Read Online Ms. Simon Says by Mary McBride - Free Book Online Page B

her that there was no way she could simply let Mick Callahan drop her off at the house and then send him on his way back to Chicago, a long and grueling five-hour trip. Even if he was a total jerk, Shelby didn’t have it in her to be deliberately rude or cruel. And anyway, jerk or not, the guy had put himself in harm’s way today on her behalf. She remembered the way he’d whisked her away from the explosion in front of her building, the way he’d sprung out of the car when her eager fans had accosted her not too long ago, and it hadn’t escaped her attention that he’d spent an inordinate amount of time this afternoon consulting the rearview mirror just in case someone was following them. She was grateful to him for that. The least she could do was see that he got a good night’s sleep before he went back to Chicago.
    “Listen,” she said. “Why don’t you plan on staying at my folks’ house tonight, Callahan. There’s plenty of room.”
    He flashed her a quick, rather quizzical look, as if he were surprised by the offer, before he said, “Thanks. I’d appreciate that.”
    “Okay. Well, good. Then it’s settled.”
    Except...
    Oh, Lord. How was she going to explain him? There was no way she was going to tell her mother and father that he was a cop assigned to protect her because she was the target of a crazed letter bomber. In the first place, she didn’t want to worry them, and in the second place—and in all honesty—she really, really didn’t want to deal with their possible overreactions to her current plight.
    Now she was almost glad she hadn’t been able to reach them by phone earlier today, when she probably would’ve blurted out the truth. Her visit was going to be a surprise. That meant she had to come up with a legitimate reason why now, when her schedule was still jammed, she suddenly felt compelled to drop in at the old homestead. To drop in not alone, but with a gorgeous guy.
    Knowing her parents, no matter how she explained her companion, whether it was a business associate, a reporter doing an extended interview of her, or merely a friend, they’d jump to the conclusion that he was her boyfriend. And the harder she insisted he wasn’t, the more certain they would be that he was.
    Strange. After her thirtieth birthday, it wasn’t her own biological clock that had speeded up, but her parents’. They rarely missed an opportunity to inquire about her love life or to drop not-so-veiled hints about grandchildren. Her mother had even written a not very well disguised letter to Ms. Simon a year or so ago, pointing out the decrease in fertility in females over a certain age.
    Okay. So she’d let them assume that Callahan was her boyfriend. That would work. Anything to keep them from worrying unnecessarily about this bomb deal.
    “Do me a favor, will you, Callahan?”
    “What’s that?”
    “I’d rather my folks didn’t know about this letter bomb business,” she said. “No point in getting them all upset. So let’s not tell them you’re a cop, okay?”
    “Okay.” There was a note of skepticism in his voice, a hint of reluctance, as if he clearly didn’t relish subterfuge. “So if I’m not a cop, then what am I supposed to be?”
    “Um. Well . . .” She closed her eyes a second and dragged in a breath. God. She hated this. Just hated it. “I was thinking about introducing you as my boyfriend.”
    “Your boyfriend!”
    “Well, you don’t have to sound all shocked and awed, for God’s sake. It’s not unthinkable, after all, that somebody like me might find somebody like you attractive or...”
    He snorted. “Or that somebody like me might find somebody like you the least bit fun to be around.”
    “I’m fun,” she shot back.
    “Oh, yeah? When?”
    “Well, not right now. This isn’t fun.”
    He rolled his eyes for about the seventeenth time today. “You’re telling me.”
    “Look. Will you just do it?” she shrieked, hating the exasperated tone of her own voice.