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9
Juliet pushed the cart of books down the aisle, shelving the last few.
She’d been at work for hours and she was still obsessing over what happened earlier. Not being able to ride her bike wherever she needed to go felt like losing a limb. She knew people thought she was crazy for riding everywhere. But she loved riding her bike. It was one of the few times that she felt normal. Carefree.
And that had been taken away from her. As well as her privacy. Her ability to make her own decisions. Everything was getting on top of her, and it had been less than seventy-two hours since they arrived.
Please let Reuben get this sorted quickly.
Because she didn’t know how much she could handle.
“Hey, it’s lunchtime. You usually go out for lunch or something?” Elias asked with a hopeful smile.
She shook her head. Her lunch was the protein bar in her handbag. But she guessed that going halves on a protein bar wasn’t going to fill the big guy up. He looked like he ate a lot of food.
Grabbing her phone from her pocket, she typed a message.
I have lunch with me. There’s a diner down the next block if you want to go get something.
Elias huffed out a breath, grimacing briefly. “Not the way it works, doll. If you’re here, so am I. My fault for not asking you about the food situation before we left.”
No. Her fault for not telling him.
Let me get my bag and go to the bathroom, then we’ll go.
Elias shot her a relieved grin. “If you insist.”
She just shook her head at him and they walked into the break room. She grabbed her bag from her locker.
“Juliet, have you finished shelving those books yet?”
She glanced up with a sigh as Gladys walked in. Gladys was four years older than her and loved to pretend she was in charge. Juliet mostly ignored her. Like right now, when she didn’t bother to look around as she searched through her bag to make sure she’d brought her wallet with her. Now that they were going to the diner, she was in the mood for a chocolate milkshake.
“I know you can hear me, you’re not deaf. Just fucking rude.”
“Hey!” Elias said in a sharp voice she’d never heard from him.
Juliet glanced over at him in surprise.
“Who are you?” Gladys asked. “What are you doing back here? Juliet, you’re not supposed to bring customers back here.”
“I’m not a customer,” Elias said. “I’m Juliet’s bodyguard. And I’m going to have to ask you to step away from Juliet.”
“Or what?”
“Or I’ll be forced to step in.”
“I’ll be telling Darin about this. You can’t bring a bodyguard to work just because you’re paranoid, Juliet. No one is after you. God, nobody even notices that you’re here most of the time. You just blend into the background.”
Juliet spun and Gladys took a step back with a gasp. She knew it wasn’t nice to smile at the other woman’s fear. But then, she didn’t always claim to be nice. As she stepped forward, Gladys was forced to move back.
Elias moved with her, frowning at Gladys.
To her surprise, as she walked out of the library, she realized she’d worked up an appetite.
Juliet hugged Missy and lay on her bed, sucking her pacifier.
She’d changed into her Halloween onesie, since that was her favorite holiday. It had pictures of pumpkins with carved faces on them. She’d put on her ruffly panties. And she was rubbing her blankie under her nose as she sucked on the pacifier. She’d chosen Missy to cuddle since Angelique was in time-out.
