“Most people aren’t,” he said. “Averageness is humanity’s greatest common ground. You’ll find your way.”
“Great pep talk, dude. You should be a motivational speaker.”
“What, and neglect my new aspiration to become a politician?” he quipped.
When we got back inside, he double-locked all the doors, checked the windows, and splayed an impressive （and terrifying） collection of guns on my counter, which he began to clean.
Without lifting his eyes from the guns, he said, “Pack up, Princess. We’re going to be in Texas for a while.”
Calm. Stay calm. You’re The Robot. The impenetrable every VIP would love to have. You’re…
Fuuuuuuuuuck.
And a few more times for the people in the back—fuck, fuck, fuckity fuck.
When I accepted the Hallie Thorne gig, I imagined the most challenging aspect would be putting up with her mind-numbing chatter. Now, less than a week into the post, I’d received a letter from the Bratva informing me that they knew my whereabouts and did not appreciate my presence in SoCal again.
Good to have you back.
Looking forward to carving new memories with you.
—K
Luckily, Brat’s shopping interest seemed to vanish with her credit card. I doubted she’d even read the contract I’d given her. Maybe her interest had vanished with her purchasing power.
Now, if I were flying solo, I would take the news as a personal invitation to rip Kozlov a new one. The issue was—I was on a job. And right now, the only threat to Brat’s life was being associated with my ass.
Logic dictated I call Tom to let him know about this, then make the next call to Anthony Thorne, informing him of my immediate resignation, my reason for it, and referring him to another security company.
Logic, however, could suck it. Now that I’d started this assignment, I had my eye on the prize. I was getting that meeting with the former president and milking the connections I got out of it to the max.
By the time I was done with Brat, she was going to be enrolled in an Ivy League school, working full time, and volunteering at a shelter.
All I needed was to ensure that Brat was far away from her natural habitat.
Los Angeles.
The next few days passed in a daze.
Ransom did not leave my side. Barely even gave me privacy when I went to the bathroom. I counted down the days, the minutes, the hours until we flew to Dallas. He was obsessed with keeping me safe, and it obviously got to his psyche, because after four days, he called Max and asked him to bring a backup to my house.
“Make sure you patrol the place and don’t leave her alone for one minute,” Ransom ordered. “I have to get some fresh air.”
Oh, did he now? Funny how it never occurred to him I might be needing a breather, too.
Max was too wrapped up in his job to be nice to me. He seemed relieved when, shortly after Ransom disappeared, I went upstairs and roamed the lonely rooms of my mansion, trying to find something to do.
I never quite understood how lonely I was until Ransom got here. His imposed lockdown made me realize that without my nighttime outings, I barely even left the house at all.
Like a ghost, I wandered the rooms on the second floor, until Ransom’s was the only one left.
Don’t go in there. Don’t ask for trouble.
But trouble was a great cure for boredom, as any ditzy heiress could tell you, and I wanted to stir the pot a little. Besides—what else did I have to do? Max was anxiously sitting downstairs, checking the windows and doors every half hour like war was upon us.
I sauntered inside Ransom’s room, closing my eyes and inhaling him.
I liked that I was attracted to him. It felt safe, because I knew he would never try anything with me.
A scribbled note on his desk drew my attention. Was that the same note he took from me? The leaflet that made him change his behavior and become so protective of me?
I made my way to the note and picked it up. It didn’t look like the paper I found in the doorway the other day. No. This looked unmistakably like Ransom’s bold, long-stroked handwriting. An address. In downtown Los Angeles.
Let’s look for trouble.
For a long time now, I wanted to find out something interesting and intimate about my bodyguard.
He knew so much about me. It was only fair I had some information on him, right?
Shoving the note into my pocket, I grabbed my bag and denim jacket. Max was downstairs, and I knew two more men were patrolling the neighborhood. The so-called backup.
The security app on Ransom and Max’s phone was on, so if a door opened in the house—even a window—they’d know about it.
But they wouldn’t know about my bedroom balcony.
My bedroom balcony did not have a camera installed, which made it a blind spot. It had one, when I first moved in three years ago, but it fell a couple years ago, and I never got around to fixing it.
I’d done it before. Slipped out via my own balcony. A couple times when I accidentally locked myself inside the house, and another time when Keller was here and made me promise him I wouldn’t break my promise not to eat ice cream after midnight.
My hands and feet shook. Despite that, I slid down easily. Hopping over the balcony, firmly placing one foot over the gutter, then lowering myself until I was leaning against a garden statue.
I hopped down, cleaning mud and grass from my hands and knees. I peered into the house. Max was there, looking out the opposite window, his back to me.
Turning around, I slipped into my second favorite car, the Prius. It was parked outside the garage from the time NeNe had borrowed it to stealth from a Botox treatment undetected, so no app was going to ping.
The entire drive downtown, I kept staring at the note with the address. What could Ransom possibly be looking for in this part of town? It wasn’t seedy per se, but it wasn’t swanky, either.
Forty minutes later, I was at my destination. I parked in front of the address on the note. It was a Mexican bar. Small, loud, bursting with colors and music. The front patio was teeming with people drinking and laughing.
He’d gone drinking?
Slowly, grasping my clutch to my hip, I began moving through the thick crowd on the patio searching for his face. What was I expecting to see? Ransom on a date? How stupid. I didn’t even know the guy and I knew he wasn’t the dating type.
He wasn’t in the bar. He wasn’t in the seating area, either. It occurred to me that he may have tricked me, to see if I’d take the bait and follow him here.
I made my way out of the bar, the music shaking the ground beneath my feet. The street was still alive and buzzing. I decided to take a quick walk. Maybe he went somewhere nearby instead?
I knew I was getting myself into trouble. Worse still, I knew I was getting Max into hot water, too. He was supposed to be keeping an eye on me. But I’d wanted to see what Ransom was up to when he wasn’t at the house.
Passing by an alleyway full of industrial trashcans, I heard a noise.
“Aww.”
I stopped in my tracks, my ears perking, straining to hear more.
The muffled moans—like a small child crying—grew louder and more desperate. They were coming from the passageway.
When I was in college （for one semester, mind you）， the sorority house director once told us if we found ourselves getting physically harassed or attacked, to scream “fire” instead of “rape”。 Because fire was a collective problem, and people were more likely to rush to help you, while rape was something people didn’t want to witness or get involved in. And now hearing these voices…I couldn’t just turn around and risk the chance of not helping someone in need.