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“Why don’t you call me Carmen.”
“Okay, Carmen it is.”
“Well I’m on my way to Ingram International.”
“That’s good to know,” Kamau said.
He was feeling very uncomfortable with her in the car. His job was to keep his distance and protect her. And then there was the fact that Carmen was able to not only lose him, but then she snuck up on him. Like I was some amateur. But that wasn’t the only reason Kamau was uncomfortable.
“You might as well take me there, because now that I know what you look like,” Carmen leaned closer to him and smiled. “I’ll just end up losing you again.”
“Yes, Ms. Taylor, I mean Carmen,” Kamau said and started up the car. And now she’s talking shit about it.
“Good.” Carmen put on her seatbelt. “I was having a hard time getting a cab anyway.”
As Kamau pulled out into traffic, Carmen looked at her bodyguard. Although her initial reaction was and still is appreciation, there was a part of Carmen - a big part - who thought her having a bodyguard, without her knowledge, was a major invasion of her privacy.
Not that I was doing all that much other than working all the time anyway, Carmen thought. But that’s not the point!
She really couldn’t be too mad at Kamau; he was just doing his job. It was Mike Black that she should be mad at. And she planned to give him a good piece of her mind the next time she saw him. But even though she was mad, she couldn’t be all that mad at Black either.
After all, if he didn’t get me a bodyguard, I might be dead now.
“So, now that we’ve got introductions out of the way, why don’t you tell me about yourself?”
“Okay. What do you want to know?”
“Everything. I mean, it’s only fair; you know all about me,” Carmen smiled, but she was serious. “Let’s start with how deeply you’ve invaded my privacy?”
“I’d say not at all.”
“Why don’t you tell me what not at all means?”
“Most of what I do for you is threat evaluation. I watch your news broadcasts, so I keep up with what you’re doing, and I make a determination about what level of security that I need to provide.”
“So you’re not with me every day all day.”
“No. Not at all.” Kamau laughed. “Being your bodyguard is a job, not a lifestyle, Ms. Taylor … I mean Carmen,” he said quickly, noticing the look on her face. “So, no, I’m not sitting outside of your building every night.”
That makes me feel a little better, but, “What about when I go to Atlanta to see my parents? Do you go with me there too? Like are you on the same flight or something?”
“Nothing like that. I have been to Atlanta once and both your parents and Mr. Douglas live in secure, well policed, gated communities, therefore, I deemed it a safe environment for you. So unless there was something that I deemed to be a threat, and it hasn’t been, I saw no reason to travel to Atlanta,” he said, trying to sound as professional as possible. Hoping that it would be enough to conceal the way he really felt about her. “Most of the time, it’s pretty lax. I keep my distance and try to be invisible.”
It wasn’t exactly what she wanted to hear, not exactly sure what I wanted to hear, but it wasn’t all that big of an intrusion, and then there was that thing about saving her life. Carmen was about to move on to asking the handsome man sitting next to her about himself when she thought of a question.
“If you don’t follow me all that closely, what were you doing outside the diner that night?” Carmen asked thinking that she had caught him in a contradiction.
“I knew that you and Ms. West were going to Paris.”
“How?”
“Excuse me?”
“How did you know that me and Ms. West were going to Paris?” Carmen really needed to know.
Kamau took a deep breath. “Since Ms. West chooses to go out without any security when she’s with you, her personal assistant, Caprice, calls me to let me know.”
“So let me get this straight. You weren’t following me that night; you were there to protect Jada?”
