Page 22 of The Bodyguard and His Bunny

When he recovers from the shock, his face goes stoic.

Whatever he’s holding back, I wish he would stop.

“I doubt that,” he mumbles, disappearing through the bedroom, down the hall, and out of sight.

CHAPTER9

Gunther

I’m an idiot.

Sara paid me a compliment and kissed me. What did I do? I acted like a middle schooler at his first school dance and ran scared.

I hop in the guest shower and try to erase the feeling of embarrassment with scalding hot water and soap.

Once I get the stink off me from my run, I start to feel better.

But nothing can fix the ache when I think about Sara and how vulnerable she looked.

An overwhelming need to touch myself overtakes me, but I resist. I know jerking one out to thoughts of her will take the edge off, but I know it will only leave me feeling hollow.

But I can’t have her.

Not because it would be crossing some professional line.

I had already crossed it over the weeks of following her and falling for her sweet smile and sunny attitude.

No, the reason I can’t have her is that she deserves someone who matches her free spirit. Her precious energy needs someone as young and sweet and optimistic as herself. She’s an innocent bunny who I would die to protect. And I would sacrifice my body and my happiness to ensure she never loses that spark.

Because I might love her with the kind of love that wants only her happiness.

She’s not the troublemaker her uncle makes her out to be. In his eyes, she’s the dirty little secret. But she doesn’t deserve that.

Sara deserves the world.

I crank off the faucet and step out of the shower, my head buzzing and my body aching as I dry myself off. The simple act of toweling off the water from my dick is enough to make me grit my teeth in frustration.

It’s not meant to be, little sailor.

After I brush my teeth and tug on my sleep pants, I stop in the hallway when I hear Sara getting ready for bed. I shouldn’t be standing here, listening to her exit the shower, humming to herself, brushing her teeth. But all of it is music to my ears.

Nobody, let alone a woman, has ever filled this space with such happy sounds. I prop myself up against the wall and listen with a grin on my face.

I hear her slide open my dresser drawer, most likely to place some of her things next to mine. She then slips into bed, the frame creaking under her weight. God, I’ll never rewash my sheets. After she’s gone, I’ll roll around in her scent like a dog to make myself feel better.

Tiredness overtaking me, I lean against the wall as I listen to her click the T.V. on, flipping through channels erratically. Eventually, she lands on the Cartoon Network, and I hear her snickering about one ridiculous show or another. I have to swallow a laugh so she doesn’t know I’m out here listening to her like a creep.

Eventually, she goes quiet after several long minutes, with me just outside her door, wishing I was in there with her, curling my arm around her and feeling her laughter tremble against me.

Her breathing is audible now, even and deep.

I peek around the doorjamb and see that she’s passed out cold, asleep in front of the T.V. And that she’s wearing my Naval Academy tee shirt. She didn’t put her clothes in my dresser after all; she was stealing a shirt to wear to bed.

It’s getting tougher and tougher not to get physically turned on by everything about her, but the thought of her body in my clothes? She’s going to wreck me.

Gingerly, I remove the remote from her hand and click the T.V. off, setting it on the ledge.

I turn and watch her sleep. I know I shouldn’t, but I do it. The silhouette of her sleeping form in the darkness of my bedroom has me transfixed, as does the sound of her deep breathing.

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