Page 3 of Steal My Breath Away

“Air force. I spent four years on active duty.” I pulled out my phone and pressed Rachel’s number. She was always able to calm Jessica down when she was distressed.

“Come sit with me on the couch.” She grabbed my free hand and led me to the enormous feather-stuffed sectional in the center of the room.

“I’m sorry, Jessica. I can’t stay. I need to go outside and do a sweep of the grounds.”

“But you work for me.” She patted the cushion beside her. “And I’m sure everything is fine outside. Talk to me. Do you have someone in your life? A wife? Girlfriend? Boyfriend?”

It was ironic that she chose to ask the question now, three months into the contract, and not at the start of the awards season when the house had been full and she’d been everybody’s darling. Her previous bodyguard had left to get married. I didn’t have a similar excuse.

“No, ma’am. I’m all about the job.”

“Then there’s no reason why we can’t get to know each other better.”

“I don’t think—”

Her phone buzzed and she picked it up, instantly distracted. “Rachel. Oh my God. I looked everywhere for you after the ceremony. Where were you? What happened? I thought you sent gifts to all the judges. You told me it was in the bag.”

With a sigh of relief, I went out the back door for a breath of air. I was done with this assignment. The awards season was over. Jessica didn’t have any new projects lined up. The house would no longer be filled with stylists, makeup artists, hairdressers, and the multitude of sycophants who clung to the biggest stars. This was the third time I’d had to turn her down and I couldn’t see things getting any better.

I sent a quick message to Tony asking for a reassignment before heading outside to do a sweep of the walled garden, a lushoasis in the concrete desert of LA. Even in the dark, I could make out the symphony of vibrant colors—a riot of pink, purple, and yellow flowers, perfectly planted and groomed until they looked almost unreal. The air was heavy with the sweet scent of jasmine, lavender, and roses. Rich and lush as it was, it couldn’t compare to the crisp mountain air and the fresh scent of pine from home.

Jessica had spent ten million dollars to buy the LA mansion and fix it up, including an entire redesign of the landscaping, but in the three months I’d been with her, not once had she walked through the garden. Given the chance, I would have spent all my time outdoors. Before moving to the small town of Riverstone, Virginia, I’d spent most of my childhood alone in run-down apartments while my parents gambled at casinos or got high with their friends. When social services finally caught up with them and took me to live with a grandmother I didn’t even know I had, I’d immediately been drawn to the outdoors. Riverstone was nestled at the edge of a forest, and I’d taken full advantage of the natural beauty, swimming in the nearby lake, hiking and mountain biking on the nearby trails, camping with my best friend Matt, and skating and snowshoeing in winter. It was the only place I truly felt free.

My phone buzzed and I picked up the call. “I just talked to her. She’s in a bad way,” Rachel said. “I need to know you’re going to stay up with her. I’m sure Sophie’s team bought off the judges. It’s outrageous.”

“You also tried to buy off the judges,” I pointed out.

“I was discreet about it,” she said. “And Jessica deserved that award. I cry every time I see that performance.”

“My job is to protect her twenty-four/seven,” I assured her. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“I don’t mean just setting the security alarm,” Rachel snapped. “Do I really have to spell it out? She needs comfort, Ace. She needs someone to hold her tonight. She’s so distraught, I don’t know what she’s going to do. I don’t need you to protect her from strangers. I need you to protect her from herself.”

My stomach tightened in a knot. “I’m not going to cross that professional line.”

“Damnit, Ace. This has been the biggest blow to her career. She needs to feel loved. She needs to feel wanted. Not one of her previous bodyguards has ever refused her.”

“We all need to feel loved and wanted,” I reminded her. “One night with me isn’t going to make any difference about how she feels about herself tomorrow.”

Of course, Rachel didn’t give up. She hadn’t become the top fixer in Hollywood without reason. “I can’t believe you would give up the opportunity to sleep with one of the most beautiful women on the planet.” She hesitated and I could almost hear the wheels turning in her mind. “Are you not attracted to women? Or are you with someone? Her last bodyguard had a girlfriend, but he was prepared to step up. It was hush-hush. No strings. No expectations. His girlfriend never knew and now they’re getting married, so no harm, no foul.”

“I’m not going to sleep with her, Rachel.” I bit back my irritation. “I can’t do the job and the client at the same time.”

“Crude,” she said with a sigh. “And disappointing. I’ll have to send someone over. He’s a friend of a friend who has been dying to meet her.”

No doubt the “friend” would come from an escort service and would be paid a huge sum of money to make Jessica feel special. I opened my mouth to tell Rachel that lying to Jessica wasn’t going to help her, and that Band-Aid solutions didn’t solve deeper problems. She needed a therapist to help her work through her issues. But who the fuck was I to give that kind of advice when I couldn’t take it myself? I still couldn’t sleep through the night. The things I’d experienced on deployment still haunted me, but worse was the accident I’d witnessed and had been helpless to stop—the one that killed my best friend.

Tony Davis, owner of Stellar Security, had served four tours of duty in the army before an injury forced him into early retirement. He was a fiercely practical man who had taken his LA-based private security firm from a three-person operation to a global enterprise with offices across the United States and Europe in the time it had taken me to serve my four years as an airman.

“Why the fuck do you want to be reassigned?” He leaned back in his chair, hands folded behind his head. Tony was shorter than me by a few inches, but still imposing, with broad shoulders, thick arms, and a frame hard with muscles earned from daily workouts in the gym. “Most of my personnel would kill to work with Jessica, and the pay only goes up the longer you stay.”

“She wanted to get too close.”

“I don’t have a problem with ‘getting close.’” He punctuated the last two words with air quotes. “Kim K., J. Lo, and Madonna dated their bodyguards. Pamela Anderson married hers. Getting close is a perk of the job. You’re taking on a surreal and intimate role in your clients’ lives. You’re there in their private moments. You’re there when they need you. There are few people they can trust to have their best interests at heart. You’re like a glorified boyfriend, but with a gun.”

I’d never understood how Tony could be so relaxed about some things and so rigid about others. He had rules we had to follow and rules the clients had to follow and extensive training courses that had to be passed, but it was okay to sleep with clients if that’s what they wanted. “I’m not interested in being a boyfriend or getting into a relationship with the clients. I want to keep them safe, and I can’t do that if emotions get involved. I need that professional barrier, Tony, or I can’t do my job.”

His eyes hardened, shifting from cool blue to steel gray. “Are you afraid of attachments? Is that it?”

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