“They were… well. They were kind of weird, just like everything else. Most of them were candid shots taken of—”
Oh, no. No, no,no.Not in front of Harlow. Not now.
Distressed, Simon grabbed the arm of the couch and jumped to his feet. Pain slammed the space behind his nose, so intense that he felt it pulse inside his teeth. He hissed in pain and flailed, sure that he’d either hit the wall or the floor. He hit a toned male chest instead.
“Hey,” Harlow said in a soft voice. “What did I tell you about taking it easy?”
Easy? Easy wasnotpossible when Simon’s heart raced like it did when Harlow touched him.
“I’m… I’m easy,” Simon whispered in reply, then realized what he’d said. His eyes widened, his cheeks burned, and he looked up at Harlow, horrified. “Thatwasn’twhat I meant. I mean, I’m… I’m—”
“The pictures,” Shep said in a loud voice, putting an end to Simon’s stuttering, but not doing anything for his embarrassment, “were of Evie. I put them in a reverse image search and found out who she was. I thought it was a little creepy, because Simon was twenty-one at the time, and Evie was between twelve and fifteen, but there weren’t any racy photos. All of them were paparazzi shots… just her on the streets, walking around. Or in shops, or at the airport, or whatever. But I knew that Simon wasn’t really into celebrity culture, so I started Googling her to figure out what it was that was so interesting…” Shep looked up at Evie and smiled. Simon barely saw it happen—his attention was torn between Harlow, who still held him to his chest, and the fact that any moment now, Shep was about to drop the biggest bomb of Simon’s life.
Simon knew which pictures he was talking about.
He wished he didn’t.
While it was true that Evie was in every single one of the pictures on Simon’s old hard drive, he hadn’t collected them because of her. In fact, he cared so little that she was in them that he’d failed to recognize her when she’d been sitting in Shep’s bedroom.
The pictures had been on Simon’s hard drive because wherever Evie went, Harlow went, too.
Harlow in t-shirts and shorts. Harlow in a full suit. Harlow smiling, frowning, stony-faced, worried. Apart from the few pictures Simon had found from his military days, paparazzi shots were the only way Simon had been able to put a face to a name. He’d collected those pictures dutifully, stowed them away, and kept them in his heart.
And Shep had seen every one of them.
“Anyway, when I looked her up, I noticed that she’d posted a vague, kind of sad status, so I messaged her and told her I hoped she was feeling better. Somehow, she was interested enough in me to message me back, and we started talking. Long story short, we fell in love, and Evie told me she was unhappy with her life, so we decided that she’d come stay with me. I figured if I could keep her away from you guys for a few hours, just tell you that I was having a friend over, you’d leave us alone and we could slip out in the middle of the night and go wherever. Evie has money, and I’ll keep her safe and happy no matter what, so we knew we could make it work.”
Simon felt the muscles of Harlow’s chest tighten, but he was still gentle as he guided Simon to stand on his own. When they were parted, he crossed the room to stand in front of Shep and Evie, somehow taller and wider than he’d ever been before. The Harlow that Simon knew was made of sunshine, but the man he faced now was the sky before a tornado struck—turbulent and dark, silently powerful. The sight of him froze Simon in place and made him look on in awe.
No picture could compare to this.
“You think you can keep her safe?” Harlow asked. His words gusted, daring Shep to test them, ready to blow him away. “You think that you have what it takes to protect her?”
Shep, who was seated on the floor by Evie’s feet, looked more like a faithful pet than a protector, but he met Harlow’s gale with a hurricane look of his own. “IknowI can protect her.”
“Then prove it.”
The Harlow who could murder them all was back, shoulders tense, stance wide, body ready for battle. In that moment he wasn’t a man, but a finely tuned machine capable of unimaginable destruction. The sight of him shut Simon down, stole his voice, and locked his tongue. He wished he could find it in him to speak, to warn Shep not to engage, but he couldn’t. The fear inside ate his resolve.
All he could do was watch, terrified, as Shep bounded to his feet and lunged at the man who could tear him apart.
