Passenger Princess: A Grumpy Sunshine Bodyguard Pageant Queen Romance (Evergreen Park Book 1)

We lay like that for long minutes with Jaime’s body lying over mine on the arm of the couch while I come down from my high before I whisper, ‘I should go clean up.’

He nods and rolls off of me.

Quickly, I move to the bathroom, cleaning up and fixing my smeared makeup before staring in the mirror, a wash of panic and confusion taking over me.

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Do I walk back into the living area? Do I go to my room? Do I ignore him? Do I walk in there and kiss him? Was this a one-time, get-it-out-of-our-systems thing?

A million questions run through me, but one is loudest in my mind: What am I doing?

I don’t do self-conscious.

I don’t do second-guessing myself. Hell, I barely do first-guessing myself.

But that’s precisely how I feel right now. What is the expectation now? Do we⁠—

‘Ava, get your sweet ass in here,’ Jaime’s rumbly voice calls from his room, and in the mirror, my eyes go wide.

Still, I take a deep breath, nod to myself once, and move back toward the room he’s staying in. He’s sitting up with his back against the headboard, a sheet pulled up to his waist, a single arm out before his fingers move in a come here way.

My body obeys before my mind can process it. When I get close, his hand grabs my hip, the other moving to my waist as his body shifts to lift me with ease until I’m straddling his lap and we’re face to face. One hand leaves my hip, gently pushing my hair behind my shoulder.

‘What’s going through your head?’

I contemplate playing it off, letting the cool-girl version of me click into place and not show him my fears and nerves, but I know he’d see it anyway. That’s the downside of Jaime Wilde—he sees everything.

I sigh before answering. ‘I just…I don’t know what I’m supposed to do now that we…you know. I don’t know where we stand,’ I whisper, staring at my hand instead of him before continuing. ‘What is this now? Did we fuck just once? Are we fuck buddies? Does everything go back to normal in the morning?’ His lips tip up, and I wonder momentarily if finally getting some has eviscerated his grumpiness.

‘You’re saying Ava, the take-no-shit one, the hyper-self-confident one, the one who has told me that I’m in love with her for almost two months now, isn’t sure how to act? My Ava, who flirted with a rock star just to annoy me,’ he says, and I let the chill run through me with the way he calls me his Ava. ‘Is suddenly nervous about how to act?’

A blush takes over me, embarrassment and anxiety and doubt rushing through my veins as I bite my lip and turn my head away from him, but his hand moves, rough fingers on my cheek as he moves my face to look at him.

‘Where we stand is that you’re mine now,’ he says without hesitation. ‘You’re mine, Ava. It means at every stop from here on out, one of those beds goes untouched because we’re sharing one. It means I take care of you, and I sleep next to you, and I get to eat your pussy every night and kiss your sweet lips whenever I want, which is a lot. Besides that, not much changes because we’ve already been toeing that line for weeks. We’re just stomping all over it now.’

I take in his words, fighting back the smile and giddiness filling my chest.

I fail spectacularly.

‘So we’re dating?’

‘Yeah, baby,’ he says, his hand moving to push my hair back again, which he seems to like doing. Maybe he just likes being able to touch me now without it being against some kind of rule, something I can absolutely relate to.

‘So you’re my boyfriend?’ I ask, my voice teasing.

He closes his eyes for a moment and sighs. ‘Boyfriend sounds like we’re fifteen, and I’m taking you to prom. But if that’s what you want to call me, have at it.’ My smile goes wider. ‘We have to make clear lines, though.’

I scrunch up my nose, not liking how that sounds, and he smiles as if we’ve traded places now. He shifts us until I’m on my back, his hands planted in the bed on either side of me.

‘Why do I feel like I won’t like this?’ I grumble.

‘Because you hate any rules or constraints when it comes to me trying to make you safer.’

‘That’s not true—’ I start, but he glares, and finally, I nod. ‘Okay, maybe it’s a little true.’

He takes a deep breath, his hand buried in my hair to hold me in place, to keep my eyes on his.

‘We can’t be together when you’re on,’ he says. ‘When you’re Miss Americana, I’m your bodyguard. When you’re Ava, you’re mine.’

‘So this is…just fucking?’ My stomach drops to my feet at the thought because, although I could play it cool and what just happened was amazing, I don’t want just sex with Jaime.

‘I told you, I’m a decisive man. I see what I want, decide I want it, and I get it, and you’re what I want. I’m not letting that go easy.’ One hand leaves the bed to cup my jaw as he drops down, planting a small kiss on my lips, leaving me lightheaded.

‘But…’

‘But you’re keeping this crown if it kills us both because no one deserves it more than you.’ Warmth blooms in my belly. ‘And you’re not supposed to date. You would be technically breaking the contract⁠—’

‘I don’t care about that contract, Jaime. And that stay single shit is wildly outdated. They’d get so much backlash if they tried to enforce it. I⁠—’

‘They’ve already threatened to remove me,’ he says, cutting me off, and my eyes go wide.

‘What do you mean?’

‘My boss called after the issue in Georgia. The Miss Americana pageant called him and told him to have me keep you in line better, or they might have to replace me.’ I open my mouth to argue, but he smiles and keeps talking. ‘I told him I can keep you in line about as much as you can keep a tiger in line. But it means they’re watching you, and they aren’t happy. We’ve got five weeks left, and I don’t want to be taken off this case.’

‘You want to make sure you’re the only one watching my ass, huh?’ His hand travels down my bare back to my ass, grabbing it.

‘Absolutely. But mostly, I don’t trust anyone else to take care of you.’

‘You do take really good care of me, Jaime.’ My hand moves to touch his cheek. ‘Okay,’ I agree. ‘We’ll keep things under wraps until the tour is over so I don’t fuck with your job. But after the tour, we revisit this. I don’t want to be a secret forever.’

He nods. ‘Great, now that that’s settled, are you ready for me to take care of you some more?’ He flips me so my back is to the bed, and he starts to slide down my body.

‘I thought you’d never ask,’ I say with a smile.

I think I’m going to love this new version of us.