Read Bodyguard: A Bad Boy Stepbrother Romance (Snake Eyes Book 1) for Free Online Page B

tilt the faucet and let the hot water fall down into the tub. Steam rises, filling the air with perfect, gentle wisps. I start to unbutton my blouse, then pause when I realize the bathroom window shades are open as well. I don’t recall doing that, but it’s been a strange few days. Everything has been a crazy blur since the moment I watched Senator Lamb get shot. I remember the hospital and my father barking orders at the nurses and today’s consult with the plastic surgeon. It’s the little details that are gone. Post-traumatic stress, they told me. It’ll pass, they told me. Smile for the camera, they told me.
    I lock the bathroom door and slide my blouse off my shoulders.
    The water is hot — too hot — but it’s how I like it. If I’m not seeing red as I lie back in the tub, then it’s not hot enough. My toes curl and sweat breaks instantly on my brow. I lean back and lay my head against a folded up towel on the porcelain edge. With my eyes closed, I let my mind wander to places it never goes during my busy days. Places of peace and quiet and—
    Fox.
    I open my eyes and lick my lips.
    No. Not Fox. Think of something else. Anything else.
    It’s been there since the moment I saw him today; that irresistible thirst. I haven’t felt it since the day he left home and it was immediately replaced with seething hatred. He kissed me — on my birthday — and then ran off without even saying goodbye. Who does that? What reason could he possibly have? Did he hate it? He seemed to like it. Maybe I just wasn’t good at it and he was too much of a coward to let me down gently.
    I slap the water with my palm, annoyed that this topic has once again dominated my thoughts. It was five years ago . I’m a completely different person now and — by the looks of it — so is he. He’s not the same Fox I met when we were fifteen and my father started dating his mother. Back then, he was that guy. The popular kid in the halls with his backpack hanging from one shoulder and a hot cheerleader on the other. That devil may care attitude that everyone loved, teachers included. It’s what let him get away with so much with little effort on his part.
    We had nothing in common. I was an average kid on the opposite end of the spectrum. Quiet and shy. I didn’t like crowds or cameras or being the center of attention but that didn’t stop my father from pushing me into theater classes and auditions.
    Fox and I never got along that well. We were just too different. It was awkward enough going to the same school. When he and his mother moved in, it got worse. Fighting, bickering. Little did we know that our feelings sat just beneath the surface, forbidden urges neither one of us dared to say out loud until that night .
    No, he’s not that same boy. He’s changed. Now, he’s the one hiding in the shadows. Honestly, he probably should have just stayed there.
    I inhale a deep breath before submerging my head. The doctor told me to keep the bandage on my cheek dry, but I don’t really care about that right now. I just want to get his rugged, bearded face out of my head.
    I shoot up in the tub, my eyes darting towards the door as something slams in the hall. Water pours from the sides, sprinkling down to the linoleum floor. I refuse to move or even breathe. I stare at the locked door. Was it real? Or was it all in my head?
    “Smith?”
    I sit up a little more, focusing my hearing on the hallway. Any second now, I’ll hear his loafers tap down the hall. He’ll knock twice and I’ll hear his authoritarian voice ask, “Is everything okay in there?”
    Silence.
    I raise my voice a little louder. “Smith?”
    Nothing. No answer. No shoes. No annoyed sigh.
    I wrap my fingers around the tub’s edge and push myself up.
    Glass shatters, echoing from the kitchen. I freeze, suspended between standing and kneeling, as something falls to the floor in the living room. Something stiff and loud. Like a body.
    “Smith?!” I shout again, pleading