Page 81 of The Bombshell and the Bodyguard
“Okay thanks,” I said and walked away, momentarily defeated.
Obviously, I wouldn’t be crossing the footbridge.
But I couldn’t wait until after the show. It was highly unlikely I’d be able to get any closer to Jessica at her hotel anyway—if I could even figure out which one it was.
No, it had to be now—here—in public. The only thing I had left to offer Jessica was my complete and utter humility.
And I could think of no better way to humiliate myself than to propose to her onstage during a live, internationally televised show.
First I had to get to that stage. The bridge was a no-go. Boating there was out. There was only one way left to reach her. My experience as a navy combat diver was about to come inveryhandy.
Fishing a discarded sandwich bag from an overflowing trash can, I wrapped and sealed the contents of my pockets inside of it. Then I walked far enough away from the footbridge that the security officers wouldn’t see me.
I stood at the edge of the dark lagoon. It wasn’t exactly famous for its cleanliness, but I couldn’t be picky. I waded in.
It was night, and I was wearing all black, so it wasn’t likely I’d be spotted while swimming to the stage, but I dived far beneath the surface anyway.
There were police boats with armed officers patrolling the water. A gunshot wound would put a serious kink into my romantic proposal plans.
To be competitive during the SEAL fitness tests, I’d had to swim five hundred yards in about eight minutes, so the two-hundred-yard distance from the shore to the stage took me less than four minutes. I surfaced for air only once.
Darkness was much more of an issue than distance. While the night was good for cover, it wasn’t so great for navigation. I had none of my gear with me, so I had to make a guess at my exact location in the lagoon.
I resurfaced inside the police line near the stage andright next toa police boat. Not good. Taking a breath, I dived again and this time swam around to the back of the stage where I’d have a better chance of climbing up undetected.
When my head broke the surface again, I heard Jessica’s voice. She was introducing a new song. I treaded the dark water, listening.
“I just wrote this one,” she told the audience. “It’s about the relationship I just got out of. You guys know I’ve kissed a lot of frogs, right?”
She laughed, and the crowd cheered. There were shouts of “I love you Jade,” and “I’ll kiss you.”
“I love you too,” she said back before going on with her story. “This last one I think deserves the title of King Frog. I really loved him, but he didn’t love me back... not enough anyway. It’s called ‘Fool Me Twice.’ I hope you all like it.”
As I began to pull myself from the water onto the back of the floating stage, her band began to play. Jessica’s sweet voice floated across the water to my ears.
Then it struck me in the gut. Because the lyrics were aboutme.
At sixteen I gave you my heart/
You gave it back with a wink and a shrug/
All these years, all these miles/
And still you had me hooked like a drug/
But now I’m older and so much wiser/
Don’t believe in kissing frogs anymore/
Fairy tale’s over, the prince is a liar/
Fooled me twice, not gonna fool me no more
Standing in the dark space behind the stage, dripping wet, my muscles shaking from the cold, fast swim, I considered jumping back into the water and returning to shore.
Was there any point in going onstage and proposing after hearingthat? The blow to my heart felt worse than the bullet I’d taken in Afghanistan.
It was excruciating to hear the evidence of just how much I’d hurt her. Cold shame washed over me, leaving me more chilled than the water had.
