“Sir, we’re going to escort you off the premises now,” one of the security guards said, pushing Quentin back. “You can go quietly, or we can call the police and have you arrested for trespassing.”
“Nally, you have to stop them,” Quentin insisted.
Nally shook his head and moved quickly to Jude’s side. “Take him away,” he told the guards in a hoarse voice.
The guards did their job effectively. Quentin continued to fight and protest, but they pushed and even lifted him off his feet at one point to get him out of the recording hall. From there, Nally didn’t care what they did with him. He was too shaken to do anything other than lean heavily against Jude.
“I’m so sorry,” Jude said, his voice heavy as he slung an arm around Nally to hold him up. “This is all my fault.”
Those words hit Nally hard as suspicion rolled through him. He straightened to look at his friend, but before he could ask what was going on, the lead tech marched into the scene and said, “We need to take a break.”
Nally nodded and somehow managed to walk to the side of the space with Jude. Sir Antonio and the rest of the orchestra disbursed as well.
Only when they got to the side of the room, sat down, and had one of the assistants bring them bottles of water did Nally’s fear subside enough for him to start to put the pieces together.
“What was that all about?” he asked Jude, his voice still slightly shaky. “What was Quentin talking about when he said we’d been corresponding?”
Jude lowered his head, just as upset as Nally, but for different reasons. “I’m sorry,” he said before forcing himself to meet Nally’s eyes again. “Quentin has been sending you all sorts of messages on all your socials. Some of them were a little…intense. I didn’t want to bother you with any of it because I know you’re already stressed out with everything.”
“Quentin has been messaging me and you didn’t tell me?” A whole new emotion welled up in Nally where Jude was concerned, anger. “How could you keep the fact that I have a stalker trying to contact me from me?”
“You would have freaked out,” Jude insisted.
“Of course I would have freaked out!” Nally shouted. He was so unused to being angry with Jude that he didn’t know howto handle his overload of emotions. “Quentin is dangerous. He thinks he loves me. There’s no telling what someone like that might do.”
“You’re always surrounded in safety,” Jude insisted. “Your family and everyone at Hawthorne House protect you all the time. I protect you, too. That’s all I want to do, protect you.”
“By not letting me know there’s a madman who thinks he’s in love with me and who keeps showing up uninvited wherever I am?” Nally demanded. “What’s going to happen when he catches me alone in a dark alley somewhere?”
“That’s never going to happen,” Jude said, reaching for Nally’s hand.
“It already did happen,” Nally snapped. For the first time ever, he pulled away from Jude, not wanting to feel his touch.
“Nally—”
“You can’t keep things like this from me,” he said, standing and taking a few steps away. The emotional overload was too much. Worse still, there were shades of the pain of betrayal he’d felt when things fell apart with Timothy. That sinking sense of losing something precious tugged at Nally’s gut. “This above all else is something you absolutely should have told me.”
“I know, I see that now,” Jude said, rising and stepping closer to Nally. “I didn’t know what to do. I’ve never been in a situation like this personally. They don’t teach you how to deal with stalkers in boarding school.”
His comment was an attempt to lighten the mood, but Nally didn’t feel any lighter. His anger started to subside, but fear and deep anxiety rushed in to take its place. “You should have told me,” he repeated in a quiet voice. “I thought we meant more to each other than silence.”
“What?” Jude said, his eyes going wide and his face flushing. “Of course we mean more to each other than that. Don’t youever doubt that you don’t mean the world to me. You meaneverythingto me, Nally.”
He stepped even closer, grabbing Nally’s hand. Nally knew that something would have happened, Jude would have said or done something that meant they could never go back again, but before he could, the security guards returned with a uniformed police officer.
“Mr. Hawthorne?” the officer asked.
Nally jumped back from Jude, stepping toward the man. “Yes? That’s me.”
“PC Bryant,” the officer introduced himself. He shook Nally’s hand, then said, “Unfortunately, Mr. Quentin ran off just before I arrived. I understand he tried to interact with you against your will?”
“He’s been stalking Nally online,” Jude answered for him. As unsettled as things were between the two of them, Nally was grateful for Jude handling things.
“Is this true?” Bryant asked.
Nally nodded. “It is. He first approached me at the premiere ofTo Serve Him. He’s tried to interact with me at a few other unexpected places, too.”
“I think you should tell me everything,” Bryant said.
