And then you’ll end up like me, desperately lusting after your bodyguard but never being able to satisfy it. It’s just not a good place to be.
***
So I’m tired the next day and not in a great mood—not just because of lack of sleep but also because it’s getting annoying to find Jack so incredibly hot, when nothing is ever going to come of it.
I mean, if he’s interested in me, I was pretty well available last night. I must have looked like a total idiot—all weak and trembling and waiting for him to kiss me. It’s embarrassing, really, and I’m supposed to be on a man-fast.
All in all, it doesn’t make for a very good day, and I don’t talk to Jack all that much.
It’s not like we’re normally super-chatty, but we do spend a lot of time together, so on normal days we talk fairly regularly. I’m not talking to him much today, though. Not because I’m sulking—I’m convinced that I don’t sulk—but just because I’m in a bad mood and I don’t have anything worthwhile to say.
We’re leaving my last class and heading back toward the car when I notice him eyeing me out of the corner of his eye.
“What?” I demand, immediately feeling defensive, like he might be judging me in some way.
“What are you all pissy about today?”
“I’m not pissy! And you can just shut the hell up.”
He’s scanning the wide lawn in the middle of the campus, filled with people walking and loitering at this time of day. I assume he’s looking for bad guys, but his gaze slants back to my face for just a minute. “Sounds kind of pissy to me.”
“I’m not pissy. Anyway, you’re supposed to be protecting me. Not giving an assessment of my mood.”
“Good thing—because your mood is pretty damn bad.”
“Am I not allowed to be in a bad mood sometimes? Am I supposed to be perky all the time to satisfy your sensitive psyche?”
“Believe it or not, princess, my psyche really isn’t all that sensitive.”
“Then why do you care about my mood?”
“I’m stuck with you all day long. It’s nice to not be treated like a robot.”
“I don’t treat you like a robot. I just have other things on my mind today.”
“Like what?”
“Like none of your business.”
“Pissy.” The one word was a low murmur, but it was obviously intended for me to hear.
“Fuck you, Jack.”
“If you say so.”
Okay, so now I want to hit him, but I also don’t want to give him the satisfaction of seeing how much he’s annoyed me.
“Anyway, you shouldn’t be distracting me.” He stops looking at me completely and again begins to scan our surroundings. There’s a group of guys kicking a soccer ball around the grass just ahead, at the far end of the lawn. Good thing there wasn’t a sharpshooter around a few seconds ago because I’d be as dead as a doornail—since Jack was too focused on annoying me to be looking for attackers.
“You’re the one who brought the topic up. I was being quiet and not distracting you at all.”
“Well, you’re distracting me now.”
“How am I distracting you?”
“You distract me just by breathing, princess.”
“What the hell does that mean?” I’m all tense and riled up now, wondering if he’s somehow insulted me and I’m too dense to realize it.
“It means I have a hard time thinking about anything else when you’re around. What the fuck do you think it means?”
He’s not even looking at me as he says it, and he certainly doesn’t sound overwhelmed by feeling or anything. I stare at him—gape at him—trying to figure out if the words mean what I think they mean.
“What do you—”
I never actually finish the question. I don’t exactly know the sequence of events. I’m focused only on Jack, trying to figure out what he means, so I don’t notice a single thing until a soccer ball comes flying towards me. Right at my head.
I don’t know if you’ve ever had a ball aimed at your face, but it’s quite disconcerting. This one is coming fast, evidently kicked by one of the guys in the lawn ahead.
I do what my instincts make me do, which is gasp and throw up my hands to protect my face.
As it happens, I don’t need to. Jack doesn’t even seem to be looking in their direction, but he reaches out a hand and catches the ball before it reaches me. It smacks his hand so hard it makes a cracking sound.
It had to have hurt him, but he doesn’t even flinch.
When I catch my breath, I turn toward the soccer guys. They’re laughing, and one is punching another one on the arm. Just from their body language, it’s obvious to me that the one guy intended to kick that ball at me.
Just to be mean, I guess.
Stupidly, it hurts. I don’t know these guy. I have nothing invested in their opinion of me. But I’ve never in my life been a girl someone would kick a ball at simply out of spite.
Jack still holds the ball, and his expression doesn’t change. He probably doesn’t see what I see and won’t know it was done on purpose.
Since we’re walking toward the guys anyway, he’ll just toss the ball back as we pass.
I tell myself to ignore the incident, to not show any reaction. Who the hell cares what those stupid guys think anyway.
I’m trying very hard to convince myself of this as we approach them. Jack raises the ball to toss it back to the one who kicked it. The guy is still grinning, as if he scored some sort of victory.
Jack does indeed throw the ball back at him, but it’s not the casual toss that is obviously expected. He throws it with force. A lot of force.
Such force that it pushes the guy backwards as he catches it. He gives a loud huff and is knocked back onto his ass in an awkward tumble. His friends break into uproarious laughter at him.
I stare, confounded by how that happened just from a throw of the ball. The guy isn’t scrawny, and he’s certainly not clueless with a ball.
Exactly how hard had Jack thrown it?
I look up at Jack in awed bewilderment and see he’s hiding a smile.
He did it on purpose, of course. Because he was annoyed by that guy kicking the ball at me. It’s Jack’s way to get payback.
All the hurt I felt a minute ago disperses in pleased admiration and surprise that he cares enough to do something like that.
“I take it all back,” I say.
“Take what back?”
“Saying you’re not a bad-ass. You definitely have a few bad-ass skills.”
Jack laughs. And, damn it, my man-fast is flying out of the window again. I really have to do better than this.
Interlude
Jack
When you’ve been who I’ve been, you learn not to let yourself fall.
Falling isn’t just a figure of speech. That’s really what happens when you let go, when you lose control, when you aren’t on guard every moment of the day. Either you fall or someone else does. Or sometimes both.
It happened to me once, and I won’t let it happen again.
Chloe is sleeping now, stretched out on the couch with a book on her chest. She was trying to do homework but didn’t make it more than an hour before she fell asleep. Not that I can blame her. From the title of her book, she’s reading about Byzantine art, and that’s got to be enough to put anyone to sleep.
I’ve held onto her phone, since I want to be the first to see any threat or nasty message she receives. She got a text from a friend a half-hour ago, and she was barely awake when I brought in her phone—although it didn’t stop her from making an under-the-breath comment about how I’m a control freak.
It’s true. It’s damned true. I am a control freak. It’s the only way I can deal with what happened seven years ago. And hanging on to her phone is the least of my controlling habits.
But when she gets another text now—this one about how the fucking Tumblr page (which was taken down the day after it was first posted, making
it nearly impossible to track) has been put back up—she’s asleep when I come back into her apartment.
I stand watching her for a minute. Just to be clear, I’m not some sort of creeper who’d break into a girl’s house just to watch her sleep. But I don’t get to look at Chloe very often. I mean really look at her, without guarding every expression in case she discovers how I’m feeling. So I let myself now. It’s dangerous, but not as dangerous as it would be if she were awake.
I have no idea how she manages to be delicate and sensuous both. But she is. Her eyelids are closed and her expression is relaxed—peaceful in a way it almost never is. Each curve I can see—the line of her skull, the arch of her cheekbone, the dip of her throat, the swell of her breasts—is exquisitely sculpted, like priceless crystal, and yet still warm, lush, and real.
I want her so much. More than anything. I want to protect her like she’s precious. I want to take her like an animal would claim its mate. I want to destroy everything that threatens to hurt her. I want her to open up to me in every way—share everything she holds tightly inside her.
I want to fuck her so bad, but I want to do so much more than just fuck her.
And all of the ways I want her are wrong. Are forbidden. Are dangerous.
It’s not just because I’m her bodyguard, although I know better than anyone that it’s a very bad idea, just for that reason alone. It’s because I made a vow to myself seven years ago that I wouldn’t lose control again. I wouldn’t let down my defenses. I wouldn’t let go.
So I’m not going to let go with Chloe. If I do, I’ll end up letting go of everything.
Her light brown hair is spread out messily around her face, and I have to fight the urge to touch it. I also have to fight the urge to touch her face, her small, gorgeous body, the smooth bare skin of her arms.
I’ve never known anyone like her before.
To anyone else, her insistence on staying at this college—even in the face of death threats—is stupid and futile. Maybe it is. But I understand it. She’s like me in that one way. She doesn’t think she can let go. She’s lived her whole life being perfect, being what everyone else wants her to be, keeping a tight control over how the rest of the world perceives her.
After so much has spiraled out of her control, now she thinks she has to hold on even tighter.
I can barely keep myself from reaching out for her, from pulling her into my arms, from claiming her mouth in a kiss that I know would leave us both breathless, from touching her until she screams in pleasure, from burying myself in her.
I want it so badly my body reacts, just to the sight of her sprawled out in front of me, completely unconscious of my hot gaze.
It’s not unusual. I’m turned on more often than is reasonable around her. But I’m determined not to give in, not to let go.
She opens her eyes and jerks in surprise.
“You have another text,” I tell her, so she won’t think I’ve just come in to leer at her while she sleeps.
She blinks groggily and reaches out for her phone.
She looks so tousled and sleepy that I have to turn away. If I don’t, then there’s no way I can keep myself from touching her.
“Did you read it?” she asks—to my back, since I’m not looking at her.
“Yeah.”
“Did you look at the page?”
I did look at the page, with more offensive pictures and posts that enraged me to such an extent that it’s a good thing no one else was around when I saw them. “No,” I lie. “You shouldn’t look either.”
“I know.”
There’s silence then, so I know she’s looking at the page anyway. I turn around and watch as her face pales and her shoulders stiffen.
I want so much to snatch the phone away from her so it can’t hurt her again. I want so much to strangle some vindictive bastard with my bare hands, if only I knew who it was.
“I told you you shouldn’t look at it.” My voice is too gravelly, but there’s no way I can sound normal.
She glances up at me through her eyelashes. “It’s about me. I have to look.”
“No, you don’t.”
She keeps looking though, and every image is like a slash to her chest. I can see each wound reflected in her expression.
I suddenly wonder if she wants it to hurt. If she thinks she deserves it. For not being as perfect as she’s always thought she should be.
“Stop it,” I say—not gently.
She looks surprised and then angry. “You can’t tell me to stop. If I want to look, then I’ll look.”
“And if I want to tell you to stop, then I’ll tell you to stop.”
“Fuck you, Jack.”
She’s angry, but I don’t care. I’d rather her be angry with me than hurt. “Just tell me when and where.” I say that to rile her up some more, distract her from the Tumblr page.
She gasps in indignation, and I can see she’s trying to think of something to say in response. “You’re not anywhere close to my type.”
It’s true. I know damned well that it’s true. I’m as far from her type as possible, and she deserves so much better than me.
No matter how much I want her, I’m not going to let go.
I’m not going to fall.
If I fell with her—for her—then I’d never be able to stop.
Three
Chloe
In any guess at the beginning of the semester, I would have said Jack would only be hanging around for a week or two. But he’s still here at the end of September.
I’ve kind of gotten used to him now.
My literature class on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons is the worst. Dr. Harwood—Professor Bitch, as I like to call her—obviously resents me, and she’s never stopped needling me about Jack’s presence and what happene0d with Carter. Not that she ever mentions Carter directly, but I’m not stupid and I can pick up on the implications of her snide comments.
But she has an attendance policy, and I’m not about to risk any gray areas in my grade. So I come to every class, steeling myself against the embarrassment and determined not to get angry.
Jack always stands behind me in the corner and glowers.
Today Professor Bitch is particularly annoying. She has dark, shoulder-length hair that she always tucks behind her ears, and she’s wearing a suit with a tight skirt and high heels. I suppose she’s attractive enough, if she wasn’t so nasty.
I still think she might have a thing for Carter, which is why she hates me so much.
Surely a professor wouldn’t waste her time hating a student just on principle.
“Chloe,” she says, looking up from the anthology she holds and over to me, where I sit in the corner as usual. “Why do you think he’s so isolated?”
I read the story the night before. I always do my homework—even now, when it feels like nothing but busywork. So I give her the best answer I can, although it feels like the other students are enjoying seeing me put on the spot. “Because no one understands him. He’s different, and they’re all caught up in superficial society. He has no one who understands him on a deeper level.”
“You don’t think they’ve alienated him because of the choices he made? Maybe he deserves to be cut off because he’s so wrapped up in his own interests.”
I try to think through the question. “I don’t see how. Isn’t the story on his side and against the narrow perspective of the rest of society?”
“On the surface, perhaps. But you need to read more carefully. No one is isolated for no reason. It’s always based on bad choices.”
So now I understand what’s going on. She’s talking about me.
And everyone in the class knows it.
I suppose some girls would be bold enough to argue, to stand up for themselves. But it will take more emotional energy than I have at the moment—after the month of nerves and stress since the semester started—and it just won’t do any good.
Things happen to you that you can’t help, you can�
��t control. No use to make it worse for yourself.
So I give a half-shrug and don’t reply at all.
I stare down at my book until she’s moved on to a different point. Then I glance back in the corner at Jack.
He’s leaning against the wall, the fabric of his t-shirt stretched over his broad shoulders and the denim of his jeans molding his lean hips and strong thighs.
His blue eyes rest on me as I glance back, and I don’t really understand the expression. It’s kind of like understanding but also like frustration. I don’t know if he’s frustrated with me or the professor.
Even after a month, I can’t really figure Jack out.
***
I have a little advice, if anyone is considering going on a man-fast yourself. We’ll call them rules for making it through a man-fast successfully.
One - Avoid romantic books and movies, since they’ll just get your juices flowing.
Two – Give yourself an end date, so if you start to waver, you can tell yourself you just have to make it through whatever time is remaining. In my case, it’s a year, so I just have eleven more months.
Three – Hang out a lot with your friends, so you still know you have a social life.
Four – If everyone in your college hates you and friends are hard to come by, go visit the friends you have at other schools on the weekends. This has worked very well for me for the last month.
Five – Don’t ever, ever go to the movies or a romantic-type restaurant on a Friday or Saturday night. That’s just dumb.
Six – Do a lot of working out. It’s good to channel pent-up energy.
Seven – Remind yourself every evening that you’re on a man-fast, so you’re alone by choice and not because no one wants to be with you.
Eight – Do some research and make a list of all the women who have accomplished great things without being paired off with a man. You can find huge numbers of them. I have to wonder if any of them were on man-fasts too.
Nine – Don’t—and this one is important—don’t constantly be with a sexy, gorgeous man, even if he’s just supposed to be your bodyguard.
Knowing Jack Page 5