by B. B. Hamel
“Yeah,” he grunts, pulling me against his body. “In a little while.”
We stay like that quietly, holding each other. We’re an unlikely pair, but it feels like the two of us against the entire world. He’s my secret, my Daddy, the man that takes care of me.
But I don’t want to hide him. Not anymore, not like this. Not forever, at least.
I press my lips against his chest then I listen to his heart beating its steady, easy rhythm.
16
Graham
I’ve done a lot of shit in my life.
I’ve been through a lot more. I’ve been through ambushes, night raids, hand-to-hand fighting, explosions, parachuting, all that shit. I’ve been stabbed, shot, strangled, blown up, everything.
I’ve faced down some of the most ruthless motherfuckers ever to grace this fucked-up planet.
And I’ve never felt so nervous in my fucking life.
Katie looks at me and smiles, like she’s the one trying to reassure me. I’m supposed to be the badass here, the fucking marine that’s seen it all. I’m her goddamn Daddy, after all.
But she’s the one calming me down. Fucking hell. I don’t know how I got here or what this girl’s doing to me, but it’s driving me insane.
Norah answers her door, fully dressed, her phone to her ear. She gestures for us to follow her into her room.
“Yes, I know, bathrooms overflow,” she’s saying. “Fix it, okay? I don’t care what you have to do, fix it, or be in breach.” She hangs up and sighs before looking at the two of us. “What’s up?”
Katie glances at me. “You have to see something.”
I walk over to the TV and get it set up. I plug in a VHS player, courtesy of the front desk, and I pop in the tape. Norah watches all this with a frown on her face.
Katie shows her the pictures on my phone. “These were on my door this morning,” she says.
Norah’s frown deepens. “Who saw?” she asks.
“Nobody,” I tell her. “Just a maid. And she’s a fan.”
“Everyone’s a fan,” Norah mumbles. “Okay, so nobody saw. That’s good then. No news coverage.”
“But we think it’s the stalker,” Katie says.
“There are similarities,” Norah admits. “At least to the note with the horse head.”
“That’s what we think,” Katie says. “But there’s more.”
Norah sighs. “There’s always more. Why can’t anything be simple with you?”
“I don’t know,” Katie says earnestly. “But check this out.”
“It gets worse?” Norah turns to the TV just as I hit play on the tape.
I left it right at the point where Jasper shows up. Norah watches as he starts writing and sticking the notes, and when he turns around, I pause the tape.
She stares at the TV without speaking for at least a full minute. I’m not sure what she’s thinking, but I know it can’t be good. I start to fidget, something I never fucking did. I’ve always been a patient man, a patient fighter. But this, it’s fucking bad, and I know she’ll be pissed.
Finally, Norah turns to Katie. “Are you okay?” she asks.
We’re both visibly surprised. Katie stutters and mumbles something. “Oh, uh, yeah,” she says finally.
“That’s fucked up,” Norah says. “Seriously fucked up. I mean, he was your boyfriend, even if it wasn’t real.”
“I know,” Katie says softly.
“Oh, honey.” Norah hugs Katie and I stare at the scene like I’m going insane.
I thought Norah was going to go ape-shit. I thought she’d chew us both up before ripping Jasper a new asshole. I never expected this reaction in a million years.
Katie hugs Norah back. “I’m fine, honestly,” she says.
They break apart. “What a little shit,” Norah says.
“What are we gonna do about it?” I ask her.
She shakes her head. “I don’t know.”
“Ruin the bastard’s career?” I suggest.
Both girls look at me.
“How?” Katie asks softly.
“We release the tape,” I say, grinning.
Norah’s eyes go wide. “No way,” she says.
“Listen, I’m betting this whole stalker thing was Jasper from the start.”
“Unlikely,” Norah says, voice clipped.
“He only cares about headlines and attention, right?” I ask her, standing. I’ve been working this out the whole morning in my head, and now I know I have to say it out loud to see if it could be real. “It leaked to the blogs almost right away, although we don’t know how or why. Katie’s been getting a lot of attention, and Jasper was soaking it up by extension. That’s the whole point of you two dating, right?”
Katie nods slowly. “But I still don’t get it.”
“The relationship was getting stale,” Norah says softly, looking at her. “You two were… normal. Things were going good, so the blogs weren’t talking about you guys as much.”
“And he wanted them to talk real fucking bad,” I suggest, hating that it’s all coming together.
Katie looks sick. “It was him the whole time? He was terrorizing me?”
“I think so,” I say. “From the very start. I bet he was doing shit before that, too.”
Norah sighs. “I hate to admit it, but it makes sense. Still, you want to ruin his career. I mean…” She trails off.
“He did that,” I say, stepping toward her. “You saw the motherfucker. He did that. He intended for it to be found. He wanted to embarrass you.”
“I dumped him,” she says.
“Doesn’t excuse it,” I respond, getting pissed.
“Enough,” Norah snaps, glaring at us. “Both of you, enough. Nobody wants to do anything stupid right now, okay?”
I glare at them and turn away. “Fine. I can take care of it.”
“Graham,” Norah warns.
I shrug my shoulders.
“Send it to his manager,” Katie says suddenly.
We both look at her. “What?” Norah asks.
“Send it to his manager,” Katie repeats. “It doesn’t have to go public, but if his manager sees that… they’ll leave us alone. And I bet he’ll never do something like that again.”
I snort. “The fucker’ll do it again. He doesn’t give a shit. Sooner or later, he’ll forget about getting caught, or at least he’ll be more careful.”
“I don’t care,” Katie says. “I’m not ruining his life over this. Send it to his manager.”
Norah sighs. “Okay. We’ll send it.”
I grunt my disapproval but I don’t speak up. I know this decision is over my head and I’m not the fucking person in charge here. That’s Katie, and if she wants to show mercy, then she’ll show mercy.
I didn’t show mercy. Always thought mercy was for weak motherfuckers. But now I see that maybe it takes someone special to be able to go down that path.
I walk toward the door. “Guess you two have it all under control,” I say. “I’ll see you later.”
I leave the room and head down the hall. I’m annoyed that Jasper’s not getting what he deserves. I want to drive out to wherever the fucker’s staying and beat him so badly he fucking bleeds. I mean, imagining the fucker followed us around? He actually came to another city, followed the tour, even after getting dumped, just to fuck with Katie.
It makes my blood boil. I’m so pissed when I get back into my room and I don’t know what to do with myself.
But there’s a knock at my door. I open it up and Katie looks back at me.
“Can I come in?”
“Yeah.” I let her past and close the door behind her. “Norah sending it over?”
“Yeah.” She chews her lip. “Look, I know you don’t like this.”
“He followed us here,” I point out. “Just to hurt you.”
“I know,” she says softly. “But I just can’t do it. Can you understand that?”
“No,” I say. “I want to chase him down and fucking kill him. I could d
o it, I’ve done it before. At least I want to beat him so bad he never thinks your name again without feeling pain.”
She walks up to me and kisses my lips softly. “I know. It’s what I like about you.”
“Fuck, girl,” I whisper, grabbing her and pulling her against me. “There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you.”
“I know.” She kisses me again.
“I’m falling in love with you. Hell, I am in love with you. I don’t know when it happened.”
“Probably around the same time that I fell for you.” She looks up at me. “I love you, Graham.”
“I love you.” I kiss her hard, pulling her tight against me, heart racing.
The kiss feels like it lasts for hours, for days. We break apart and she’s a little breathless, cheeks pink.
“You don’t need a bodyguard anymore, you know,” I say softly. “The stalker’s taken care of.”
“I think we can find a way to keep you around,” she says, grinning.
“Yeah? You want me to just be the guy in your entourage that fucks you every night?”
“Sounds good to me.”
I laugh and kiss her. “Fine then. I ain’t going anywhere, not ever, if you don’t want me to.”
“And I never will want you to.” She whispers the words, sending chills down my spine.
We kiss again, holding it this time, and I feel weirdly at home, like I never have before.
Out in the desert, I felt alive. But here, in this room with Katie, I feel at peace. And I feel like I’m at home.
That’s a feeling I never thought I’d have, but here I am, living like a new man.
I don’t know what she did to me. I don’t know how I’m feeling this. But I love her, and she loves me, and I’m never leaving her side.
I’m her Daddy, her secret, her man. And she’s my girl, for as long as she’ll have me.
17
Katie
One Year Later
You never get used to an entire stadium screaming along as you sing.
It’s a surreal feeling. Everyone in this room knows me and wants me and is a fan of me. They love and hate me in equal measure and I don’t know them at all. To them, I’m not even a person.
And here we are, all doing this together, and it’s amazing.
It’s even more amazing because I’m not living in the shadows anymore.
After my last tour ended, I wrote another album in two weeks. It took another two weeks to record it, and as soon as the label gave the record the green light, I married Graham.
The world went insane. I mean, a pop star marrying her much older bodyguard is a scandal, to say the least. Everyone lost their minds, and a lot of it was bad, very, very bad.
We basically went into hiding. We lived out of this little vacation spot in the Caribbean for three months, doing nothing but fucking, drinking, and eating. It was some of the best days of my entire life.
But the real world came back sooner or later. “Can’t hide forever, princess,” Graham growled at me. “Time to do what you do best.”
And so, here we are touring again, barely ten months after the end of the last tour.
For a first show, it goes smooth. When it’s over, I’m sweating and exhausted and exhilarated. Graham’s waiting for me in the wings, grinning as I run up to him and jump into his arms.
“Damn girl,” he grunts, laughing. “You’re gonna break an old man’s back.”
“Please,” I say, looking at him, legs wrapping around his waist, his hands on my ass. “I couldn’t break you if I tried.”
He chuckles and kisses me nice and slow.
People are around and they’re staring, but they don’t say a word.
It feels good, not having to hide this anymore. He’s still my Daddy, and that part’s still a secret, but at least we’re not hiding in the dark anymore.
We walk back to the green room. It’s quiet and empty, exactly the way I told Norah it better be when I got back. She’s waiting on the couch, legs crossed, and smiles.
“Congrats on the first show,” she says.
I sit down and Graham sits next to me. “I’m so tired,” I say, laughing. “God, I’m out of shape.”
“Hardly,” Graham says. “I’ve been keeping you fit.”
Norah looks a little awkward at that and I kiss Graham, laughing.
“Anyway,” Norah says. “We have a bunch of stops this tour planned.”
“How are record sales?” I ask her.
“Good,” she says. “Really good. You even got a review in Pitchfork.”
“Did they hate it?”
“They didn’t hate it, but they didn’t love it.” She shrugs. “About as good as you could expect from them.”
I laugh and Graham growls. “I’ll take care of them, if you want,” he says.
“You can’t solve all our problems with your fists, honey,” I say.
He grunts. “Bet I could.”
I laugh again, remembering how he wanted to chase down Jasper and beat him up. That seems so long ago now.
After Norah sent the video to his manager and explained the situation, Jasper disappeared from public life for a while. There were rumors that he went into rehab, but I don’t really know what he did. I can say that he never contacted me again, and the stalker stuff instantly stopped.
He also hasn’t been in any movies since then. I suspect Norah had something to do with that, too. I think she sent that video to more than just his manager, against my wishes, but I don’t have any proof.
Oh, well. It doesn’t matter anymore.
Norah gets up and stretches. “Well, early morning tomorrow. You two up for it?”
“She is,” Graham says. “I’m just the old man tagging along.”
I grin and kiss him. “Cut it out. You’re not old.”
“Not yet.”
“See you two later,” Norah says, rolling her eyes.
“Alone again,” I whisper to him.
“Alone again,” he agrees, and we kiss, slow and deep.
When we finally break it off, he holds me tight against him. “Are you happy you’re out on the road again?”
“I guess,” I admit. “I don’t know. This isn’t my favorite part of being famous.”
“Why bother then?” he asks.
“This is how I make money.”
“Do you need money?”
I frown. “I mean, yeah.”
“You’ve got plenty already.”
“True.”
“So take time off. Write more songs. Do fun shit.”
“Too late now.”
“After the tour,” he says gently. “Promise me you’ll take time off.”
I grin at him. “Maybe we’ll start a family.”
He perks up at that, which surprises me. We haven’t talked about kids or anything like that yet, but the way he’s looking at me…
“I could take care of that,” he says. “I could get you nice and pregnant, if you want.”
“I don’t know,” I admit. “I think I want to be a mom…”
“You’d be a great mom. You could still write music and tour. I’ll be your stay-at-home dad.”
I laugh at the thought. “You’re just a big thug.”
“Thugs can have kids, too.”
I take a sharp breath and bite my lip. I love the idea of having a family with him, but I’m afraid of what it’ll mean, what it might do to us.
But if there’s anyone in this world that can take care of all that, it’s Graham.
“Okay,” I say. “After the tour. We’ll start a family.”
“I love you,” he says, his eyes flashing.
“I love you too. I never imagined you’d want kids.”
“Never did before I met you. But I guess you’re making me soft.”
“I guess so.” I put my hand on his cheek, my hard man. He’ll never be soft, no matter what he thinks.
We kiss and he holds me tight. I know this is my future, just the two of us for now
, and soon we’ll start our family. I don’t know how life will look after that, but I do know one thing.
Graham will do anything to make me happy, and that’s all I need.
My big man, my Marine, my Daddy.
THE END
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