

SEVEN

AVA

Harper sits on the loveseat in my bedroom, filing her nails, while Jules lies on my bed, head in her hands, watching me frantically try to fit three months' worth of clothes into two giant suitcases. Unfortunately, the pile is looking like there’s no way it’s not going to take up at least three. I still need hair and body products, pajamas, workout clothes, underwear, makeup…andshoes.

“Oh my god, I’m so fucked,” I say, looking at the mess scattered around us. “How am I going to bring all of my clothes?”

Harper sighs, putting her nail file on the side table and standing. “You’re not. This new collection means you just need the bare minimum, and we can add accessories. Each is double-sided, so there are really two items in each. And these tops”—she lifts two tops with multiple straps and ties—“can be worn a thousand ways and never look the same. I’ve sent you a document with what to wear at each stop. Based on what I prepared, you only need four pairs of shoes and a pair of sneakers.”

My anxiety melts.

“I could kiss you,” I say with a sigh of relief. “Can you help make sure I pack the right things?” She rolls her eyes, and I smile when shestarts lifting and folding, acting like it’s an inconvenience, but really, her type A personality means she secretly loves this shit.

“So your bodyguard is that hot guy from the club?” Jules asks, picking up the nail file and rounding out her own nails.

“If byhot guyyou mean the grumpy asshole, then yeah. And he can’t stand me because he thinks I’m some self-centered princess.”

“Well…” Harper starts, but I throw a bra at her, making her laugh right before promptly folding and packing it.

“Nothing out of you,” I say.

Tomorrow is the very first event at the Atlantic City Boardwalk. Even though I’ll be spending one last night in my bed tomorrow night, I won’t be getting back until late and leaving super early, so I have to pack tonight, hence the chaos.

“I don’t know, I feel like I could get over him thinking I was spoiled if he looked like that,” Jules says.

“What?”

She turns her phone, and shows me a photo of Jaime, arms crossed on his chest, glaring at the camera. I grab it and see it’s from the Five Star Security website.

It’s absolutely unfair to look that good and be inthatbad of a mood all the time.

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