Page 21 of Tangled Like Us

“I’m seventeen—I mean, I’mJane.”

Six years later and he’s still one of the few people who tongue-tie me.

But before that encounter, I have no idea what he was doing. Where he was living. What his life looked like, and this isn’t the first time I’ve contemplated this cumbersome space of unknown time.

I can’t bolt my tongue down fast enough. “What did you do before you became a bodyguard? Were you in college?”

He gives me a protective look like I’m about to step on a landmine. “No. I didn’t go to college.” His squared shoulders never budge out of their readiness state of being.

I nod.

Tread carefully.

“I don’t mean to pry—that’s a lie, I do mean to pry.” I smile more at him.

I swear to all that is holy, his lips almost twitch into a tiny, fragment of a smile.

It causes me to carry onward. Like I live in a word vomitorium. “I don’t know where you were between high school and joining security, and if you want me to stop talking, just tell me, because I can—”

“Jane.” He breaks our eye contact, which worries me. He runs a rougher hand across his jaw and dips his head, causing a piece of brown hair to fall in his face. The strand lightly caresses his jaw before he tucks it back behind his ear.

I touch my hot cheek with a few fingers. “Really, you don’t have to answer.” I’m about to transition topics, but I’m stuck watching Thatcher.

He drops his arm to his side with a sort of decisiveness. As though he’s certain about his next action.

I’m feverishly trying to read and understand him from four feet away.

Thatcher nods to me. “You really want to know?”

“Of course I do.” I inhale a sharper breath and then lean my hip on the shelf, a lilac fabric roll poking my side.

Skin between his brows pleats, his confusion like cracking cement. “Why?”

You’ve always fascinated me.I open my mouth, those words trapped for a full second. I end up saying, “…I suppose those years, eighteen to twenty-two, make up who you are, and I’d like to know you better.”

He seizes my gaze in a vice that I’d rather not escape. “Most people don’t get this far. When I tell them I haven’t gone to college, that’s it. Hold on.” He clicks his mic and speaks louder. “Thatcher to Omega, I don’t copy. You’re coming in weak.” He scans the fabric store for threats while he listens.

Sometimes I envy bodyguards and their radios. To be a fly on the wall within the team. Farrow has let Moffy and me listen to comms chatter before. I thought it’d weaken my interest in security, namely Thatcher, but hearing how assertive he is just drastically increased his appeal.

He detaches the radio off his waistband, and his eyes dart to me. “Sorry, I’ve got to unfuck the comms.”

I wave him onward. “Go ahead.” While he handles security, I flag down the storeowner who passes the aisle. She’s elderly and sweet enough to answer several questions I have about fabrics. After which I let her be, and now I’ve gained a morsel more knowledge.

More prepared. I’m veering towards sheer black fabric. Very Calloway Couture. Verynotme.

Thatcher clips the radio back to his slacks and adjusts his earpiece.

I peek more over my shoulder. “Finished?”

Without tearing his gaze off me, he checks his holstered gun on his waistband.

In the silence, the wordfinishedlingers oddly. “With comms,” I add, facing him fully. “Not any other sort of finishing.”

Oh my God.I’m on six months without sex, and I wonder if this is a symptom of dick starvation. It better not be because I’ve sworn toneverlet a man inside of me. Never again. Not after the last time.

Thatcher doesn’t blink. “I know what you meant, Jane.”

“Bien.” I nod.