“I can’t wait to hear more about your family over dinner.”
“If I agree to go to dinner with you, will you stop giving me heart attacks at the newspaper office and at the gas station?” I ask, but I can’t hide the smile in my voice.
Milo laughs his loud laugh, holding the door open to the classroom building. “Maybe.”
“You can go now,” I say, staring at him as several people brush past me.
“No,” he says. “I really can’t.”
That statement turns out to be true. When I finish my second to last exam, he’s standing outside, in the hallway, waiting for me.
“You’re drawing attention to yourself, you know. Pretty soon, people are going to be asking for your autograph.”
And then Milo says something that totally throws me off guard.
“They’re staring because they’re jealous that this weird old man is allowed to walk next to a goddess.”
Fine, I think. If he wants to play bodyguard, he can have at it.
He can play pretend at being Kevin Costner, but I am not his Whitney Houston. No way.
Even so, I still can’t help the small smile that creeps across my face as my six-foot-four shadow follows me to the library.
Chapter Eight
Milo
Why am I here, lurking around a college campus instead of boarding a plane to Mexico right now?
Because I can’t get Cecily out of my head.
I need to see her again.
So, I’m here, reading a book on the bench outside of the library in the cold, waiting to escort Cecily wherever she goes next.
“Mr. St. Germaine! What are you doing here?”
I turn and see it’s Cherise, Cecily’s sister.
“Oh hi! Long story short? I’ve been…delayed.”
“Oh really? I’m sorry.”
I smile at her. “I’m not.”
She looks confused but amused. “Why?”
There’s no point in hiding it. I already look like a total lunatic to Cecily, might as well let the family in on what’s happening. “Because I just really like your sister.”
Cherise stares at me and blinks. After several awkward seconds, she smiles. “And another one bites the dust.”
“I’m sorry?”
She wags her head. “Anyway, I’m glad I ran into you. I wonder if you might consider giving a talk to the culinary school?”
“Cecily told me you graduated already.”
Cherise beams up at me. “Cecily talked about me? To you?”