Page 11 of Songbird
Rosalie shrugs. “She was never my friend. Just another person on the payroll.”
Money. Just one more thing wrong with the world. I’ve got no interest in it, and I’m not a man who exchanges his time for a dollar and never thinks about the cost. When Jack asked me to take the gig protecting Rosalie, I didn’t say yes to collect the paycheck. I took the job as a favor to a friend, and I took it seriously because a woman’s life was at stake.
And from what Rosalie is telling me now, maybe in some ways, it still is.
“So what do you need?” I ask.
Her face lights up, and beside her, Dakota lifts her head and blinks. “You’ll take the job?” she asks again.
“Nope.” I raise my hand when she starts to argue. “I’m not just another person on your payroll, Rosalie, and if I take your money now, you’ll never believe that.”
“But—”
“What do youneed?”
Rosalie is silent for a moment, the cast to her head speculative, but then her tight nod says she understands me.
“A couple of days to figure out my next steps?” Her request sounds like a question, her confidence still building, and I’m careful to not let any reluctance show on my face. “As soon as Chip realizes I’m not coming back, he’ll want to control the narrative. Public perception is everything in this business, and he won’t let it get out that I left him because he’s an emotionally abusive cheater. I just can’t deal with the media or the paparazzior the rumor mill right now. I need quiet and space and a chance to think without all the noise. Maybe I’ll find the strength to take back my life, because I can’t give Chip more of me than I already have.” Her voice drops low enough that I need to lean in to hear her. “Ican’t.”
That fucker’s not taking anything else from this woman. Ever.
“You won’t,” I tell her. “And it’s a deal. A couple days on your own, which will give you time to figure out your next move. This place is yours. I’ll—”
“You’re not leaving, are you?”
Rosalie’s eyes widen, her hand straying toward Dakota and her fingers tightening in her coat.
“This is a one-bedroom cabin,” I explain. “A one-bedcabin. There isn’t room enough for both of us.”
“But…” She looks around the bungalow again, this time with a shortness to her breath. “We can make it work. I’ll sleep on the sofa.”
“Rosalie—”
“I don’t want to be alone. Not here. Not like this.”
I sigh and nod slowly. “Yeah. I know.”
She sags and releases a relieved breath. “So you’ll stay?”
“I’ll stay—on the sofa.”
“Thissofa?”
Her snort is surprisingly indelicate and my lips twitch. “What’s so funny?”
“Nothing,” she says, but I like that she’s trying not to smile. “Nothing at all.”
“Okay. So if we’re going to do this, let’s do it. Where’s your phone?”
It’s in her purse, which is small enough to have gotten lost between the sofa cushions and the fabric of her dress. When she pulls it out to show me, I’m pleased to see her phone’s switched off.
“I didn’t want to deal with Chip,” she explains. “If he’d called me on the way here, I might have turned around.”
“You did the right thing. I assume he has some kind of tracking app on this thing?”
“Just the one installed with the phone.”
I nod even though there’s a good chance she’s wrong. “This cabin is a black spot for cellular networks. It’s safe to turn on your phone again, but switch it to airplane mode to be safe, and then wait until I remove any tracking software before you connect to my Wi-Fi.”
