Page 75 of The Bombshell and the Bodyguard
Chapter Twenty-Six
Buy a Ticket
Jessica
Wilder was acting weird.
Not rude exactly, but not like he had been when we’d first left the island. At the hospital, he’d been all business. Now on the private flight home, he seemed reserved, a bit aloof.
Like he used to be.
He wasn’t touching me. When I’d tried to kiss him, he’d gently evaded it, claiming to have a lot on his mind.
I hoped he didn’t feel guilty over the almost-kidnapping. It wasn’t his fault. Who in the world could have anticipated it happening during a concert in the middle of a crowd?
The man who’d done it was clearly insane, and you simply couldn’t prepare for insanity.
While the policehadarrested a dangerous stalker—it hadn’t been the same man who’d broken into my Eastport Bay home the night Wilder had come to my rescue.
No,thatman had gotten away with his crime and shown up later at Coachella to try to snatch me there.
His name was John Delacroix. Like the other stalker, he had an obsession with me. Unlike the other man, Delacroix had access to me.
In his confession he said that while he hadn’t been assigned to my home in Eastport Bay that night, he did work for my former security company and had been sent to the estate on occasion to fill in if one of the other guys was sick or had a conflict.
He knew the other guards and had easily fooled them when he’d stopped by with a kind offer of hot coffee on that chilly night.
He alsoknewsecurity guards had extreme access to their celebrity clients. And not all security companies were as strict as Wilder’s when it came to the interview process.
The kidnapper had worked in several security jobs over the years, moving around the country, and keeping his record spotless.
After I’d gone off the grid that night, he’d begun making plans to gain employment at one of the venues where he knew I was scheduled to perform.
Anyway, the guy was locked away now, and I was fine. I just wanted things to get back to normal—or what Ihopedwas the new normal, which was Wilder and me together and happy. We hadn’t yet made any sort of formal declaration of coupledom, and he didn’t seem exactly happy.
In the seat beside me he sat staring out the jet’s window where wispy clouds glowed like shreds of cotton candy in the day’s waning light.
“You okay?” I asked.
He blinked, as if resurfacing from some very deep thinking and turned toward me. “Yeah. You?”
I nodded, eager to reassure him. “I am. I’m completely fine. So I don’t want you to beat yourself up. Everything’s going to be okay.”
He frowned. “Not too sure aboutthat.You didn’t hear him on the phone.”
I blinked in confusion. “On the phone? You talked to the kidnapper?”
“What? No. To Hap. I was talking about Hap.”
“Oh. What did he say?”
Wilder gave an unwilling shake of the head. “Never mind.”
I touched his arm. “No, don’t do that. Tell me. What did he say?”
He sniffed a laugh and scratched his face. “I probably shouldn’t repeat it in front of a lady. Suffice it to say he isnothappy with me.”
“Is that what’s got you in a funk—Hap reading you the ‘my baby sister’ riot act? Who cares? I don’t. He’ll get over it.”
