Emily McKay: Always On Her Mind: Playing for Keeps / To Tame a Cowboy / All He Ever Wanted

“Celia? Celia? ” asked Valeria. Or was it Valentina? “Miss Patel, you know him? Oh, my God! How? Why didn’t you tell us?”

She didn’t intend to delve too deeply into those murky waters. “We went to high school together.” His name was etched on the sign that proclaimed “Welcome to Azalea, Home of Malcolm Douglas” as if the town hadn’t once tried to send him to jail because of her. “Now, let’s get back to the risers, and I’m sure Mr. Douglas will answer your questions in an orderly fashion since he disrupted our rehearsal.”

She shot him a censorious look that merely prompted an unrepentant grin in return.

Sarah Lynn stayed glued to Celia’s side. “Did you two date?”

The bell rang—thank God—signaling the end of class and no time for questions after all. “Students, line up for your last class.”

And wouldn’t you know, both the principal and the secretary stood in the doorway as starstruck as their students in spite of the fact that both ladies were happily married and grandmothers. How had he gotten into the gym/auditorium without causing a riot?

Celia led the students to the double door, her sandals slapping the wood floor. Step by step, she realized the pair of guards inside were only a part of Malcolm’s security detail. Four more muscle-bound men stood outside in the hallway while a large limo lurked beyond the glassed front entrance. Additional cars with majorly tinted windows were parked in front of and behind the stretch limo.

Malcolm shook hands with the principal and secretary, making small talk as he introduced himself, ironic as all get-out since at least half of the free world knew his face. “I’ll leave autographed photos for your students.”

Sarah Lynn called over her shoulder, dragging her feet on the way down the hall, “For all of us?”

“Miss Patel will let me know how many.”

The last of the students stepped into the corridor, the door swooshing closed after the administrators left. How had their departure managed to suck all the air out of the massive gym along with them? She stood an arm’s reach away from Malcolm, his two bodyguards looming just behind him.

So much for privacy.

“I assume you’re here to see me?” Although she couldn’t for the life of her fathom why.

“Yes, I am, darlin’,” he drawled, his smooth baritone voice stroking over her senses like fine wine. “Is there somewhere we can talk without being interrupted?”

“Your security detail makes that rather moot, don’t you think?” She smiled at the bulky duo, who stared back at her with such expressionless faces they could have been auditioning for positions as guards at Buckingham Palace.

Malcolm nodded to the stony-faced pair and without a word they both silently stepped out into the hall. “They’ll stay outside the door, but they’re here for your protection as much as mine.”

“ My protection?” She inched a step away to put a little distance between herself and the tempting scent of his aftershave. “I seriously doubt your fans will start worshipping me just because I knew you aeons ago.”

“That’s not what I meant.” He scratched the back of his neck as if choosing his words carefully. “I hear via the grapevine there have been some threats made against you. A little extra security’s a good thing, right?”

Perhaps some security from the temptation of having him around disrupting her well-ordered life, not to mention her hormones. “Thanks, but I’m good. It’s just some crank calls and some strange notes. That kind of thing happens all too often when my dad has a high-profile case.”

Although how in the world had Malcolm heard about it? Something uneasy shifted inside her, a stirring of panic she quickly squashed down. She refused to let Malcolm’s appearance here yank the rug out from under her blessedly routine existence. She refused to give him the power to send her pulse racing.

Damn it all, she was a confident adult and this was her turf. Still, her nerves were as tight as piano strings. Fighting back the urge to snap at him for turning her world upside down, she folded her arms and waited. She wasn’t an indulged, impulsive only child any longer. She wasn’t a terrified, pregnant teen.

She wasn’t a catatonic, broken young woman caught in the grips of a postpartum depression so deep her life had been at risk.

Her road back to peace had been hard-won with the help of the best shrinks money could buy. She refused to let anything or anyone—especially not Malcolm Douglas—threaten the future she’d built for herself.

Loving Celia Patel had changed his life forever. The jury was still out as to whether that had been a good or bad thing.

Regardless, their lives were linked. For nearly eighteen years, Malcolm had been able to keep his distance from her. But he’d never mastered the art of looking away, even when they were a couple of continents apart. Which was what had brought him here now, knowing too much about her life, too much about a threat to her safety that sent old protective urges into high gear. He just had to figure out how to persuade her to let him back into her life so he could help her. And by helping her, he could atone for how he’d wrecked their lives. Maybe then he could finally let go of a glorified puppy love that after so many years he doubted was real.

Although given his physical reaction to her at the moment, the memories of their attraction were 100 percent real. Once again, desire for Celia Patel threatened to knock him flat on his ass.

Hell, no, he hadn’t been able to forget her even while across the world singing to sold-out stadiums. He certainly couldn’t tear his eyes off her now when she walked only a step ahead. Her wavy dark hair hung loose halfway down her back, swaying with each step. The bright yellow sundress hugged her curves the way his hands once had.

He followed her across the gymnasium floor, the same building where they’d gone to school together. He’d performed on that stage in the junior-high choir to be with her. Taunts hadn’t bothered him—until one stupid little idiot had said something off-color about Celia. Malcolm had decked him and gotten suspended for three days. Small price to pay. There was nothing he wouldn’t do then for Celia.

Apparently that hadn’t changed. One of his contacts had gotten wind of a case on her judge father’s docket, a high-profile drug case with a kingpin who’d drawn a target on Celia’s back. Malcolm had notified local authorities, but they hadn’t bothered looking into the evidence he’d gifted them with. Evidence that detailed a money trail connecting a hit man to the suspected drug dealer.

Local authorities didn’t like outsiders and were stubborn about their ability to handle matters on their own. Someone had to do something, and apparently that someone was Malcolm. Nothing, absolutely nothing, could derail him from his plan to protect Celia. He had to do this in order to make up for all the ways he’d let her down eighteen years ago.

She opened the door by the stage steps, her spine stiff and straight as she entered her small office lined with shelves surrounding a tiny desk. Musical scores and boxes of instruments packed the room—everything from triangles to xylophones to bongo drums. The smell of paper, ink and leather mixed with the familiar praline scent of Celia.

She spun to face him, her hair fanning gently, a strand caressing over his wrist. “It’s more of a closet really, where I store my cart, instruments and paperwork. I travel from classroom to classroom, or we meet in the gym.”

He adjusted the fit of his watch to cover rubbing away the sensation of her hair skimming his skin. “Just like the old days. Not much has changed here.”

The police department was every bit as slack as before, swayed by the person with the most influence.