The Bodyguard & Ms Jones

“Are you a nurse?” he asked.

She laughed. The sweet sound caught him off guard, and he felt himself smiling. It was the second time in less than fifteen minutes. Before now, he probably hadn’t smiled twice the entire year.

“Hardly. I teach math at the middle school.”

“Excuse me for asking, but if you’re not a nurse, what the hell are you doing looking after me in your house? This is your house, isn’t it?”

She leaned back against the footboard. After drawing one knee up toward her chest, she clasped her hands around her calf. “I’m friends with your sister Grace. She lives next door.” She tilted her head. He recognized it as the same move Allison had made. “Grace has lived here four years. If you’re her only brother, how come we’ve never seen you here before?”

“I don’t have much time to see family.” Grace was always inviting him. And she made him feel that she really wanted to see him. But Mike could never bring himself to visit. He’d always been a loner. It was easier, and in his profession, safer. “You still haven’t explained why you didn’t just dump me in the hospital.”

“I owe her. My kids get out of school about an hour and a half before I get home. Grace looks after them. She won’t let me pay her. I can only buy her so many lunches. When her husband found out he would be spending the summer in Hong Kong, she wanted to go with him. Then you got in touch with her. She didn’t know what to do. Going to Hong Kong was the opportunity of a lifetime, but you needed a place to recuperate. That’s where I came in. I said I would look after you until you were back on your feet.”

“Just like that?”

“Of course. She’s my friend.” She seemed surprised by the question, as if opening her house to a sick stranger was commonplace.

“What does Mr. Jones think about this?”

Her mouth twisted down at one corner. “I didn’t consult him. We’re divorced.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It happens. He left me for a trophy wife.”

She leaned forward slightly. The movement caused her shorts to gape slightly by her thigh, exposing a hint of white, lacy panties. Mike told himself he was a bastard for looking and forced himself to concentrate on the conversation.

“Trophy wife? You mean a woman he won somewhere?”

“Exactly. A trophy wife is younger, prettier, blonder. Now that Nelson is successful, he wants someone new to share that with. I’m surprised you’re not familiar with the phenomenon. It’s very prevalent in the suburbs.”

“I’ve never been in the suburbs before.”

“You’re in for a treat. It’s a different world here. One of four-door cars and families. This is the American dream in progress.” Her eyes brightened with humor. “I sometimes think I’m the ultimate cliché.” She shifted on the bed and sat cross-legged. It made his knees hurt just to look at her. She held up one hand and began counting off on her fingers. “I’m divorced, and I was left for a younger woman. I’m a teacher, a traditionally female profession. I live in a bedroom community, I drive a minivan, I use coupons and I have two-point-four children.”

He folded his arms over his chest and grinned. “Let me guess. The point-four child is Shelby, Allison’s imaginary friend.”

“You’ve met?”

“She’s met me. I wasn’t sure where she was standing.”

Their gazes locked. Something leaped between them. Something hot and alive—like electricity. Mike felt warm all over, even though he was practically naked under the sheet. His skin prickled and he had the strangest sensation of taking a step off a bridge, or a building. Only this time, instead of falling, he was suspended there.

Cindy’s green eyes darkened as her pupils dilated. Her breathing increased. He could hear the rapid cadence in the silent room. His blood quickened and he felt the second flickering spark of desire around her.

Then, as if someone had snapped his fingers to break the spell, it was gone. They both looked away. Mike didn’t know if Cindy was feeling the same sense of loss, but he noticed a splotch of color on each of her cheeks.

She cleared her throat. “The only difference between me and most women in my situation is that I got to keep the house. Aunt Bertha, bless her heart, died and left me enough money to pay down the mortgage, pay off Nelson and refinance. You can’t keep a place this big on a teacher’s salary.”

He didn’t know what to say, so he blurted out the first thing that came to him. “Why did you marry someone named Nelson?”

She laughed. “It’s a question I’ve asked myself again and again.” She leaned forward and lowered her voice. “He wasn’t much of a husband. Good riddance.”

He tried to remember the last time he talked with a woman. Just talked. Not as a prelude to sex, or because they were working together. Except for his phone calls with Grace, he didn’t know that he ever had.

“What about you?” she asked. “Ever married?”

“What makes you think I’m not now?”

“Because you would have gone home to her instead of coming to Grace’s.”

“Good point. No, I’ve never been married.” It wasn’t his style. He didn’t believe in getting that close.

“And you’ve always lived in the city?”

He nodded. “I had a place in New York for a while, then I got a lot of work in Los Angeles. I kept an apartment there until it was damaged by the earthquake a couple years back. Since then I’ve been working steadily and haven’t found anywhere I liked.”

She stood up. He couldn’t help watching the graceful way she unfolded her legs. He’d dated a couple of models while he was in New York, but he didn’t like their bony torsos and straight legs. Cindy’s calves and thighs curved as if trying to lead a man astray while tempting him to paradise. He grimaced. He was thinking some strange thoughts. Maybe he’d fallen on his head harder than he’d realized.

“You live a very odd life, Mike Blackburne. You’re about to get a crash course on how the other half lives,” she said. “Welcome to the world of children and Middle America.”

A car honked. She walked to the door and yelled, “Allison, Jonathan, your ride is here.”

The two children ran down the stairs and over to her. She bent down and kissed them both. “Be good.”

They called back that they would, raced across the floor, then slammed the door shut behind them. Cindy drew in a breath. “Ah, blissful silence. You hungry?”

At her question, his stomach rumbled. “I guess so,” he said.

“I’ll make you some soup.” She glanced over her shoulder. “Think you can manage to get to the rest room on your own?”

He eyed the door. “Yeah.”

“I have chicken soup with round noodles, noodles shaped like dinosaurs and alphabet noodles.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Obviously you’ve never had to feed children.”

“I guess not. You don’t have any plain flat noodles?”

“Sorry. They’re not exciting enough.”

She was right. He had entered a strange and different world. “Surprise me.”

* * *

Cindy set the soup bowl on the tray, shifted the water glass over and stared at the crackers. Dry toast might be better. She hesitated for a moment, then figured the man was unlikely to finish what she’d brought him, as it was. She picked up the tray and headed for the bedroom.