Determined to Protect, Forbidden to Love: Ramirez's Woman / Her Royal Bodyguard / Protecting the Princess

Gala swallowed the fear lodged in her throat. “I will do as you ask.”

“Good. You have made the right choice. I am good to my friends, as you already know.”

“I have to go now. I see Seina,” she lied.

“Ask her about her visit with Esteban, then take her home. If she gives you any interesting information, call me. Otherwise, show up at the country club at one-thirty, then I will contact you this evening.”

Miguel shook hands with everyone on staff at the television station directly following his fifteen-minute interview on the noon news. Afterward, with his fake fiancée at his side, he spoke at length to the huge audience crammed into the small auditorium at the station. He noticed the way she not only kept watch over him, but continuously surveyed the area around them. Everyone seemed as interested in meeting Jennifer as they were in him. But who could blame them? The woman even intrigued him.

The television station was owned by a member of the Nationalist Party who provided Miguel with a weekly interview as well as numerous free one-minute ads that ran often during each twenty-four-hour period. When the reporter doing the interview had asked about Miguel’s fiancée, he had been given little choice but to bring her on camera and introduce her to the people of Mocorito. His lovely Jennifer had surprised him. The ease with which she appeared on camera, a warm smile in place and her hand clasping his the whole time, told him that she had done this type of thing before today. She was what the Americans referred to as “a natural.”

When asked how she felt about her future husband being a candidate for president, she had replied without missing a beat, “I am very proud of Miguel and support him without reservation. I will do everything within my power to help him become el presidente because I know in my heart how much he loves Mocorito and all the people of this wonderful country.”

“Thank you, J.J. I am a fortunate man to have found such a loving and caring helpmate,” he had said as he’d gazed lovingly at her.

He had deliberately referred to her as J.J., the nickname that Domingo Shea had told him everyone close to her used. For half a second, she’d reacted, her eyebrows lifting ever so slightly, but then she had simply smiled and continued looking at him as if he were the sun and moon and stars to her.

If he had not known better, he would have believed every sweet word out of her mouth. The lady had been quite convincing, all that he could have asked for in a fiancée. Not only had she shown her support by word and deed, she had presented herself as a fashionable yet conservatively dressed lady. The simple purple suit she wore was accented with pearl earrings and necklace. Her shoes and handbag were a rich, dark purple leather. Everything about her whispered aristocratic sophistication. Understated and elegant.

After the interview ended, he told her in a quiet voice, yet loud enough for everyone around them to hear, “You were perfect.”

“Thank you, Miguel.”

She gazed at him with those incredible blue-violet eyes and he found himself unable to resist the urge to kiss her. Only at the last minute, with Roberto clearing his throat behind them, did Miguel manage to restrain himself and simply brush her cheek with a tiny peck.

“Miguel, my friend,” Mario Lamas, the TV station’s owner clamped his hand down on Miguel’s shoulder. “The phones have been ringing off the hook. Your lady is a huge success. The people love her.” Mario turned to Jennifer, took her hand and kissed it. “You, my dear Señorita Blair, are a definite asset in this election. You must accompany Miguel everywhere from now until election day.”

“I plan to do just that, isn’t that right, querido?” Jennifer slipped her hand into Miguel’s. A subtle yet effective sign of affection.

“Absolutely.” Miguel confirmed her statement.

“I don’t mean to rush you,” Roberto said, “but if we are to arrive at the country club at one-thirty, we must leave now.”

“Yes, yes, go, go,” Mario told them, waving his hands expressively. “And next week, you and your lady will come back here for another interview. Each week until the night before the election, you will speak to the people for an hour. Yes?”

“Yes. Thank you, Mario.”

Miguel shook Mario’s hand before slipping his arm around Jennifer’s waist and, following Roberto, escorting her outside to the waiting limousine. Roberto waited until they were safely ensconced in the back of the limo before he slid inside with them and closed the door.

Knowing what was next on Miguel’s schedule, Carlos shifted into Drive and headed the car away from the downtown television station and onto the main thoroughfare that would take them a few miles out of the city limits to Ebano, a suburb of Nava, where many of the up-and-coming middle-class and upper-middle-class citizens lived. Dolores and Emilio had purchased a home in Ebano only six months ago and Juan Esteban lived there with his aunt in one of the older sections of the area that had been updated in recent years.

Once inside the limousine, Miguel had expected Jennifer to move as far away from him as possible. But she didn’t. She remained at his side, although several inches separated them.

“You put on quite a performance, Señorita Blair,” Roberto said, an odd tone to his voice.

Miguel glowered at him.

“You object, Roberto?” she asked, using his first name, as she would have done had she truly been Miguel’s fiancée. “I would think you would approve of the fine acting job I did. We don’t want the people to suspect that I’m not only a fraud, but that I am Miguel’s bodyguard.”

“I apologize if it appeared I was criticizing,” Roberto said.

“It sounded that way to me, too,” Miguel told him.

“Then I apologize to both of you. I meant it as a compliment, although I admit I was surprised that an American woman, especially one trained as a bodyguard, could so effectively present herself as a lady of breeding.”

Jennifer’s laughter stopped Miguel from chastising his friend. Undoubtedly she found Roberto’s comment amusing.

“You can thank my mother for that aspect of my personality. You see Lenore Ashford Whitney is a lady of breeding and nothing would please her more than to know I am capable of presenting myself as a carbon copy of her when the situation calls for it.”

Miguel studied her closely. Those seductive blue-lavender eyes. That mane of shiny black curls. The pouty pink lips. The oval-shaped face, the tiny nose and the translucent, creamy complexion. If he allowed himself the luxury, he could easily fall under her spell. And if other matters were not far more important in his life, he would set about seducing the beautiful Jennifer.

Suddenly, without any warning, a loud bang reverberated through the limousine. The car bounced, then skidded off the road, onto the shoulder and crashed into the ditch. The wreck happened so quickly that there was no time to think, only to react. As the limo came to a jarring halt, Miguel reached out and grabbed a tumbling J.J. seconds before his left shoulder slammed painfully against the crushed back door.

Chapter 5

“Phase one has begun,” he told his comrade. “I just received a phone call telling me that Miguel Ramirez’s limousine has wrecked. It seems a tire blew out and the vehicle is now in a ditch.”

Hector Padilla smiled broadly, the corners of his thick black mustache lifting. “Perhaps if Miguel is not afraid for himself, he will soon realize that those near and dear to him are in danger. Since we have no proof his fiancée is a fraud, we can’t use that against him. Not yet. And now that she has appeared on television with him, the people seemed to be quite taken with her.”

“If Miguel truly cares more for others than himself, then convincing him that the lives of others are in danger because of him could be more effective than trying again to eliminate him.”

“With the American bodyguards on duty around the clock, it will be more difficult to strike Miguel himself, so your plan to show him how vulnerable others are was quite brilliant.”

“Thank you, Hector. You know there is no one in Mocorito who wishes to see you reelected more than I do.”

Hector laughed. “Despite our being friends, I am no fool. What you want, more than anything else, is to see Miguel Ramirez defeated.”

“The man does not deserve to be president. He is an upstart. The bastard son of a whore, a man with delusions of grandeur.”

Placing his hand on his good friend’s shoulder, Hector asked, “And when is the next incident set to occur?”

“There will be a minor incident at the luncheon, if Ramirez makes it to the country club. I have arranged for an unpleasant surprise for his guests. But tonight, at Anton Casimiro’s party, we have something more significant planned.”

J.J. found herself on top of Miguel after the crash. Everything had happened so quickly that it took her a couple of seconds to get her bearings. The first thing that struck her was her awkward position—her body intimately pressed against Miguel’s and his arms securely holding her, one hand cupping her hip.

“What the hell happened?” Miguel spoke first.

“I believe a tire blew out, Señor Ramirez,” Carlos said.

“Is everyone all right?” Roberto asked. “Miguel? Señorita Blair?”

“I am unharmed,” Miguel replied. He ran his hands over J.J. with gentle familiarity, as if the two were actually a couple. “How are you, Jennifer?”

Looking him square in the eyes, she lifted herself up and off him. Then when she had firmly planted her behind in the seat beside him, she responded. “None the worse for wear.”

“I think perhaps we should call a wrecker,” Miguel said.

“Good idea.” J.J. scooted across the seat and opened the door. “Everyone stay put. I’m going to check the tires, see if one of them did blow out and try to determine the cause.”