Page 67 of Wrecked
“The four men you’d be working with are smart—very smart—excellent at their jobs, and ruthless. You can hold your own, of course.” Pausing, he glanced in her direction. “But it’s good to know these men would have your back… and you’d have theirs. I’d like for them to find another woman for the group, but they haven’t yet.”
“I don’t want to go into hiding. I want to track down Ronald’s killer.”
“Don’t do that,” was all he said.
He grew silent as they moved from piece to piece. They left one salon, moved across the hall to the next one.
“Are you armed?” he asked.
“Of course, I am.”
“Good.”
More silence.
Her dad stopped to admire a painting that had been there for years. “You know,” he began. “I’ve never noticed the look of love in the man’s eyes.”
The painting was of a couple from centuries earlier. A woman, in the portrait’s foreground, cradled a swaddled baby in her arms while a man sat in the background, his attention on the woman and the infant.
“This painting always reminded me of us. Mom holding you or your sister, while I sat clueless in the background, too consumed with my own career to pay attention.”
She regarded him.
“But this man has a soft side,” he said. “I always hated seeing him just sitting there, but maybe he’s got their backs. There’s a kindness in his eyes I never noticed until today.”
He stepped closer, studied the famous painting for another moment. When he turned back, she thought she saw tears in his eyes.
What is happening?
Her dad never cried. Ever. Not even when her mom had abandoned them.
He cleared his throat, put his arm around her, and they continued on.
“Do you have any reason to think you’re in danger?” he murmured.
Her thoughts jumped to the surveillance cameras on her house. He might insist she move out, might put an armed guard outside her front door, or worse, assign someone to tail her. While she hadn’t told him she owned a nightclub, she had every confidence he knew.
“I had a little thing with a couple of my security cameras out front.”
He flicked his gaze her way.
“One was stolen, the other was vandalized, but Hawk already replaced them, so it’s no big deal. Probably neighborhood kids. You know, they were bored during summer break, you know, just out having some fun. We call it vandalism, they call it excitement, entertainment, whatever.”
“You’re rambling, Addison. That’s one of your tells. You’re trying to convince me so I won’t worry.”
Busted.
“When?” he asked.
“Yesterday.”
Her dad grew quiet as they stopped in front of another painting. He tilted his head. Perhaps he was experiencing it from a different perspective. He could have been thinking about the vandalism to her cameras. Sometimes, he was hard to read.
“If I tell you you need a bodyguard, that means I don’t think you can protect yourself. If I say you’re capable of protecting yourself, and you’re ambushed by multiple assailants, and you can’t manage them alone—I would never forgive myself. And I would never get over losing you.”
In silence, they left the salon and followed the signs for the temporary exhibit. This was always the best part of their outing. New pieces of art that were on loan from another museum for a limited time.
They entered that section of the gallery. More people had flocked to see these paintings and their forward momentum was slowed by the sheer number of art aficionados.
