Page 17 of Auctioned to the Billionaire Bodyguard

What the hell was he talking about? “You’re scaring me,” I whispered.

He dropped my arm. “Sorry. Just… be normal, but be on the lookout for anything unusual. I might have to be gone off and on for the next few weeks.”

I wanted to know what he was talking about, but I knew better than to ask for details. He wouldn’t tell me.

We were quiet on the way to Mom’s. Skeeter took me in his tricked-out F-150 truck because he knew I hated riding on the back of his motorcycle. When he pulled into her driveway, he sat there for a minute.

“Your mom lives in a shithole.”

I frowned. That wasn’t what I thought he was going to say. I looked at the house I’d grown up in. It was nothing special, but it was nice enough. It was just a one-story ranch in a quiet neighborhood full of other one-story ranch homes. “You think so?”

He gave a quick nod. “One day, I’ll put her up somewhere real nice.”

I glanced at him. Why was he being nice? I swallowed hard. For some reason, that made me more nervous than anything else he’d done lately.

“That would be great. I know she’d love it.” That was a lie. Unless Mom got some serious therapy, I was afraid she’d never come out of that house. It wouldn’t matter if he bought her a mansion.

He nodded again. “Well, why are you just sitting there? Get out.”

I got out.

Mom gave me a huge hug when she opened the door. “Oh, Jessica Fletcher! It’s so good to see you.” She stepped back and held my face in her hands. Her eyes were worried as she studied the thick makeup on my face.

Skeeter cleared his throat.

“Well, let’s have a seat,” Mom took the hint.

Skeeter looked so strange in her house. He was sitting on her favorite floral sofa, and I had to bite back a laugh at the sight. There he was, this six-seven biker dude with tattoos all over his scalp and hulked out arms, sitting on a delicate, feminine old lady couch.

It had been my grandma’s

His leather cut, ripped jeans and clunky black motorcycle boots didn’t fit in, either. Of course, neither did my skanky dress and rhinestone stripper shoes.

Mom was wearing a soft-looking lavender cardigan. “What have you been up to, Jessica Fletcher?”

I sighed on the inside. It kind of drove me crazy that Mom insisted on calling me that. She treated Jessica Fletcher like it was a normal two-name name, like Emma Grace or Sara Beth or Mary Ellen.

Skeeter hated it. “Tell me who the fuck Jessica Fletcher is again? Her grandma or some shit?”

Mom winced at the language, but she didn’t say anything. “No, she’s named after my favorite TV character. Jessica Fletcher solved mysteries onMurder, She Wrote. You’ve watched it with me before. Remember, Skeeter?”

“Yeah. That’s right. I forgot.”

Skeeter sat there bored while Mom and I talked about what little we could in front of him. I knew she longed for a chance to get me alone. I wanted that, too, but I could only dream of it at the moment.

Mom talked for a while about the cozy mystery series she’d been writing for years and years. She’d never tried to have it published despite me begging her to do it.

“How many manuscripts do you have now?”

“Thirty,” she said in an off-hand way, like it was no big deal.

“Mom, that’s amazing! I really want you to try…”

“Time to go,” Skeeter said abruptly, clapping his hands loudly and getting up.

I blinked at him for a second.

“I said get up!” he practically shouted at me. Mom flinched and then gasped as he took my arm and jerked me off the couch.