Page 22 of Auctioned To Be Mine

“That’s not an answer.”

“It’s the only answer you’re getting.” I was acutely aware of how close he was standing. How tall he was. How those green eyes seemed to see right through me.

How did one man get all the looks? The cocky bastard was perfect. Like someone hand-picked every perfect feature and put it in one man.

“I was hoping you’d—oh shit.” His entire demeanor changed in an instant. “Hide me.”

“What?”

“Please. I’m begging you. Hide me right now.”

I followed his gaze and saw a woman making her way through the backstage area. She was wearing what looked like the ass end of a peacock sitting on her head. Her dress was sequined within an inch of its life, and she was holding her phone up, clearly filming everything.

“Who is that?”

“Chantilly. The terrible date I mentioned.” He moved behind me slightly and ducked, using me as a human hiding place. “The one from the restaurant. She’s been stalking me ever since. Please tell me you have somewhere I can hide.”

“I’ll run interference,” Drew said.

I should have left Callum to deal with his own problems. He was arrogant and annoying. But he had just helped me escape from Jeff Connors, and he was here for the children.

“Fine. Come with me.” I grabbed his arm and pulled him toward a side door I’d noticed earlier during set up. It led to what looked like a storage room—boxes of supplies, extra chairs, and random equipment stashed away and forgotten.

I closed the door behind us and turned to find Callum leaning against a stack of boxes, looking genuinely relieved.

“Thank you,” he said. “Seriously. You just saved my life.”

“That’s a bit dramatic.”

“You haven’t met Chantilly.” He ran a hand through his hair, messing it up slightly. Somehow he looked even better disheveled. “She’s been texting me nonstop.”

“Maybe you should have been nicer to her.”

“I was perfectly nice. I sat through an entire dinner while she filmed herself eating caviar and complaining about everything. The fire alarm took way longer than I expected.”

“Wait, did you do that?”

“Do what?”

“That fire alarm seems to have been very convenient.”

He flashed a grin. “I plead the fifth.”

My eyes widened. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

He had the nerve to laugh.

I stared at him in absolute disbelief. “Seriously, you’re the reason I got soaked?”

“I’m sorry for getting you all wet.” He had the audacity to look sheepish, but his eyes were still dancing with amusement. “It was a code red. We only use that in the most desperate of times. My brother pulled the fire alarm so I could escape that date, but we didn’t know the sprinklers would go off.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. He was a punk kid. Spoiled. Entitled. Obnoxious.

My hands balled into fists at my sides. “You deliberately set off a fire alarm just to get out of a bad date?”

“Drew did, technically. I just texted him.”

“Oh, well, that makes it so much better!” My voice was rising, and I didn’t care. “Do you have any idea how illegal that is? How dangerous?”