I understand.
“Right,” I breathe, and I tie my hair back in a pony, warmer all of a sudden. “Professionalism is important to you?”
He runs a hand over his mouth, nodding.
I tense, unable to read him. The air thickens with a new sort of heat. “I respect that. Very much.”
“I appreciate it.” His husky voice might as well rake hot coals over my body.
I’ve been trying not to notice how physically handsome Thatcher is, but he exudes powerful masculinity just sitting. As though he could lift me up in his arms and carry me to heaven. Somewhere safe and beautiful.
I clear my throat. “If you’re tired, we can make this quick.”
“I’m awake,” Thatcher says. “And it doesn’t have to be quick. I want to make sure we’re squared away before we leave the lake house.” He starts to reach a hand towards me, and my shoulders arch. I eye him in curiosity.
What’s he about to do?
Thatcher suddenly goes still, his hand a couple inches from me. “Can I?” He nods to the purple paper.
“Oh…yes. Yes, of course.” I lift my hands off my lap, and he takes the stationery paper. He wants the notes, Jane. Not to touch you in carnal ways.
Which would be too orgasmically good to be anything other than a fantasy. And we’ve just solidified what we are to one another.
Professional.
Respectful.
Bodyguard and client.
I lace my fingers together. “My handwriting can be illegible, so I’d be happy to type out the list for you.”
He concentrates on the notes. “I can read your handwriting.”
I can’t help but smile. “You must be able to read all chicken scratch.”
“No,” he says, multitasking well by talking to me and doing his job. “It took practice to read yours.”
Fact: Thatcher Moretti taught himself to decipher my handwriting. He didn’t have to do that. My old retired bodyguard never did.
My pulse skips. “You know,” I say, thinking aloud, “I’ve known of you since I was seventeen.”
He looks up at me.
“Which you already know,” I add quickly, flush creeping up my neck. “Because that’s when we met. I was seventeen…” Oh my God, why am I repeating this fact? “And you were twenty-two. Now you’re twenty-seven.” I waft my pajama top away from my sweating breasts. “You look older, very much a strong…twenty-seven.”
Shut up, Jane.
He sees that I’ve stopped talking. “Jane—”
“How does this work exactly?” And there goes my big mouth cutting off my new bodyguard after I just word vomited all over him. “I’ve never had two 24/7 bodyguards before, though I know this is just temporary. You’re temporary, I mean.” I shake out my jumbled thoughts. “I mean, you and I—we’re temporary.”
I’m rarely this flustered, and I’m breathing heavily.
Too heavily.
Thatcher stays quiet for another second, which helps ease me a little. I take a few more breaths.
He keeps his eyes on mine. “I’m working alongside Quinn, so if you need anything, you can come to either him or me.”
Thankfully he skipped over my extraneous ramblings. “Merci.” I pause. “Do you know French?”
He returns to the notes. “I’m trying to learn, but I can’t promise I’ll be able to pick up more than simple phrases.”
“It’s okay if you aren’t fluent. I don’t mind translating whatever you need.”
He nods, scanning the notes again. “Do you have a preference on who drives?”
I scoot forward a little. “That depends. Would you consider yourself a good driver?”
I swear he almost smiles. “Yeah.”
My lips rise. His one word answer carries so much confidence. “Then I’d prefer we switch off on driving.”
Thatcher nods. “Copy that.” We discuss several more of the preferences I listed out. Mostly how I react towards fans, crowds, and security at home—which is really the bus.
“I might grab onto your back in large crowds,” I warn him.
“That’s what I’m there for.” Thatcher looks over at me. “If there are hostile threats, I’ll need to touch you. Are you okay with that?”
“Yes.” I’m more than okay with that. I swallow a knot in my throat, trying not to pulse between my legs. I cross my ankles instead. “So…I think that’s it?”
He pockets the paper.
I rise.
He stands so much taller.
I look up, and I just realize something…I realize it out loud. “This is actually the very first time we’ve been alone together.” The air pulls deathly taut.
Thatcher hardly blinks.
My breath shallows. “I’m…” I shake my head, scrambling for more words.
“Are you alright being alone with me?” Lines crease his forehead.
I whisper, “I am.” I know it’ll happen ten times as much now that he’s on my detail. “You…make me feel very comfortable.” I open my mouth to say more, but a yawn fights its way forward, and I cough into my palm.
He nods, arms crossed, then he uncrosses them to click his mic. “Keep your eyes on the weather.” One pause. “Roger.” He stares down at me. “You should get some sleep. I think we’re good for when we push out.”
I take a few steps back towards the staircase. He watches me go, and once I reach the banister, I mime a tip of a top hat. “À la prochaine,” I tell him. “It means until next time.”
His face is all hard, professional lines. Caged of emotion, but he doesn’t look away either. He nods and says, “Goodnight, Jane.”
Until next time. With our boundaries cemented and solidified and permanently set.
1
JANE COBALT
PRESENT DAY
“You’re giving me too much, honey,” Thatcher tells me, completely serious like I’ve bought him a Rolls-Royce and diamond-encrusted watch.
I have the means to gift both to my new boyfriend, who is also my ex-bodyguard, but I actually haven’t purchased anything extravagant for Thatcher yet. That’s not what’s happening here.
I stand absolutely confused in my bedroom, and his quiet, bold dominance bears down on me. Reminding me that he’s a former Marine, he’s twenty-eight to my twenty-three, and he carries the severity and focus of an experienced leader. Despite not being on my detail anymore, Thatcher Moretti still looks at me like his sole mission is to shield me and ground me and build a fortress of peace around me.
It’s one of the greatest feelings I’ve ever felt. His love is raw, bottomless safety that deserves as much as I can give in return.
But he’s already rejecting the little, infinitesimal, bitty nothing I’ve offered.
I frown at the closet, then at him. “You think this is too much?”
“Yeah, it is.” His strong arms are crossed, not in defense. It’s just his usual sturdy posture.
My flannel pajamas heat up my body, along with the growing pile of pastel blouses, cheetah vests, and tulle skirts I’m hugging.
Hangers still attached to the clothes.
“I’ve only cleared out 30% of the closet,” I tell him, “and you’re allowed 50% now that we’re living together.”
Thatcher rubs a hand across his mouth, and we seem to glance at his duffel bag at the same time. His packed belongings are propped against my nightstand. Ophelia, my white cat, sniffs the bag while my two hyperactive calicos scamper around our heels.
It’s sinking in, for us both. How my room is now our room.
We’ve only been an official couple for two days. Just two, and he’s already moving in with me. But if I calculate our time spent fake-dating in public, we’ve been together for much longer.
Yesterday was Thatcher’s last night in security’s townhouse, and only a half hour ago, he came into my room and threw his duffel bag down.
Our gazes return to each other, and he says, “I don’t even need 20% of the closet.”
My face falls at that microscopic number. “I’m most surely giving you more than 20%. I don’t have a dresser for you to put anything in.” I only have room for my vanity, and when I offered to donate the vanity and buy a dresser, he also said no.
“That’s fine. I don’t need a dresser.” Thatcher takes a few of my blouses from my arms and places them back into the disorderly closet.
“Wait, Thatcher,” I say before he grabs more clothes out of my hold.
His hard gaze fixes on me. “I grew up with one drawer, then I lived out of a fucking rucksack. I don’t even have enough shit for 15% of that closet.”
My eyes widen. “Stop decreasing your percentage.”
His lips almost lift. “Jane—”
“The fact that you’ve lived out of a single drawer, then a bag for most of your life is precisely why you deserve the whole closet. At least let me give you 50%.”
Thatcher is about to shake his head.
“It’s imperative,” I add.
He brushes a hand across his unshaven jaw. Carpenter swats at a hanging tassel near my hips, cutting into our talk. Thatcher picks him up under his furry belly and places him on the nearby vanity.
I notice how Thatcher eyes the zebra-print notebook on my pink bedspread. He’s been far more interested in that notebook than unpacking.
Protecting me is still a priority of his, even if he’s not allowed to be my bodyguard.
From a few feet away, my gaze traces the beautiful gold horns of his cornic’, the necklace resting against his shirtless chest. Natural hair tracks down his muscles and draws my eyes lower.
To his sculpted abs and V-line, even lower—to his gray drawstring pants and the outline of his…large cock. I linger on his bulge, and an awkward amount of silence passes.
“Um…” I look up, his attention already on me, but he’s relatively stoic.
My cheeks blaze. Thatcher catching me staring shouldn’t cause any sort of red-hot flush (he’s already been inside of me) but I’m set to broil.
I smooth my lips together and then clarify, “It’s distracting.” Why am I clarifying at all? Hands full, I nod to his package. “Your dick.” End this quickly, Jane. “You’re big, which you know—we both know.” Oh my God.
He goes to speak, and I cut him off, “It’s just that you’re not wearing boxer-briefs.” He’s my boyfriend; I shouldn’t be this flustered around him anymore.
Thatcher nods, looking me over from head-to-toe. “I almost never wear them with drawstring pants.”
“And the fabric is thin,” I add for some reason.
I swear a smile is in his eyes. But then he leaves my side and goes to his duffel.
I study him more curiously. “What are you doing?”
He crouches down and glances back at me. “Getting dressed.”
“You don’t have to.” I adjust the clothes in my arms, a hanger poking my small boob. “I like this quite a lot.” My heartbeat flutters a mile a minute. “Seeing you in pajamas just reminds me that you’re here in the early morning and not for security reasons or secrecy.”
He’s here because he’s truly with me, and the world and the security team and our families know we’re really romantically together. Some learned more recently than others.
Not all are thrilled, to say the least.
Still squatting, Thatcher rests a forearm on his knee. “You can’t even know how much I want to be here with you.” He skims my features from afar, as though tomorrow I could disappear and he needs me in his mind for a second more. “But I’m not gonna be a distraction for either of us.” His South Philly lilt fights through, and he digs for clothes in his duffel.
A smile tugs my cheeks. “I distracted you?” His seriousness draws me closer to the bed.
Thatcher grabs a pair of boxer-briefs and slacks, then he rises to a commanding stance. “The longer you stare at my cock, the more I want to push inside of you.”
My hip knocks into my bedpost. I ache for him to lift me in his arms, to fill me. I’m tempted to drop my clothes and step into his towering build. “Why don’t you then?”
“Because you’re not a normal girl.” He pulls off his drawstring pants, no hesitation or pause. His naked, muscular body resembles epic warriors in fantasy novels, and somehow he’s my protector—and so much more. I expect him to come forward and hoist me up, but he steps into his boxer-briefs.
I draw forward. “What does that mean exactly?”
“It means you have a recent unknown threat who broke into your townhouse, a new bodyguard who acts like he’s a descendant of Hercules but is more like a fucking Potato Head, and you’re supposed to be giving him your preference notes this morning. Which you haven’t finished yet.” He lifts the elastic band to his waist, then picks up his slacks. “You need someone to have your six right now. Putting my cock in your pussy pretty much hinders that.”
I love him.
The sudden abrupt feeling wells up inside of me like a balloon filling with helium. Followed closely by bubbling fear. My pulse skips.
I readjust my grip on my clothes again. “You realize I’m more used to the sexual aspect of a relationship—seeing as how I’ve only had friends-with-benefits.” My voice drops to a whisper. “Anything else is entirely new to me.”
Thatcher nods. “I know.” He puts on his black slacks. “If it means anything, it’s not like I’ve dated an American princess before.”
I nod back.
But it’s not exactly the newness of a relationship that scares me. I’m frightened of loving a man to an overwhelming degree—to where I’d need to be loved by Thatcher. Necessity is life, and I’m afraid to need his love like I need air.
I can’t tell him this. I can’t say, Oh, Thatcher, I’d rather only fall mid-deep in love with you because I don’t want to need your love like water in the Sahara. Part of me longs to feel that un-reversible depth of emotion with him, but the other part resists completely.
Regardless, I need to prioritize and focus on what’s in front of me—no, not his dick. But rather his luggage and the closet. I toss the armful of clothes on my pink duvet. Pastel blouses land in a wrinkled heap.
A worn library copy of The Outsiders peeks from his unzipped duffel. I’ve already asked Thatcher about the book—not just because it looks like it was due back to the library eons ago—but because Thatcher has admitted more than once that he’s not a big reader.
What I know: the book belonged to Skylar Moretti.
Thatcher’s older brother would read it every night, and in the end, he never returned it to the school library. Skylar’s name is even still scribbled on the card inside the flap.
The bigger fact: the book is Thatcher’s only possession of Skylar’s, besides his cornic’.
Thatcher buttons his pants. “I’m putting my duffel under your bed. All of your clothes can go back in the closet.”
I crinkle my brows. “You’re not living out of a bag.”
“It doesn’t bother me—”
“It bothers me,” I rebut. “Greatly.” I think quickly while he sidles next to me. “So you’d prefer not to unpack? Would you rather live somewhere else?”
“Hell no.” Skin pleats his forehead. “I already said I want to be here.” More strongly, he emphasizes, “I want to live with you, Jane.”
I nod, believing him. But we’re both still frowning, and I hear his voice from before saying, you’re not a normal girl. “Are you trying to give me the whole closet because I’m obscenely wealthy—because you think I’m used to this humongous amount of space and need it?”
I did grow up in a mansion that is regal enough to be a modern-day American castle. But I’ve lived in this modest townhouse for four years, and I’ve loved every minute here.
Thatcher stares into me. “No. I wouldn’t want any girlfriend of mine, rich or fucking poor, to shove her clothes under a bed to make room for me.”
I hate that I almost smile, and I hate how my heart swells. He makes me feel…doted on. It feels quite
nice, and it shouldn’t. Because he can’t give me everything while I give him nothing. My parents are equal to each other in every measure of their lives.
It’s what I saw growing up.
It’s what I know works. It’s been proven to succeed.
So I have to stand by my decision, and I tug a frilly purple blouse off a hanger. “I’m not putting this back.” I fold the blouse very messily. It’ll do. As soon as I set it down, my boyfriend picks it up. “Thatcher—” I cut myself off. Because he’s not slipping the frilly sleeves onto a hanger so it can be returned to the closet.
He refolds the blouse into a much neater square.
Our gazes meet, and he says, “Don’t take out more than this.”
He’s accepting 10% of the closet. Far less than I wanted for him, but I suppose it’ll have to be enough for now.
I extend my palm. “You have a deal.”
Light touches his stern eyes, and his large hand engulfs mine as we shake.
We don’t let go.
In a quiet moment, his other hand finds the small of my back, and Thatcher dips his head down so slowly…
Our lips collide in a scalding, sensual kiss that melds me against his chest. I rise on the tips of my toes. Electricity spindles up my limbs, from each toe to my head. My fingers descend to his ass, and his tongue parts my lips. Yes.
A high-pitched noise tickles my throat, and his hand slips beneath my flannel top. Scorching my skin. We are overflowing magma. Heat gathers, and our bodies scream blistered pleas for skin-on-skin contact everywhere.
And then, he breaks the deep kiss, his forehead nearly pressed to mine, and I scrounge my lungs for lost breath.
“You’re…” I breathe hard, words scattering into oblivion. You’re very good at kissing and very good at stopping. You’re more and everything.
He straightens up, resting a hand on top of my head. Our eyes still hot on each other. I eagerly search his gaze, and he tells me, “We’re still kerosene.”
Flammable.
Combustible.
I smile. “Sounds disastrously right.”
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