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“Our client chooses to remain anonymous. Sarah and Elijah will be discreet, but one or the other of them will be in your vicinity at all times.”
“You can’t do that if I choose not to be…” What the hell was the word? “Surveilled.” God, Bella, that sounds lame. But seriously, what the hell?
“Ms. Grace, when was the first time you noticed one of my operatives?”
“I…” She trailed off. How many times had she felt eyes tracking her? A handful in the last month? Possibly a little more. “Maybe a few weeks at most.”
“We’ve had you under surveillance for five and a half months.”
Dumbfounded, she rocked back on her heels. “What? How?”
“My people are very good at their jobs. And if you’ll cooper—”
“No, I’m not going to cooperate. I demand to know who hired you.” When the man at the other end of the line didn’t answer, she put her stern auction voice on. Being a woman in her industry, she dealt with a lot of good ole boys. “Now, Mr. Roth.”
“Impressively impassioned, Ms. Grace, but I’ll need to discuss this with my client and get back to you.”
“Is it a buyer that wants to work with me? An auction house? What?” She huffed out a breath. “Mr. Roth?” She pulled the phone away from her ear and growled. He’d hung up.
Tank plucked the phone out of her hand. “We’ll be sure to stay out of your way, ma’am.”
“Where are you going to go? We’re stranded in an airport for at least the next six hours. And why the hell would anyone want to watch over me?” She folded her arms. “Is this something kinky?”
“I need a new assignment.” RBF—Sarah—pivoted and stalked across the hall to the newsstand.
Bella looked up at Elijah. “You’re seriously not going to tell me?”
“Client’s request.”
Bella scrubbed her hands over her face. She’d probably just smudged what was left of her make-up, but she really didn’t care. She wanted to know why she’d been plunked down in an alternate reality where anyone cared enough to watch after her.
Was she being researched for a job? She’d had a lot of different offers to work for larger auction houses. Her list of contacts in the book world grew each year. And yet, it just didn’t seem likely.
The auction houses had a helluva lot of money, but not enough to chase after her, especially with the frequent flier miles she’d been accruing. She’d been in full-on work mode for the last four months especially. Pretty soon she was going to know the schedule to every flight out of Chicago, Atlanta, and D.C.
She hefted her carry-on and her briefcase and walked across the terminal to her scheduled gate. Another couple of inches of snow had gathered on the runway since she’d been gone and the plows were doing their damnedest to keep up.
A few of the boards had updates from canceled to new departure times. Her job wasn’t exactly the kind that required a rush. It was just a matter of moving a book from one bookcase to another for a lot of her clients. They loved the kn
owledge that they had a rarity, but in all honesty they wouldn’t actually touch the book often. The fragility of the pages, especially the age of the one she was carrying, made ownership the most important part.
She understood that, but in the end, she wanted the tactile part of ownership. To know the book was hers, to smell the old pages, and to curl into a chair and absorb its words. That was the reason she knew this job inside and out. She understood the lust of an old book, but she also understood the status factor.
It was a fine line to walk. One of prestige, and one of passion. Not many of her contemporaries understood that. The business was aging out and the auction houses needed younger people like herself. She could understand a background check, but not this. She glanced up at the broad-shouldered man. Her new shadow didn’t even attempt to make himself scarce.
He walked beside her, his eyes quietly assessing everything.
Disgusted, she tucked her belongings into the little corner she’d created and pulled out her phone. Tank plucked her phone out of her hands.
“Hey!”
He held the power button at the top of her phone and shut it down, then tucked it into his pocket. “According to your itinerary, you have plans to go to Vancouver after Seattle?”
“How do you know that?”
“Credit cards rule the world, Ms. Grace.”
She rested her forearm on the briefcase. “Where is your company based, Elijah?”
