her. “I’ll grease some palms and find you a last-minute venue in Dallas. You can’t leave town with this mark on your back. I forbid it.”
“What mark? Do you think I’m going to be kidnapped by Blake’s henchmen or something?” Stef let out an exasperated laugh. Emmett didn’t find it funny. His back went ramrod straight, his senses on high alert at the idea that any harm would befall her.
He forbade it.
“You do things without thinking,” the mayor said. “Who knows what could happen?”
“Chase, that’s enough.” Emmett took a step closer—to Stefanie this time.
His friend was right to watch out for his youngest sibling, but he was handling this wrong. Not that Emmett had much experience with sensitivity—he had been raised by Van Keaton, after all. But Emmett knew Stef and he also knew the situation. He couldn’t keep from stepping at least one toe in her corner.
“You can stand down,” Stef snapped. “I don’t need your protection from my stupid brother.”
“You need protection from yourself,” Chase interjected.
This conversation was getting nowhere.
“I’m going to San Antonio tomorrow,” she said. “I’ll be back in a few days. I’m sure your precious campaign will be intact when I return.” She grabbed her handbag and slung it over her shoulder as Chase rose from his chair, his face a beet-worthy shade of red.
“I’ll drive you,” Emmett blurted.
Again he was faced by both Fergusons. But only one of them looked upset by his offer. The cute blonde one.
“Yes. Great idea.” Chase nodded. “Emmett will be your escort.”
“I don’t want an escort!”
“I don’t care!”
“Knock it off.” Emmett bodily moved himself to stand between Stefanie and Chase. “I’ll drive you to San Antonio. Book me a room wherever you’re staying.”
“It’s a bed-and-breakfast and it’s full.” She raised her chin, her aquamarine eyes flashing in warning.
“I’ll sleep in my SUV.” Emmett tipped his head in challenge. “It’s either this or you don’t go. Your brother’s right about it being dangerous. Your image is plastered all over social media. I’ve seen you in the spotlight before. Paparazzi chase you, Stef.”
She was beautiful and young and easily the most famous female billionaire in Dallas, if not the state of Texas. The combination of her it-girl reputation and a rumor that she was going to marry the mayor’s sworn enemy made for tempting media fodder.
She opened her mouth, probably to argue.
Emmett lifted his eyebrows, silently communicating. Give me a break, okay?
Miraculously, rather than arguing, she gritted out, “Fine.”
“Great. Get out,” Chase said. “Both of you.”
So, his best friend was prickly. So what? Emmett wasn’t one for being handled with kid gloves. His rhino-tough hide had been hewed at a young age.
“Come on,” he told Stef, opening the mayor’s door for her to exit. “I’ll give you a ride home.”
Emmett held open the passenger door of his black SUV, a gas-guzzling, tinted-windowed, way-too-big-for-a-road-trip vehicle.
“You can’t be serious about taking this beast to San Antonio. We’ll have to pull over every fifteen miles to refill the tank.”
“Get. In.”
She glared up at his chiseled jaw and perfectly shaped head beneath very short, dark brown hair. He wore it cropped close and rarely was it more than a few inches long on top. He was bedecked in what she’d come to think of as his “standard uniform.” A crisp white shirt open at the collar and dark slacks. His brawn and bulk and attitude were better suited for a T-shirt and sweats, but his job title required a dab of formality.
She tossed her purse inside and grasped the SUV’s door handle and the front seat to climb in. Emmett’s warm, broad palm cupped her elbow to steady her, and she nearly jerked away in shock. If she wasn’t mistaken, that was the first time he’d ever touched her.
It was...alarming.
And not in the get-your-damn-hands-off-me kind of way. His touch had felt...intimate.
Once she was inside he dropped his voice and leaned close. She ignored the clean leather smell of him. Or tried to, anyway.
“Heads up. There’s a suspicious cyclist over there.” He shut her door and walked around to the driver’s side.
She scanned the immediate area outside her brother’s office twice before she spotted a casual-looking guy on a bike with a cell phone conspicuously propped on the handlebars and pointing at the SUV.
Damn.
As much as she hated to admit it, Chase might have had a point about media attention.
Emmett settled into the driver’s seat and turned over the engine, sending her an assessing, stony gray stare. Typically, his eyes held a note of blue, but today they mirrored the cloudy skies above.
“What?” she barked. “Do you want me to congratulate you because you’re right?”
He smirked. “Buckle your belt.”
“Let’s get one thing straight, Neanderthal,” she said as she jerked the belt over her torso. “You may believe a woman’s place is in the passenger seat. Or that I can’t handle anything on my own without one of you big strong men to help me out, but FYI, I am not yours to command.”
Though some foreign tingly part of her suggested that Emmett might be the perfect specimen to take commands from.
She swallowed the rest of her speech about being an adult and handling her own problems, mainly because they both felt like stretches of the truth. In all of her attempts not to involve her family in her life, she’d somehow managed to tow them in. Her parents, Chase, Penelope, Zach and now Emmett.
Angry with herself more than her driver, she stared out the window in silence as the SUV pulled away from the curb.
Stef had gone to bed late last night, staring at the ceiling for a long while, her mind lost on her current predicament.
She hadn’t stayed up late to pack—she’d done that already and her matching luggage was lined up dutifully next to her apartment door. Knowing that Emmett would pick her up promptly at 7:00 a.m., she also hadn’t indulged in more than one glass of sparkling rosé before bed. No, her insomnia couldn’t be blamed on a lack of planning or too much alcohol. She’d lain awake, earning this morning’s puffy eyes and
