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“I’m aware,” I tell him, not backing down.
Simon finally breaks eye contact and brushes past me to snatch a banana off the kitchen counter. He cracks it open, peeling back the flesh, and holds it out to me. “Please?”
And only because I’m evil as fuck, I step forward, my gaze remaining firmly on his, and wrap my mouth around the tip of the banana, biting it off with every ounce of seduction I can muster. I chew it slowly while staring at him. “Happy?”
Simon swallows harshly like he’s considering his words carefully.
Instead of responding, he steps closer, bringing the banana to my lips.
I take another bite, watching him watch me, and then take another. We continue this back-and-forth thing until only a small chunk remains.
“Now I am.” He pops the rest of it into his mouth and nods to the door. “You may leave.”
Here I was, thinking I was calling the shots, but in a matter of seconds, Simon completely flipped the script, and I played right fucking into it.
Him being my bodyguard might annoy the fuck out of me, but at least this is an entertaining game of who can push who more.
2
SIMON
Istand in the corner of Bram’s diner, a quaint little place on the edge of town that serves the best coffee in the entire city. Hell, maybe the whole state. But that’s not why I’m here. I’m here because I’m June’s personal bodyguard. Because it’s my job to make sure she remains safe at all times when she’s not under the protection of her three boyfriends.
They hate me.
And I hate them.
But that doesn’t change the fact that we have one common goal—keep June alive.
I almost failed her once, and I won’t make that mistake again.
It was my fault she put herself in danger. I was the reason she got shot. Because one of my men got trigger-happy when they saw her press a dagger to my chest. I should have acted sooner, noticed the threat. But I was too damn captivated by the radiant beauty aiming a blade at my heart. If she would have succeeded, that death would have been far less painful than the one I’m experiencing now.
To bethis damn closeto her…but unable to call her mine.
To watch her, day in and day out, be with the three men I hate the most.
To know with certainty that she’ll never feel the way she does about them, for me.
A large part of me wishes she would have succeeded that day. That she would have driven that blade into my heart, ending my life right then and there. It could have been me bleeding out in her arms instead, and I wouldn't be here, slowly tortured by the impossible distance between us.
But then I remember, I’m Simon fucking Beckett, and when have I ever given up so easily?
Dying that day would have been the easy way out.
When I went to visit her in the hospital, to confirm with my own eyes that she really was okay, I told her I would wait forever.
And that is what I’ll do.
I'll play the long game. I'll suffer through the unbearable sight of her loving three other men just for the possibility that I might eventually convince her of the truth. That I'm better for her. That my arms are where she belongs.
Until then, I’ll play the role she needs—a devoted bodyguard.
I nearly lost it this morning. I was perched just outside her bedroom door as the scent of sex lingered in the air. I wanted to breach that threshold and toss her onto the bed, claiming her for myself. But I didn’t. I couldn’t.
One: because that’s not what she wants…yet.
And two: because if the guys kill me first, she’ll never be mine.
