When I came to the bottom of the handful of ones plus the fifty, I paused. A hundred-dollar bill was last in the stack. I frowned. I hadn’t cashed in my ones last night and I certainly would have remembered a hundred-dollar tip. Where had it—

Blane.

He must’ve counted the money while I’d been in the shower, adding in the hundred.

I stared at it, unsure how I felt. I sure didn’t like the charity, but then again I wasn’t in a position to be proud. The electric bill that I was behind on could really use that hundred dollars. Plus, Blane was already gone. How was I supposed to return it?

I hadn’t believed him when he’d said he wasn’t going away. After the argument we’d had, I doubted I’d see him again anytime soon, a thought that was immediately quashed when I went outside a short while later to find a glass company’s truck pulling out of the lot and Blane standing by my newly repaired car.

Déjà vu hit me hard as I remembered the first time Blane had fixed my car for me. It had felt so good then, for him to help me.

It felt quite different now.

“What are you doing, Blane?” I asked, walking up to my car. He turned toward me. “I told you I didn’t want you fixing it.”

“If Gage is behind this, then it’s an expense for the firm to absorb,” he said, eyeing me as though wary that I’d flip out on him again. He glanced at my clothes. I was wearing the same thing, had just slipped on a pair of flip-flops and my sunglasses. I’d pulled my hair back into a high ponytail. “Where are you going?”

“Weren’t you the one griping about the food in my refrigerator?” I retorted. “I’m going to the grocery store.” I stepped around him and climbed into my car. All the glass had been swept away and I couldn’t pretend I wasn’t glad it had been taken care of for me. I decided not to argue with him about it. It’s not like there was anything I could do now anyway. I thought about the hundred dollars but didn’t say anything. I didn’t want to humiliate myself by arguing with him over the money, especially when I was in such need of it.

Blane slid into the passenger seat. “I’m going with you.”

“You’re what?” I stared at him.

“You’re not going anywhere unprotected,” he said, slamming the door shut.

Short of throwing a big-ass temper tantrum, I didn’t see any way I was going to get him out of my car, and I wasn’t one hundred percent sure he’d go even in the face of a tantrum.

“Fine.” I threw the car in gear and sped out of the parking lot.

We didn’t speak as I drove. I was acutely conscious of him. As it did in my apartment, Blane’s presence overwhelmed my car, too, its confines made even smaller by the size of his body. His sunglasses hid his eyes from me now as he rested an elbow on the rolled-down window, the wind artfully ruffling his perfect hair.

“Shouldn’t you be doing some campaign stuff rather than following me around?” I asked.

He glanced my way. “I’ve taken a temporary leave from the campaign.”

I swallowed and focused on the road. Blane was putting his campaign on hold to play bodyguard for me?

“I bet your uncle isn’t too happy about that,” I said stiffly.

“It’s not his decision.”

I wondered if the senator agreed with that sentiment.

When I parked, Blane followed me inside, watching as I got a cart and walking beside me down the produce aisle. We could’ve been like any of the other couples doing their weekend shopping, if the tension between us wasn’t as palpable as a living thing.

My nerves were on edge, Blane’s silent vigil next to me making it hard to concentrate. He’d hooked his sunglasses on his shirt while I’d pushed mine on top of my head. Blane looked incredibly out of place, standing in front of the broccoli. Grocery shopping was something we’d never done together.

I shook my head. Best to hurry up and get this over with. Peaches were in season and on sale. I grabbed a few. Cucumbers were plentiful and a couple of those went in the cart. Lettuce. Tomatoes.

I lived a lot off sandwiches and ramen noodles, so I grabbed some prepackaged lunch meat. The soup aisle was next, where I got some more noodles, then to the bakery for a loaf of generic white bread. I caught Blane looking sideways at the bread and noodles.

“So is there an assassin hiding in frozen foods?” I asked snidely, my pride stung when I suspected he was looking down his upper-class nose at my food.

His gray eyes met mine. “None that I can see.” His serious reply took the heat from my snit and I heaved an inward sigh.

“Let’s go,” I said, turning for the checkout.

“Wait, that’s it?”

I glanced around. Blane was staring at my cart.

“That’s pretty much what you do here, Blane,” I said with exaggerated patience. “You put food in the cart, then you put it on the belt and pay for it so you can take it home.”

His eyes flashed at my tone. “I meant, is that all you’re getting.”

I looked in my cart and did some quick math. If I was lucky, the groceries would be just under fifty dollars. I had food for sandwiches, salads, and noodles for dinner.

“Yeah, that’s it,” I snapped. “Some people have to live on a budget.”

“I need some stuff, too,” he said, inching me out of the way to take over the cart. “Might as well not make two trips.”

“You need stuff?” I asked in bewilderment, having no choice but to trot after him as he started down an aisle. My purse was sitting in the cart. “What happened to Mona?”

Mona was his housekeeper and took care of the cooking. She and her husband, Gerard, lived in a house that adjoined Blane’s property.

“She asked me to pick up some things,” he said, grabbing some jarred pasta sauce off the shelf.

Whatever. “Fine, just keep it separate from my stuff.” I reached in the cart and pushed all my things into a small pile in the back.

I followed Blane as he went back through the store. He wasn’t consulting any list that I could see and I had a suspicion as to what he was doing. Meat went in the cart, steaks, chicken, and pork chops. Cereal, granola bars, pop, chips, pasta, frozen meals, potatoes, fresh vegetables. I really hoped Mona hadn’t gone shopping recently because she was about to get a load of other stuff.

Blane was taking great care in picking out “Mona’s” asparagus, so I rolled my eyes and wandered away. He knew I liked asparagus, but it was expensive, so I hardly ever bought it. I wondered with a sigh how this was going to play out when we got to the cashier. If I’d had my purse, I would’ve just left Blane standing there inspecting the strawberries.

Glancing next to me, I saw a man looking over the melons. Our eyes caught.

“I, uh, never know how to tell what’s ripe,” he said.

He seemed to be in his late twenties or early thirties, attractive with blond hair that looked like it had been kissed by the sun. Blue eyes, straight teeth, and a smile that was both shy and sexy—and that had me smiling back.

“Yeah, something about if it sounds hollow when you tap it, I guess,” I replied with a shrug.

“They all sound hollow to me.”

I laughed at his self-deprecating grimace and his smile was wider this time.

“I’m Luke,” he said. “What’s your name?”

“Kathleen.”

“Nice to meet you, Kathleen.” He held out his hand and I took it.

“Likewise.”

“I don’t usually do this—” he began.

“Kat, you ready to go?”

I turned to see Blane now standing behind me, his face like granite as he stared at Luke.

Nice.

“Sure,” I said easily as Luke glanced from me to Blane and back. “Luke, this is my… brother. You were saying?”

I didn’t look to see how Blane was taking that.

“Ah, yeah.” Luke focused on me again when Blane didn’t speak. “I was wondering if you might like to go out sometime.”

I could have done a little dance in delight. A cute, sexy guy was asking me out right in front of Blane and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it. Maybe fate had a twisted sense of humor after all.