Ex-Con: Bad Boy Romance

  Although the man now approaching me with a tape measure had a smile on his face, I could see the few other customers in the shop giving me sideways looks. I wouldn’t have been at all surprised if one of them asked when the trash would be taken out.

  Fortunately, I was at least spared that.

  Determined to stick it out, I found myself in front of a three way mirror, arms out while the dude – his name was Harrison – buzzed around me, needles in his mouth like an extra row of crazy little teeth. He somehow managed to talk with them in there, too. I could just see myself trying to do that. I’d choke on them. Get them stuck in my throat and bleed to death on the carpet, right there in the middle of a couple of rich old bastards.

  “You’ve got a great form, Mr. Cantrell.”

  “Bobby,” I corrected, trying to pretend my arms hadn’t turned into lead weights, oh, five minutes ago. I was in good shape, but no one was made to hold this position for long.

  “Of course, Mr. Cantrell.” He straightened and then took a step back. “Lower your arms.” He gave me a once-over and then nodded. “Yes. That will do for the time being.” He checked his watch, and then turned to Carly. “I can have this one done in two hours. I have a few other pieces I can have complete within twenty-four hours, if you need the rush.”

  “We need the rush,” Carly said, her voice absent, a frown on her face. She was staring at her phone and tapping away furiously.

  “Absolutely, Ms. Prince.”

  Jake moved forward and gestured to the counter. “Why don’t we get all that sorted out?”

  I closed a hand into a fist as I looked down at the pinned and tucked up clothes I wore. The material was softer and finer than anything I’d ever known. I didn’t even want to think about how much it cost. So much for swinging by a Target or something. Or stashing all of that five thousand while I looked for another job. “I can’t afford this.”

  Carly waved a hand. “It comes with the position. I pick up all my employees’ on the job expenses.”

  I opened my mouth to argue, but she turned away, shoving her phone toward Ryan. Her tone was agitated, and the sound made my stomach clench. I didn’t like whoever was making her feel like that.

  “Look at this shit!” she said to Ryan. “She’s at it again. I’m calling my damn lawyer. I can’t keep doing this. The lawyer can handle it this time.”

  Ryan took the phone and skimmed it. He held it out towards her, but Carly didn’t even notice. She was striding across the floor, long strides that did crazy things with her stretchy mini skirt, over the knee boots and those long, long legs. “Why do I have to put up with the crazy, Ry? What did I do to deserve this?”

  “You know what my advice is going to be, Carly.”

  She stopped and raked her fingers through her tousled hair. I wondered what it would feel like to bury my hands in her hair, to see it messed up after a night together. My hands curled into fists. Dammit. This was going to be torture.

  “I can’t...” She stared up at the ceiling, and then her head rolled toward me and she caught sight of me. As if she’d forgotten I was there, she gave an odd little start, a half-jump, half-shiver. Then she smiled. “Sorry. Family freak-out. Ignore me.”

  Like that would ever happen.

  But I shrugged. “No problem.” Then because I couldn’t not ask, I said, “Is everything okay?”

  “Oh, yeah.” She shrugged. “Just typical family crap. You know how it goes.”

  Right. “Yeah. Sure.”

  I turned at the sound of footsteps.

  I didn’t think her idea and my idea of family crap were even close to the same. With my dad, back when he’d still been breathing, an average day had gone something along the lines of this: food wasn’t done, or maybe it was done and it was cold, he’d dump his shit, wash up, and then slap my mother. If his mood had been really foul, she’d gotten a belt across the back or a fist in the face. If I’d been too loud or not fast enough, or if he’d been just feeling mean, I’d gotten a kick in the ass or fist in the face.

  That had been my family until my mother and I left Tennessee. Then, it had been just the two of us…until she died and I’d had no family. It’d just been me. Then, before I’d gone to jail, that had been changing. I’d been looking forward to it, even. But I didn’t have that anymore either.

  “Hey.”

  The sound of Carly’s voice drew me out of the ugliness of the past, and the even uglier mess of my own mistakes. I looked up to see her studying me. “Where did you go?” she asked, her voice soft.

  “Nowhere that matters.” I shrugged it off, or pretended to. There were people who acted like guys didn’t get emotional or some shit like that, but that was all bullshit. Some of us just didn’t show it.

  In my opinion, what was the point of getting worked up over something I couldn’t change or fix. Except I still thought about it, the past. Sometimes I thought about it so much it drove me crazy, made me want to take drastic measures just to make it stop.

  “If it doesn’t matter, then why did you slip off there?”

  I jerked my head up and met Carly’s soft blue eyes. For a princess, she sure as hell saw pretty deep into people.

  I didn’t like it. And because I didn’t like it, I leaned in close and murmured, “I’m in the middle of a good hard brood, princess. But if you insist on distracting me, why don’t we slip off to one of those dressing rooms they got back there, huh?”

  I didn’t back away, crowding into her space. I waited for her to blush, pull back, or maybe even call for Ryan or Jake. Or both of them. They both had a rough idea of how I moved now, and if they planned it out, they might be able to take me down. Especially since I was in a mood to hurt. Not to hurt somebody, but get hurt myself.

  But all she did was reach up and lay her hand on my cheek. I sucked in a breath at the way her soft skin felt.

  “If and when I decide to get naked with you, it won’t be because you want to use me as a distraction, or to forget what’s cluttering up your head, Bobby Cantrell.” She leaned in and kissed me.

  I was stunned enough by what she said that I didn’t think to deepen the kiss or even grab her and hold on. And then it was over and she was backing away. By the time my brain caught up, she was already five feet away.

  And I realized what I thought I’d heard her say

  “What?” I had to have misunderstood her.

  She smiled at me, that sly, feline, female sort of smile a woman gave a man when she knew she said something that will drive him out of his mind. “You heard me well enough, sugar,” she said, mimicking my accent almost perfectly. Then her face brightened and she pointed over my shoulder. “Look, I think Jake found you some clothes to wear for now.”

  I almost snapped that I didn’t want any clothes. It would’ve been the truth. I didn’t want any clothes, and I sure as hell didn’t want any clothes from this place. I hadn’t seen so much as a price tag, but I had a weird suspicion that even a week’s worth of clothing would cost more than I made in a couple of months.

  The man with Jake gestured toward me. I couldn’t help but notice it was the same guy who’d been ready to hustle me out the door earlier. I gave him a mockery of a smile. He swallowed and smiled gamely back. “Sir, if you would...”

  ***

  Four hours later, I’d more than doubled my wardrobe. I just about choked when I heard the discreetly murmur of the total. Ryan passed over a gold card without blinking, while Jake and Carly started talking to me, clearly an attempt to distract me from a sum that had not three digits, but four.

  She’d just spent a few thousand dollars on clothes, and that wasn’t even counting the suits she’d had those guys putting a rush on either. These were just some jeans, sweaters, a few sports coats that fit like they’d been made for me, and some other clothes that ranged from casual to...well, they looked pretty damn dressy to me, but with the suits I now had, I didn’t know what to call the other stuff.

  Before we left, Carly had me take a pair of
black trousers and one of the shirts into the dressing room to change so I could wear them out. When I got back there, I looked at the clothes. For fuck’s sake. She’d given me underwear. She hadn’t even blinked when she’d given me a fucking pair of boxers. I didn’t wear boxers. But I wasn’t about to argue that point with her. I’d deal with the underwear problem on my own later.

  A few minutes later, though, I decided maybe I’d give the shorts she’d pushed on me a chance. They weren’t the loose-fit boxers I’d thought they were at first, but rather those boxer-briefs, and they were pretty nice. Soft, too. It was pretty pathetic, but I couldn’t even remember the last time I’d gotten new underwear.

  The clothes were better. Okay, the pants fit well, snugger in the ass than I preferred, but the shirt was amazing. I guessed it was more of a sweater, but it was soft. Like softer than anything I’d ever felt before, except maybe Carly...

  I suddenly realized I was standing there, stroking the arm of the sweater, and I felt like a damn idiot. Muttering to myself, I scooped up my old clothes and was now embarrassingly aware of how they looked. Jeans so worn they were white at the seams and faded old thermal that wasn’t all that warm anymore. I didn’t even want to look at my underwear. I opened the door, and then stopped in my tracks, staring at the image of the man in front of me.

  I recognized the face, the hair. I knew the man – he was me, after all.

  But whoever in the hell said clothes didn’t make that big a difference didn’t know what they were talking about.

  Chapter 5

  A haircut turned the man in the mirror into even more of a stranger, and an intense session on table etiquette with Jake had me ready to shove my head through a plate glass window. But that headache paled in comparison to what came next.

  It was a dinner party at the home of a local mystery author.

  Apparently, Louisville had more than its share of local celebrities and this author was known for her slew of mysteries. I’d read more than a few while I was in prison, not that I planned on mentioning that if I happened to meet her.

  The car came to a stop in front of the building that I wasn’t sure I would call a house, and Ryan paused before he opened the door. “Remember, you’re mostly just watching and taking things in tonight. There’s security on site. Just stick with Jake and do what he tells you to do.”

  I nodded and tried to pretend I didn’t feel like I was going to puke on the toes of the shiny new shoes Carly just bought. And she’d paid some ridiculous amount for them, I was sure.

  “Quit fussing, Ry,” Carly said from across the limo. “Bobby will do just fine.”

  Ryan rolled his eyes. And then he opened the door.

  The flash of lights practically blinded me.

  Now it made sense why anytime I’d seen a picture of a bodyguard, they almost always wore a pair of sunglasses. I fumbled in my pocket for the pair Jake had loaned me. They slid down my nose almost instantly – he had a face like a big, square brick – but they were better than nothing.

  As I slid them into place, Ryan settled his body in front of the door.

  I climbed out and he stepped aside.

  The whine of cameras and the roar of voices flooded my ears. I didn’t know how much time passed before that annoying bit of posing for the cameras and ignoring microphones was over.

  A few people tried to shove a microphone into my face and I did just as Jake had said, covered it with my hand and pushed it away. After a few minutes of standing silently by Carly’s side, they seemed to get that I wasn’t the flavor of the night, but actually there in a working capacity and they turned their focus to her.

  Not that she gave them much more.

  She posed and smiled and waved at the cameras, but any time somebody tried to talk to her, she ignored them.

  As we were led inside, I caught sight of basketball and football players from the University of Louisville, a coach, and other faces that looked familiar, although I couldn’t remember where I knew them from.

  By the time we got inside the big house, I was ready to tell Carly she was out of her mind. This job wasn’t worth five grand.

  But as soon as the door shut behind us, she turned and flung her arms around me.

  Damn. My dick stood up and took notice.

  “You did fantastic, Bobby. See? It’s easy for you. I knew it would be.”

  I rested a hand on her hip but didn’t push her away. Ryan and Jake hadn’t covered how to handle this. Clearing my throat, I waited until she backed off and managed a game smile. Okay. I could do this. For a week.

  Maybe.

  “Doesn’t take much to stand there like a monkey in a suit, Ms. Prince.”

  “Ms. Prince?” She wrinkled her nose at me. “It’s Miz Caralee, remember.”

  I found myself smiling at her. It was hard when she was teasing me like that. “You like making fun of the way I talk, don’t you...Miz Caralee?”

  “Making fun?” She shrugged. “No. But I do enjoy listening to it.” She smiled up at Ryan. “Are we ready?”

  He withdrew an invitation from inside his jacket. “Let’s go find our hostess.”

  ***

  It didn’t take me long to realize that while Carly Prince wasn’t the only celebrity there with bodyguards at her side, she was one of the few who actually interacted with them – er...us. Ryan and Jake took their job seriously, there was no denying that. She couldn’t take a step without one of them moving with her, and if anybody so much as moved in her direction, one of them was already working to intercept. It was effortless, the way they did it. It was subtle, elegant. People didn’t realize they were being subtly herded into an approach that the two guys had decided was the safest way to approach their self-appointed princess.

  They liked her.

  Hell, I liked her, and not just because I’d spent half of the night before dreaming about getting her naked. She was funny, and sweet, but with an acerbic sense of humor that was hidden under that angel’s face.

  But they didn’t just think she was charming. They cared about the woman they were paid to protect. I could tell easily enough that wasn’t always the case. It was damn easy to see why too. Quite a few of these people treated everybody as their servant, even the ones who were clearly not working for them. Most of what I saw just solidified my opinion about the upper-class.

  Fuck. I needed a drink. Somebody was roaming the room with a tray of drinks, and Carly saw me eying the tray and she leaned over.

  “The bar’s open. Go grab you a drink if you want.” She winked. “I’ll bet they’ve got that bourbon you liked.”

  “I’m fine.” I shouldn’t drink on the job, right?

  “Oh, come on.” She leaned against my arm, hugging it a little. “If you get one, then I won’t feel so bad if I ask you to get me one.”

  I couldn’t really explain the charm she possessed, not in words. But standing next to her, I fully understood what charisma was for the first time in my life. Which explained how I found myself wandering the brightly lit, wide-open hall, searching for one of the open bars Carly had mentioned. I found one tucked under the staircase and caught the eye of the guy behind the bar as he finished passing two tall tumblers off to a couple who looked as wide-eyed as I didn’t want to admit I felt.

  “Drink, sir?” he asked.

  Sir. I resisted the urge to look behind me. Barely. “Ah, yeah. Do you have...?” I wracked my brain. “Angel’s Envy?”

  “Of course. Single or double?”

  I swallowed. “Double. Make it two.” I remembered how Carly how had taken hers. “No ice.”

  He nodded. A moment later, he slid two small, squat glasses to me. “Angel’s Envy. Neat.”

  As I headed back to Carly, I pondered the wisdom of asking for two. If I’d been smart, I would have gotten three. One to toss back before I headed back, and then another to have after I gave Carly hers.

  I told myself to keep it in mind for next time.

  And there I was thinking I’d make it
to the next time. An hour ago, I’d been convinced I’d trip over my feet or drop spaghetti sauce down the front of my obscenely expensive sweater. So far, I hadn’t seen any spaghetti, and here I was, making plans on how to drink next time.

  Was this really my new life for the next few days?

  It wasn’t hard to catch sight of Carly in the crowd. I towered over most everybody, and Carly wasn’t one of those delicate little princesses, even without her heels. The heeled boots she wore tonight should’ve counted as dangerous weapons – in more ways than one – and they put her at just under six feet tall. How she could walk in those things amazed me, and how she could walk gracefully amazed me even more.

  Of course, she’d paired them with a black velvet skirt that ended about three inches above her over-the-knee boots, and the vivid blue shirt she wore was cut low in the back, baring an expanse of soft, pale skin that made my hands itch.

  Apparently, quite a few other men liked the way she looked too, but she didn’t look at any of them. She was too busy talking to an older woman. The woman’s smile was a match for Carly’s and they looked like they’d discovered their own little world. A world that didn’t include the rest of us.

  I moved closer, feeling more than a little out of place. Then Carly saw me and she waved me closer. Shit. I couldn’t move.

  I’d just now figured out who Carly was talking to. It was the writer. The one who’d written the mysteries. The one who owned this museum of a house. I’d known I was out of my league, but seeing the two of them together made it hit me even harder.

  “Here he is,” Carly said, seizing the bourbon from my hand and tossing half of it back.

  But she didn’t stop there. She twined our fingers together, swinging our hands back and forth like I was some new friend she’d found on the playground at school. Except I’d never seen anyone on the playground who looked like her.