Page 66 of Thirsty Bodyguard Summer

I kept my feet planted behind the protected line.

Melanie tried to wrench free. The camera swung from its harness and struck her ribs. Cassidy trapped the monopod against her side, shifted her hips, and used Melanie’s momentum to turn her into the wall.

The weapon hit the concrete.

Cassidy kicked it out of reach.

Melanie shoved backward and twisted, but Cassidy hooked one of her arms behind her and folded her over the corridor rail without slamming her face into it.

“Stop fighting me.”

“He doesn’t deserve this!” Melanie shouted.

Cassidy shifted her grip higher on Melanie’s wrist. “You’re done.”

Rafi and two SBS agents reached us from stage access. A uniformed officer followed from the opposite end of the corridor.

Cassidy didn’t release Melanie until the officer secured both wrists and one of the agents had the monopod.

“Preserve her camera and credential,” Rafi said. “The false post and credential scan are already documented.”

Melanie craned her neck toward me while the officer pulled her upright.

“You told the police everything,” she said. “You destroyed them, and now they’re letting you pretend you were the victim.”

“I’m not pretending anything.” My voice came out rough. “Vince almost died. Telling the truth didn’t destroy Sunday Drive. What happened that night did.”

“You made Jesse lose his career.”

“Jesse has a career.”

“He should have yours.”

“That isn’t your decision.”

The officer moved her down the east corridor. The bass rolling through the walls swallowed the scrape of her shoes and the voices closing around her.

Rafi spoke into his comm. “Suspect is contained. Maintain the west-gate response and continue the hold at the public doors. Isabel, confirm the entrances remain controlled.”

Cassidy bent and picked up Melanie’s camera by the strap before handing it to another agent.

A red line crossed her left arm where the monopod had struck.

I waited until the officer and Melanie cleared the junction.

Then I went to her.

“Let me see your arm.”

Cassidy glanced down as though she’d forgotten it existed. “It’s a bruise.”

“That sounded like an assessment you made without looking.”

“I felt it happen.”

I reached for her, then stopped before touching the reddened skin.

“Does it hurt?”