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CHAPTER4
Penelope
“N-no,”I force out. Way to show them I’m a strong badass. It’s the panic setting in, firing up my muscles like I’m going to sprint out of Malibu.
The idea that Cannon would be around me twenty-four seven. Cannon with his wide shoulders and baggy Hawaiian shirt. Cannon with his shaggy hair and rumpled cargo pants.
Cannon with the piercing eyes that see more than I want him to, like he knows that most days I’m barely hanging on. Like he knows that when I’m with London and Holland, I want to cry. I’m not as strong as them, I’m not as talented as them, and I missed five years of being a carefree and single adult like them.
I’m overreacting. There’s no way Cannon can know what I think.
London leans closer. She dragged me out of the guest room—I’m determined to spend only one night in it—and down to the patio ensconced in the curve of their house. I’m on a lawn chair next to her. Jacobi is standing behind London, and Cannon is frustratingly behind me. I can’t see him, but his shadowed gaze strokes across my bare shoulders, leaving tracks of heat behind.
I changed out of my practice clothes when I arrived at London’s. The handkerchief top that hooks around my neck and anchors at the waist seemed like a comfortable idea at the time. Now, I want a cardigan and a blanket to cover my bare legs. I should’ve kept the leggings instead of exchanging them for shorts. Cannon has a way of making me feel exposed, hyperaware that I’m not some old married lady but a young and almost single woman. Thoughts I should not be having at the moment.
“I don’t need a bodyguard.” I don’t need a stranger seeing that I have nowhere to go other than my studio, and I’m not sure I can withstand staying there alone. My mom isn’t in the public eye like she used to be, but a juicy story about her daughter being stalked will still sell. I won’t depend on someone I don’t know to pick their job over that type of easy money.
“We don’t want to find out that you do when it’s too late,” she says, not afraid to speak plainly.
I stick my lower lip out and immediately suck it back in. A habit from childhood that’s impossible to break. I got enough derision from Roman when he noticed. I don’t need to witness Cannon roll his eyes or something when he thinks I’m pulling the pouty rich woman card.
“I’ll be fine.” My words lack conviction. I don’t know whether I’ll be fine, but I know two things: I don’t want a handsome stranger hovering around me and watching the shit show that has become my life. And I don’t want that stranger to be the oddly familiar Cannon. I can’t pay a bodyguard anyway.
Is that three things?
“If it’s payment you’re worried about…” Jacobi says like he’s reading my mind. Years of expressing myself on the dance floor have made it hard to hide my thoughts off it. “…Cannon will wait until the divorce is settled to take payment.”
Damn London’s husband for seeing through people. Just because he spends so much time behind a screen doesn’t mean he hasn’t spent his life watching and monitoring people or manipulating them like he did London.
“Will that work?” London asks gently.
My major argument is that I don’t want my bodyguard to be Cannon. He puts me on edge. He’s the conglomeration of everyone who’s judged me throughout my life and found me lacking.
But it’s not like I can call a firm and hire someone. I can’t pay them up front, and I can’t pay them in installments until my divorce is final. When will that be? And will I end up with anything once it’s done?
“How would this go? Logistically?” I ask, my first weak attempt to question how Cannon’s going to feel when he sees that I’m sleeping at the studio.
Again, Jacobi swoops in like a mind reader. “When you’re here, Cannon can take a little time off, go run errands, even go home to sleep. I have plenty of security.”
I’m shaking my head before he’s done talking. “I’m not staying here. I’m not—” Hurt crosses London’s face. I grab her hands. “It’s not you, London. It’s me. I didn’t leave Roman so I could stay at my friend’s. I left for my own independence. I don’t want to risk you, and I don’t want to feel like…”
A burden. Just another helpless girl someone has to take care of.
Maybe she could’ve fostered some of the brain cells in her head if you hadn’t thrown in all those dance classes.
Father’s words had sounded like the worst thing that could be said to me until Mother replied with It was hard enough to find something she’s actually good at, much less that she stands out in.
“You can’t stay at the studio,” London says gently. She knows I have nowhere else to go.
I left Roman with only one place to go. There is no backup plan. My world closes in around me, making it hard to breathe.
My back burns. I glance over my shoulder, but Cannon’s leaning against the house and scrolling through his phone. Foolishness swamps me. I’ve built up all these preconceptions about him, but he can’t even be bothered to look at me. I would be nothing but a job to him. A favor for a friend.
Why do I care what he thinks? Is it easier to direct my anger toward a man with no fashion sense and no real job than to face my parents or my husband?
I pick at the skin around a nail. I care what everyone thinks. That’s been a problem my whole life. “I wasn’t expecting to have to need another backup. It won’t be for forever.”
“The studio won’t work,” Cannon says with his attention still on his phone.
