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still not looking at him.
    “Dammit, you know better. You’re not stupid. Your mom raised you so well all those years, making sure you were protected, and the minute she’s gone you run off half-cocked to—”
    “To live?” she shouted back, slamming her empty cup in the holder. “She shoved me under a glass lid, then she decided she needed to experience the world and what the hell was I supposed to do? I didn’t know how to be free. I’d been in a box all those years, and when she left, I couldn’t figure out how to deal. So I did what I always do when I can’t handle life. I sing.”
    God, didn’t that sound pathetically quaint. Meek little church girl, needing to lose herself in lyrics she had no right to be singing. What did she know about love? She’d never experienced it. Sex, yes, that she knew, in limited, disinteresting quantities. She’d had boyfriends, done the whole looking for love in all the guess-they’re-good-enough places. But that was a poor substitute for a lasting relationship built on something real. Assuming such a thing existed.
    “I get that,” he said quietly, sending her train of thought headfirst into a wall. He flipped on his turn signal and coasted through the center of their small town— her small town, since apparently he didn’t live in Yardley anymore. The severity of his expression seemed even more poignant when illuminated by the watery flicker of streetlights. “That’s why I play ball. To get out of my head. It makes me more than I am. And less, if that makes sense.”
    “Yes.” A whisper was all she could get out; her throat was so tight.
    “That doesn’t mean you can risk your safety. Freedom must look awfully alluring when you’ve been cooped up in a small town all your life. I get that.”
    “You would, since you left too.”
    “Yeah. I did. I didn’t want to come back either.” He sighed and rubbed the back of his head, his weariness evident in every strained movement. “Look, I don’t want to clip your wings. You’re old enough to live your life the way you need to. I respect that. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to keep your secret from my sister or look the other way when I know you could get hurt. That’s not me. If your mother were around, she’d skin my ass if I didn’t step in.”
    “There’s nothing for you to do. You said it yourself. This is my life, my decision.” She hated that she was practically pleading, but she had to fight for her dreams. She’d be damned—full curse intended in this case—if she let him take them away under the guise of friendship. “My next show is scheduled in two weeks in a much safer area of Brooklyn. I’ve been there a million times and nothing will happen, I promise.”
    He pulled to a stop in front of the small house she’d lived in since she was ten, next door to the family home where Cass still lived. It was a way they each had hung onto slices of their childhood even when the world had been spinning wildly out of control. Silly, maybe. Childish probably. She didn’t care.
    Sometimes comfort and security came in odd forms, and she and Cass had snatched onto theirs with both hands.
    “Nothing will happen,” Chase agreed, staring straight ahead while his truck idled at the curb. She was afraid to move and startle him out of the semi-trance he’d dropped into. She could almost hear the but hanging in the air.
    When she didn’t reply, he swung his gaze to hers. “You’ll be safe, all right, because I’m going to be there too.” Her lips parted on a wheeze of breath. “If you intend on playing bigger venues and keeping your whereabouts a secret from those who love you, you need personal security. And right now I’m the only man I trust you with.”
    He slammed out of the vehicle before she managed to shut her mouth.

Chapter Four
    Chase stewed about the situation throughout the weekend and into the following week. It wasn’t as if he had a ton of other things on his plate at the moment,