“No,” I interject, spinning on my heels with wide eyes, a leather corset in my hands. Unbeknownst to Moffy, Thatcher has already erased that line and drawn a new circle around himself and me.
Thatcher’s arms are ironbound over his chest. Difficult to read, but I think he’s just on guard.
Maximoff looks between us.
I speak quickly. “I highly doubt an extra recommendation in Thatcher’s resume will persuade the Tri-Force of anything.” I hook the corset on the rack. “Let’s just leave things as they should be and not cause more trouble for our bodyguards.”
Maximoff reluctantly nods. “Alright.” He cracks another knuckle. “You want to split up? Farrow and I will meet you back at the checkout?”
I clasp my hands. “Oui. Diviser et conquérir.” Yes. Divide and conquer.
23
JANE COBALT
We hug before I go.
Farrow and Maximoff stay in the steampunk section for Vada’s costume, and Thatcher and I walk into the darker depths of the shop, away from paparazzi and onlookers at the entrance.
His hand brushes along my back, and he scouts every inch of ground. He’s on-duty. Regardless of fake-dating, he places my safety above all else, and so each glance we take still feels stolen.
Each touch still feels forbidden, and I’ve come to realize that this allure will never die with Thatcher Moretti. As long as he’s my bodyguard, as long as he values protecting me and taking care of me first and foremost, our embraces in public will be drawn out slowly like flowing magma.
Until an eruption happens. Somewhere, sometime. At night.
Thatcher surveys the back area. “I meant to tell you in the car, about what the team decided.” He stares down at me, then fixes on a fog machine that gurgles out smoke, whisking along his boots, my ballet flats. He adds a deep, “I’m sorry.”
“No need to be.” We trek further, and he pushes aside a fake spider web that almost catches in his hair. I take a breath. “I distracted you back in the car.”
He lets out a soft laugh. “We both know I distracted you.” He glances back at me, his eyes falling down my body. “Honey.” He cradles those five letters.
I inhale, about to say more, but I’m trapped just watching him. Staying pinned to his hard features. Engraining all the stern creases around his eyes. As though he may vanish soon. It’s terribly illogical.
He’s still here.
And he’ll still be my bodyguard no matter—Thatcher suddenly catches me around the waist, stopping me from bumping into a life-sized mummy.
He pulls me back against his muscular chest, my breath ejecting.
Heartbeat racing.
And while I’m in his protective, warm clutch, while we’re alone, I feel safe to ask him anything. “I have so many questions,” I say softly, thinking aloud. “I want to know all about you, but I can’t ask fast enough—and when I think about you, I wonder what your hands have held. What your eyes have seen.” My pulse has skyrocketed, but I keep speaking. “What your ears have heard and where your feet have landed.”
He’s quiet, and I ache to see him. So gradually, I unfreeze and turn to look up at Thatcher. I skim his stoic features, more entranced. But I also mentally replay what I just said and my eyes grow bigger. “If that sounds disturbing, I’m so sor—”
“No,” he cuts me off, one of the few times he ever has. “You’re an American princess. You being comfortable enough to say what’s on your mind in front of me—and to me—is something I don’t take for granted.”
My lungs flood, knowing he’s felt this way means more than I realize or thought it would.
His hands fall to his radio, and he hawk-eyes the rear exit that says emergency only . We’re very close to the back of the store. Where neon wigs and animal masks are shelved on endless rows of mannequin heads, and I’m multitasking, perusing the nearest rack of gothic costumes, heavy lace and black veils.
Fog continuously rolls over the ground, hiding our feet.
He seems to be aware of every little thing.
Especially me.
Thatcher sweeps me head to toe. “And I want you to know all about me. So shoot.”
I will most surely fire away. “How old were you when you lost your virginity?” I’m too intrigued, especially after how exceptional he is under the sheets…and on top of the sheets, on the floor and against the shower wall.
“Fifteen,” he answers, unflinchingly. “What about you?”
My brows bunch, fingers paused on a veil. “Don’t you know about me already?”
It’s not public information. But the boy had to sign an NDA, and my bodyguard at the time was around to protect me.
Our bodyguards are privy to stories and secrets that they’re supposed to safeguard. For most of my life, I had Mitchell, who’s now retired. I always believed he shared more stories with the team about me, which is allowed. So I just assumed all of security knew this one.
“I do know how old you were.” He holds my gaze tighter. “But I want to hear it from you.”
My lips rise. The act of sharing personal stories feels intimate. I’ve never really done this with anyone beyond the docuseries producers and family.
“I was fifteen when I lost my virginity,” I say aloud. “Same as you.” I can’t restrain a smile.
His carriage lifts in a headier breath.
“Did you enjoy your first time?” I ask.
“Hell yeah,” he nods a few times. “Did you?”
“I did, immensely, and I really love that you enjoyed your first too.” Feeling that there was happiness in his life makes me happy.
He checks slight movement on his right, orange streamers blowing as the air conditioning kicks on, and then he looks at me. “Your first time didn’t hurt?”
I inspect a pair of black wings in a fallen angel costume. “A little bit in the beginning, but then it felt better.” I turn more to him. “The overall experience was illuminating and exciting, and now sex is practically a favorite hobby.”
He nods. “Sex feels different with you though.”
We both tense at his admission. Treading carefully.
“Good different?” I pry a little deeper.
“Beyond fucking good, honey,” he answers, inhaling strongly like my scent does him in and we’re only a few feet apart.
Heat pricks my nerves, flush ascending my cheeks. He’s on-duty , I remind myself, and I’m respecting his position as my bodyguard from now until forever.
He shifts around me, standing closer to the emergency exit as someone pounds on the door from the outside.
I flinch at the noise.
Thatcher’s indomitable I will annihilate anyone who tries to harm you presence eases me considerably. Anyone who tries to hurt me will have to pass through his iron-will and brawn, and it won’t be an easy feat.
I hear a muffled, masculine voice. “It’s locked.” And then footsteps drift further away.
Thatcher turns to me. “It’s still safe here.”
I relax more, and he watches me examine the black angel wings. I manage to land on another question. “What were you like as a teenager?”
He’s a second from responding, but his phone rings. Security would communicate through comms, so I’m assuming this has to be his family in South Philly.
“Mannaggia,” he curses under his breath in Italian and digs for his phone in his pocket.
I asked him what the Italian-American word meant not long ago, and he said, Damn.
Thatcher narrows his gaze onto the phone screen. “Xander is calling me.” We share a look of confusion.
When Thatcher permanently transferred to my detail, I asked him repeatedly if he was positive, if he was comfortable, leaving Xander Hale: my fragile cousin, who Thatcher protected and saw grow up from nine-years-old to fourteen.
I love my cousins as if they were my sisters and brothers, and Xander needed Thatcher more than me. There was a giant place inside my heart that felt like I was stealing someone crucial and vital to Xander’s mental well-being and life.
Thatcher told me, “I need to leave Xander, and Banks is going to have to leave at some point soon too. And it’s going to be one of the hardest things we ever do.”