Protector #5 (A Navy SEAL Military Romance) (3 page)

“I’m not managing you,” Brian sighed as his shoulders slumped.
“I’m simply trying to keep you safe.”

At that moment, the elevator reached our floor and the doors
opened. I quickly walked out and headed down the hallway failing to even notice
the room service guy who was cleaning up the dishes left outside rooms until
Brian said, “Hey, can you get us a few more glasses?”

“That’s housekeeping, man,” the guy replied. “Call 611 and ask
Jeannie for more glasses. She’ll bring them right up.”

“Thanks,” Brian replied with a pensive look on his face as he
walked through the door I held open. “I’ll do that."

He walked into the room, turned around, closed the door, locked
it, and went about putting all of the safety mechanisms back in place as I
watched with wide eyes.

“Just being safe,” he said as he stacked glasses near the door and
then jammed a chair under the door handle. “Just being safe.”

*****

The
next several days were uneventful as we
hung out in the hotel fitness room, ordered room service more often than going
down to the restaurant, and watched every movie offered on the pay-per-view
channels. I spent time trying to get my assignments from Jessie and Lara who by
this time were well aware of the situation and had agreed to run interference
in class without letting on what was happening. God forbid that one of my
instructors should decide to intervene and alert the police, so Lara had
concocted a lie that involved me traveling to some exotic location for some campaign
event that my father was hosting. The professors were wary, but once they
received apologetic emails from both me and, after Jessie tapped into the ISP
my father’s campaign was using and set up a fake email account for me to email
people from, from my father it seemed that everything would be okay.

The irony of all of this was that my father did everything he
could to keep me away from his campaign. He didn’t believe that I should have
to suffer the consequences of his decisions, so he’d done his best to eliminate
the need for me to attend any events or functions, and he rarely mentioned me
in any of his stump speeches. He said it was an attempt to preserve my privacy,
so out of a sense of loyalty, I tried to do the same. I rarely talked about my father
or my family anywhere other than with my closest friends, and I never gave
interviews. At times, I’d even denied that I was his daughter in order to avoid
nosy reporters who were digging around looking for some angle. I knew
eventually they’d catch me in the lie, but I didn’t care. It was none of their
business.

The upside of the isolation was that it had given me time to
formulate a solid plan for how to approach the anti-war action, and I’d spent
several hours every morning writing letters and sending emails to people
I
thought might be able to offer support to our burgeoning
movement. I’d gotten a couple of responses, but they’d been far from what I’d
hoped for in terms of support and organizing power. On the third morning, I
typed out an email to the members of the group asking them to contact a list of
people I’d gathered and told them that we needed the support of the community
in order to make our plan work. I assigned two of the committee members the
task of contacting veterans, and told them that we definitely needed their
support if we were going to make this work. I hit send and crossed my fingers
hoping that they’d be able to do what I’d asked.

I looked up from my laptop and saw Brian sitting on the window
ledge furiously tapping on the screen of his phone while he frowned.

“Will you please tell me what it is you are doing on that phone
all the time?” I asked in an exasperated voice. I was sick of him constantly
communicating with people I couldn’t see.

“It’s really none of your business,” he replied in a tone that
caused me to shrink back.

“Sorry, I was just trying to figure out why you’re allowed to
constantly be in contact, but I’m only allowed to communicate from a secret
location and address,” I said pointedly.

“Because my phone has security features that your laptop doesn’t
have,” he said matter-of-factly.

I knew he was pissed at me because I’d told him two nights before
that I didn’t want him sleeping in the bed with me anymore. He was either going
to be my body guard or my lover, but not both. I had to draw the line
somewhere. He grudgingly accepted his role as body guard and had slept on the
pull out couch. I missed having him in bed next to me at night, but I wasn’t
going to back down until he agreed to let me go home. It was the
Lysistrata
approach and I had faith that if it had worked
for ancient the Athenian women who prevented a war, it would definitely work
for my puny demands.

“Well, then maybe I’m just interested in what’s going on with you
these days?” I said in a sickly sweet voice.

“Don’t manage me,” he said in a mocking tone.

“I’m not managing you, I’m just asking a question,” I replied in a
sassy tone. “I’m bored! I’m sick of being stuck in this room! I need some
stimulation; something to do!”

“What? You want me to take you to the zoo or an amusement park?”
he said dryly.

“Would you?” I replied excitedly.

“Not likely,” he said in a flat tone.

I dropped down on the couch and pouted as I hoped he’d notice, but
he’d gone back to his phone and didn’t see my dramatic performance. Suddenly it
occurred to me that his interest in his phone was a lot like someone who’d just
begun dating someone new. Was he on a dating site? Was he talking with girls
while he was with me? Had he met someone online and was texting her like crazy
as a means of avoiding me? Maybe he’d fallen for her already and was planning
on meeting her after he finished this job. Maybe I’d become nothing more than a
job to him since I’d kicked him out of bed. The thought left me with a lump in
my throat and a sick feeling in my stomach.

He was busy planning his life after me.

The
thought of Brian being interested in
someone new sent my brain spinning down a path of destruction. I was mad and
hurt, but most of all I was frustrated that we weren’t doing anything to find
Dominic and put an end to his reign of terror. I knew it wouldn’t be easy to
stop him because he was rich and he was incredibly manipulative, and right now
he had everyone fooled. Dominic’s modus operandi was to be friendly and amiable
in public, and then to take out his frustrations in extraordinarily cruel ways
in private. He intimidated his victims in a way that kept us all silent and
afraid. I knew I wasn’t the only one who’d suffered at the hands of the blond
monster, but how to get to the others without him knowing was a whole other
matter.

When we returned from the gym on the third morning, I headed to
the shower as I plotted my strategy for getting Dominic out into the open and
exposing his nasty secrets. I turned on the water and began peeling off my
workout clothes as I thought about the kinds of things that would attract him
and how I could shape the encounter to trap him in his abuse. I didn’t want to
let Brian know what I was doing because I didn’t think he’d agree with my
approach, and I knew he would definitely not agree with my idea of using myself
as bait to lure Dominic into the trap. The only thing that scared me was that
if I did what I was planning, I’d have no backup. It would have to work
seamlessly the first time or we’d be in real trouble. I stepped into the shower
and began planning.

As I emerged from the bathroom, I saw Brian on his phone and my
blood began to boil despite the fact that I’d told myself over and over that it
didn’t matter. He didn’t matter. None of this was real. I just had to endure it
for a little while longer and then I could go back to the life I’d shaped on
campus.

“You’re really adept at texting,” I observed casually.

“I’m working on something,” he replied absently.

“Oh yes, I can see that,” I tossed back.

“What does that mean?” he looked up as he caught the hint of
sarcasm in my voice.

“Nothing, just an observation,” I shrugged.

“It sounds like a whole lot more than observing going on under the
surface of that statement,” he replied.

I looked at him and debated whether I wanted to get into the
discussion, but when the phone buzzed yet again. I swallowed my feelings and
just shook my head as I headed over and fired up my laptop.

“I’m going to do some homework and see if I can’t stay caught up
in my classes,” I said.

“Alright, if you’re sure you don’t have anything to say to me,” he
offered. “If you want to get something off your chest, just let me know.”

“What on earth would I possibly want to get off my chest?” I
asked.

“I don’t know,” he shrugged. “You’re the one with the silent
beef.”

“I don’t care what you do!” I said a little too forcefully. “I
just want to go home in four days. That was our deal.”

“Indeed it was,” he replied and then said nothing else. I sat
waiting for him to say more, but once I realized he’d lapsed back into silence,
I turned toward my computer and began pulling up the assignments that Jessie
and Lara had pulled together for me.

I’d been able to download copies of the text books from the online
store, so I spent the first hour reading the definitions of various psychiatric
conditions and when I got to the section on Narcissistic Personality Disorder,
I sat staring at the screen for a long time. It wasn’t that I was unaware of
Dominic’s personality traits, it’s that I’d never seen them laid out so clearly
before. The book defined NPD as “characterized by an over-inflated sense of
self-importance, as well as dramatic, emotional behavior that is in the same
category as antisocial and borderline personality disorders” nothing about that
was surprising,
but when I got to the
definition of Sociopathy, I stopped reading and sat in front of the screen
afraid to move as I tried to control my breathing. It defined a sociopath as “c
haracterized
by enduring antisocial behavior, diminished empathy and remorse and
disinhibited or bold behavior
” and what
struck me about it most was that Dominic exhibited all of these characteristics,
and had since the beginning. And I hadn’t noticed.

As I read further, I realized that I could
use these personality traits to manipulate him into my trap and catch him, but
it was going to require me to go back to playing the victim long enough to get
him to believe that I wanted to come back to him, and I wasn’t sure that I
could do that without damaging my psyche. I’d worked too hard to rebuild my
self-esteem after I’d left Dominic and I wasn’t sure that I wanted to play with
the foundation I’d built for fear that it would crack under the strain.

The more I read, the more I wondered if it
was wise to enact my plan.
What if
Dominic brought a weapon? What if he decided he wanted to hurt innocent
bystanders? What if he decides he wants to kill me instead?
The last
question replayed over and over in my mind as I tried to decide what
was the best way to proceed
.
 
I knew I should be telling Brian about this, but I didn’t want to hear
him tear the idea down and I definitely didn’t want him to move into protective
mode above and beyond what he was being paid to do.

I looked over my shoulder and saw that Brian
was sitting on the couch engrossed in a texting conversation, so I turned back
to the computer and began composing an email that I hoped would bring Dominic
out of hiding and give me the opportunity to expose him for the monster he was.

Dear Dominic,

I’ve been thinking a
lot about what you’ve said and written and I keep remembering how we had so
many good times together and I don’t want to throw that away. I’m hesitant to
jump back into anything, but I do feel like you deserve a chance to make your case
and that I deserve the opportunity to hear what you really have to say to me.
We shared a great love, and maybe it’s possible to revive what we once had and
shape it into something even better.

Will you meet me on
Thursday afternoon? I’m staying at our favorite escape with the body guard my
father hired to “protect” me. Please, don’t worry about him, he’s nothing more
than a hired gun who reports back to my father and sits around texting all day.
He’s no competition for you, so let go of those thoughts and come find me and
sweep me off my feet again.

Fondly,

Kitten

I had to swallow the bile that rose in the
back of my throat as I re-read my message. I felt none of the things I claimed
to feel, and even writing them made me feel sick, but it was necessary if I
wanted to lure Dominic into the trap I was about to set. I hesitated for a
moment, swallowed again, and then pressed send.

I
looked up from the computer and caught Brian staring at
me from across the room. “What?” I asked.

“Nothing, just wondering how the homework is
going,” he said.

“It’s. It’s fine. Why?” I asked. He was
making me nervous with the way he was watching me or maybe it was just my
guilty conscience at work. Maybe he wasn’t even thinking about me beyond what
he needed to do to end the situation and get rid of me so that he could get
back to the new girlfriend on the other end of his phone.