AllFreeNovel
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I started the truck and drove out of the parking lot onto the street that would take us out to the highway. All the while, the flashes never ceased.
Neither of usspoke until we were safely inside my garage.
“Does the dude ranch have gates?” Annie asked. “Ones that lock?”
“Yes.”
“Call Thad and tell him to lock them now. If they know where I am, that means they know about your father too.”
“Why do you think so?”
“Because of the crime scene photos. The motel was plain as day. They traced it to here. That’s not hard. I should never have come here. Now I’ve got you all involved.”
“Your mother and my father are to blame, not you. And some zealous paparazzi.” I took hold of my phone and called Thad. He answered right away. I could hear a football game going on in the background.
“What’s up?” Thad asked. “You okay?”
He was asking because I wasn’t much of a phone caller, more of a texter. “I’m okay, but the paparazzi found Annie. They took pictures of us. Kissing. In the parking lot of the tavern.”
Thad didn’t say anything for a few seconds, probably needing a little time to process what I’d just said. “I’m going to put the kissing aside for now, but we’ll be following up on that.”
“Yeah, fine. You need to lock everything up tight,” I said. “They may have pieced together the connection between our families. They’ll be trying to get more photos.”
“The gate’s always locked up at night, and the property has fences, many of them with cameras.” Thad stopped for a moment, cursing under his breath. “I think there’s a helicopter flying over the ranch right now. You guys need to stay inside.”
“Yeah, from now on, we will.” My house was protected by an electric fence that I didn’t usually bother to turn on. It was going on now.
“Don’t worry, brother,” Thad said. “But turn on your fence.”
“Doing it right now.” I hung up and pulled up the app on my phone. With just a few clicks I had the fences turned on. “I’m locking us in here tight.” I looked across the truck at her. “This is bananas.”
She buried her face in her hands. “It started when I dated Benjamin. Up until then, I was just a working actor. But you don’t date one of the most famous men in the world and stay under the radar.”
“At least you didn’t marry him.”
“You know what I thought of after the whole thing went down? Your mom. I could suddenly see the similarities between Rex and Ben.”
“Narcissist pigs?” I asked.
“Yeah, something like that.” She sighed, rubbing her eyes. "I think I came back here looking for you. Actually, I know I did. You seemed like the safest place to go, and now I've brought chaos to you and your family."
"We're tough," I said. "We've been through worse."
"No, you don't understand. They have pictures of us kissing. They're going to figure out you're the billionaire who sold your company to Seamark. They'll follow us around everywhere."
"We'll deal with it."
"I want to go to the tavern. And to the Christmas festival."
"Then we'll do it. I don't care if they link us."
She turned slightly, her eyes cast downward. "Why not?"
"I'd be proud. To be honest."
"Because I'm famous?" Annie asked, voice shaking.
"What? God no. Because you're Annie Armstrong. The girl I loved before I even understood what that was."
