Vulnerable: (McIntyre Security Bodyguard Series - Book 1) (41 page)

“Do you bring your lunch today?” Mary asked.

“No,” Beth said. With all the excitement that morning, she’d forgotten to bring lunch.

“You need to eat something,” Mary said. “Let’s walk over to the cafeteria and grab something. Or we could go off campus, if you’d prefer.”

Beth didn’t feel like eating anything, but she knew she’d feel even worse if she skipped lunch. Her body wasn’t very forgiving when it came to skipping meals. The last thing she needed today was to pass out from low blood sugar.

“The cafeteria is fine,” Beth said. She really didn’t have the energy to go anywhere else.

As soon as she stepped out of the library, Beth noticed Miguel’s black Mustang parked in the visitor lot in front of the library. When they headed toward the Student Union, Beth glanced back and saw Miguel following on foot. Funny, he must have been following her all over campus and she’d never noticed before. What surprised her now was how oddly comforting it was to know he was there.

The Student Union was a quick 10-minute walk from the library. It felt good to be out in the sunshine and fresh air, and for a few minutes Beth tried to convince herself that she was handling all of this just fine.

She bought a bowl of vegetable soup and a fresh baguette, and Mary got her customary chicken wrap and chips. They sat at one of the window tables.

“Your soup’s getting cold,” Mary said after a while, as Beth stared out the window watching birds squabbling over a birdfeeder.

Beth hadn’t touched her soup. She just didn’t feel like eating. Her body might be here with Mary in the cafeteria, but her heart and mind were elsewhere. “I’m just not hungry,” Beth said. She was also very conscious of the fact that Miguel was seated on the other side of the dining room eating a sandwich. Now that the cat was out of the bag, so to speak, he wasn’t trying to be invisible.

“It might help if you talked about it,” Mary said. “I’m a good listener.”

“I can’t – ” What could she tell Mary without revealing more of her past life than she wanted to? She didn’t like people knowing about what had happened to her. Whenever she told someone, they’d always ended up treating her differently, so she’d stopped telling people. “He withheld some important information from me,” she finally said.

“You said he wasn’t cheating on you,” Mary said.

Beth shook his head. “No, he would never do a thing like that. He has too much integrity.” And then she realized what she’d just said. Shane was an honorable man. He’d always been honest with her about so many things, about his personal life, about his fears for her, about what he wanted them to be to each other. He’d been honest for the most part, and yet he’d kept such vital information from her. It didn’t make sense.

“Okay,” Mary said. “So he didn’t cheat. Is he married?”

“No! It’s nothing like that.”

“Did he intentionally try to mislead you?”

Beth shook her head. “No. It wasn’t intentional. He was just... waiting for the right time to tell me something.”

“So, what happened?”

“Someone beat him to it.”

Mary leaned back in her seat and crossed her arms. “Beth, I’ve never seen you as happy as you’ve been these past couple of weeks. Are you sure you want to end it with him, because of some withheld information? Maybe he would have told you himself, when he thought the time was right. When I met Shane, he struck me as a pretty honorable person.”

“He is,” Beth said, closing her eyes. She covered her face with her hands and groaned. “Oh, God. I don’t know what to think.”

“Think carefully, Beth. Guys like Shane don’t come around every day, you know. Maybe you should give him another chance.”

The rest of the day dragged. Beth had several afternoon student appointments, she cataloged some new arrivals to the collection, and she took several phone calls. One of them was from Gabrielle.

“Are you okay?” Gabrielle said.

“No, not really.”

“I’m sorry about this morning,” Gabrielle said. “I shouldn’t have told you like that. I just – well, when you said you were falling in love with him, I guess I just lost it. I thought you should know the truth about what you were getting into. I’m really sorry, Beth. I feel terrible.”

“It’s okay. I don’t blame you. It’s Tyler who kept the information from me. Tyler and Shane.”

“I can take the evening off from work tonight and stay home with you. We can have dinner together and just hang out, maybe watch a movie.”

“No, that’s okay. Thanks for the offer, but I don’t want you to miss work on my account. I’ll be fine.”

* * *

“I’ll do the mailroom run,” Mary said late in the afternoon. “I’ll be back.”

After Mary left, Beth dug her cell phone out of her purse and checked her messages for the first time since morning. There were ten texts from Shane, as well as three missed calls. A glutton for punishment, she scrolled through the texts.

Did you get to work okay?

I’m sorry.

Beth, please talk to me.

I was going to tell you. I was just waiting for the right time. There was no easy way to tell you.

I was afraid you’d bolt when I told you, so I kept putting it off.

Please don’t punish me like this. I’m sorry.

Would you at least send me a message, so I know you’re okay?

Would it kill you to throw me a bone? Just say something. Anything.

Okay, I’m officially groveling now. Tell me what you need from me. I can fix this.

I love you.

Beth could barely finish reading his messages for the tears obscuring her vision. She put her phone back in her purse and closed her desk drawer. There was no way she could listen to his voice messages. If she heard his voice right then, she’d lose it completely. Right now, it was all she could do to make it through the last hour of the day. And then she could go home and have a melt-down in private.

* * *

Beth walked home from work. The weather was fine and the exercise would do her good. It might help her think things through and clear her head a little. She was just a couple of blocks from the library when Miguel pulled up alongside the curb and lowered the front passenger window.

“Want a ride home?”

She smiled sadly at him. “No, thanks. I could use the walk.”

He nodded, then continued to follow her at a discreet distance.

She found it odd to think that people – strangers – had been following her around for weeks and she hadn’t known. Good God, how much was Tyler paying for this protection? She couldn’t even begin to imagine what this cost, and how could Tyler afford it? He made a pretty decent salary, yes. But this had to be costing him a fortune. And that wasn’t even taking into account the cost for conducting surveillance on Howard Kline.

She’d need to talk to Tyler soon about all this crazy security stuff. She also needed to find out what they knew about Howard Kline. So far, she hadn’t even given him a moment’s thought since she found out. She’d been too distraught over Shane’s betrayal to even think rationally about Kline.

Shane’s betrayal.
That’s what it had felt like. Since the moment she’d met him, he’d been lying to her. Granted, he hadn’t been doing it to be malicious, but still, he’d been deceiving her. How could she ever trust him now?

He said he’d meant to tell her, and Beth figured that much was probably true. Shane couldn’t have continued his charade for much longer before Tyler got wind of it. In fact, Beth realized it was just sheer luck on Shane’s part that she hadn’t yet told Tyler about her new so-called boyfriend. But then she realized she’d been putting that conversation off, herself, because she was afraid of how Tyler would react. Shane wasn’t the only one who hadn’t been forthcoming. She was guilty of that, too.

Beth waved at Miguel when he parked across from her house, and then she went inside. She thought it was really unnecessary for Miguel to sit outside her house. She didn’t need a babysitter. She really needed to talk to Tyler. He needed to put a stop to these bodyguards.

She thought about fixing herself something for dinner, but that just seemed like too much effort. Instead, she went upstairs and changed into her lounging pants and a t-shirt. She tried watching one of her favorite rom-coms  downstairs in the parlor, but her mind kept wandering back to her meeting with Shane that morning.

Halfway through the movie she wasn’t really watching, she checked her phone and saw one new text message from Shane.

Please reply. I’m worried about you.

By the time the movie ended, she was lying on the sofa clutching a throw pillow as the tears fell unchecked. The loss of Shane was like a gaping wound in her chest, open and raw. Her heart ached. She didn’t have the energy to go upstairs to her own bed, so she pulled an afghan over her and closed her eyes.

* * *

Shane walked into the kitchen at Renaldo’s at ten-thirty that evening.

Peter Capelli glanced up a huge pot of sauce he was tasting. “Hey, Shane,” Peter said, clapping Shane on the back. “What brings you here?”

“Actually, it’s a personal matter,” Shane said, his sharp gaze sweeping the kitchen. He spotted Gabrielle standing in front of a stove, her back toward him – but her red hair was a giveaway. She was tossing something in a flaming skillet. Shane nodded in Gabrielle’s direction. “Do you mind if I have a word with Ms. Hunter?”

“No, of course not,” Peter said, eyeing Shane in bewilderment. “How do you know Gabrielle?”

“She’s my girlfriend’s roommate,” Shane said. He clapped his hand on Peter’s shoulder. “Thanks.”

Shane walked through the crowded kitchen to Gabrielle. When she pulled the skillet off the open flame and passed it to a colleague, she turned, jumping when she realized who was standing behind her.

“What are you going here?” Her expression was tense as she glared at him. She glanced at her boss across the room, who was watching the two of them with keen interest. “You shouldn’t be here,” she hissed. “I’m working.”

“I need your help, Gabrielle,” Shane said.

Gabrielle frowned in surprise. “My help? Why?”

“Because Beth won’t take my calls, and she won’t return my texts.”

Gabrielle flushed. “I see,” she said.

“You didn’t see her this morning, Gabrielle,” Shane said, his voice tight. “I found her in the floor of the ladies’ room in my office building, sobbing.”

Gabrielle blanched. “Oh, God.”

“Yeah,” Shane said, his tone bitter. “I’m worried about her. She’s hurting, and it’s my fault. I’m trying to give her some space, but not knowing if she’s okay is killing me.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“Call me tonight after you get home. Let me know how she’s doing.”

Gabrielle nodded. “All right. I’ll call you.”

* * *

“Hey, you,” Gabrielle said, coming to sit by Beth on the sofa. “What are you doing down here? You should be in bed.”

Beth opened her eyes, blinking at Gabrielle. “I didn’t feel like going upstairs.”

“Beth, I’m so sorry,” Gabrielle said. “I shouldn’t have told you like that.”

Beth shrugged. “Everything you said was true.” She took a deep, shaky breath. “I broke up with him this morning.”

“I know. He stopped by the restaurant tonight and asked me to check on you when I got home. I’m supposed to call him.”

“Was he angry with you?”

“No. He was just worried. He said you weren’t returning his calls or texts.”

“I don’t know what to say to him,” Beth said, her voice tightening painfully as she struggled to not start crying again. She was so sick of crying.

“What do you want to say?” Gabrielle said.

Beth shrugged, and then the tears started. “It hurts so badly,” she sobbed. “It’s killing me. I don’t think I’ve ever cried this much in one day.”

“Oh, sweetie,” Gabrielle said as her own eyes filled with tears. She pulled Beth into her arms and held her tightly. “This is all my fault.”

“It’s not your fault,” Beth said, wiping her eyes on her t-shirt.

Gabrielle pulled the afghan off Beth. “I’ll walk you up to bed. Come on.”

Beth followed Gabrielle upstairs. After a quick trip to the bathroom, Beth crawled into bed.

“Try to get some sleep,” Gabrielle said, covering Beth. “Things will look better in the morning. They always do.”

* * *

It was nearly 1 a.m. when Shane’s cell phone rang. He was sitting in the Escalade outside Beth’s townhouse once again. He’d wanted to be close by in case she changed her mind about seeing him.

When the phone rang, he grabbed it and checked the caller ID. It was Gabrielle Hunter, thank God. “Gabrielle, how is she?” he said.

“She’s devastated,” Gabrielle said. “I’ve never seen her like this. Shane, I’m really sorry. I should have kept my damn mouth shut.”

“No, don’t beat yourself up for this. It’s my fuck-up. I should have told her sooner.”

“What are you going to do?” Gabrielle said.

“I’m not sure yet. But I’m not giving up. I’ll give her some more time – one more day. If she doesn’t contact me by tomorrow evening, I’ll come to her and make her talk to me. I know I can fix this, if she’ll just let me.”

“I hope you can fix this,” Gabrielle said. “I really do. I’ve never seen her like this. I think she really loves you.”

* * *

Shane’s phone rang an hour later. “What is it, Jake?” he said, surprised to be getting a call from his brother at this hour.

“Kline’s out trolling for hookers.”

“Fuck, you’re kidding me.”

“Nope. Really skanky ones, too,” Jake said. “That’s probably all he can afford.”

“Where are you?” Shane said, starting the Escalade’s engine. “I’m coming.”