Free Over the Line by Cindy Gerard

Blue's profile as he vigilantly scanned the mob outside the car for trouble, she wondered what it would feel like to work off a bit of her tension with her bodyguard.
     
     
    Sunday morning, July 16th, Atlantic City Hilton
     
    Jase rapped a knuckle on his charge's closed bedroom door the morning after another sold-out concert. "Wakie wakie. Chow's here."
     
    As of today, he was alone in the suite with the superstar. Max had made the move into a separate suite of his own so he could get some work done.
     
    Jase was a little nervous about the new arrangement. It was bound to make for a lot of up-close and personal day-to-day contact, and as unlikely as it seemed, he'd been picking up some pretty hot vibes from the rocker lately.
     
    At least he thought he was picking up something. Wishful thinking? Hell no. Just... a gut feeling was all. And probably a crock. By her standards, he was an aw-shucks country clod. She was a star. And he was delusional.
     
    In the meantime, he'd showered and dressed—thinking the five-star hotels the small entourage frequented were whopping steps up from the housing at Bat and the fleabag motels he was used to—by the time breakfast arrived.
     
    He'd risen around seven and, according to his bodyguard slash butler duty roster, ordered room service—bacon, eggs, hash, and coffee for him, fruit and chai latte for her. According to the folder, it was her standard breakfast. Once a week she indulged in crème brulee oatmeal.
     
    And wasn't that damn special?
     
    Actually, it was. So far, the God's honest truth was that the woman had surprised the hell out of him, he admitted, glancing toward her closed bedroom door. He'd expected spoiled. He'd expected demanding. And he'd expected to be disgusted—regardless of the package she came wrapped in.
     
    Instead of spoiled, demanding, and disgusting, he'd seen the grace and strength with which she'd handled her mother's death. She'd been steady under some pretty heavy fire, there. And she didn't obsess or boo-hoo or "poor me" about Grimm—even though she had good reason to. The creep had to be a constant source of concern for her.
     
    Jase had watched her after several concert dates now, kept expecting her to join in on the decadence. But she always left the booze alone, opting for water instead. Now and then he caught a whiff of weed at one of those gatherings, but she never smoked any of it. And she never disappeared to the head for a hit of something to keep her high.
     
    He'd seen dope-induced skinnies before. She was slim, but she wasn't wasted. She was fit and fine. And she worked hard at it—the proof was in the way she'd laid out that trainer the other day.
     
    So yeah, so far she was a huge surprise. And every surprise so far was going to make his job easier. He'd been envisioning tailing her from club to club during the next six months, fighting off crowds, keeping her out of trouble. He'd also figured he'd have to put up with Derek McCoy sniffing around, but Jase was beginning to wonder if the tabloids had missed the mark on that one. Oh, McCoy had the hots for her all right—but Janey never gave him much more than a cursory glance.
     
    So, unless she was on her good behavior for Jase's sake—which he highly doubted—they both just might live through this without too many complications. Well, except the obvious ones he'd been hired to handle.
     
    When fifteen minutes had passed and she still hadn't shown, he walked back to her bedroom door and knocked again.
     
    "Miss Perkins. You wanted to get up early so you could get a run in this morning." She'd decided that instead of working out—which she did five days a week, even on the road—at the local gym, she wanted to jog on the beach this morning.
     
    "Miss Perkins?"
     
    Nothing.
     
    Jase stared at the door, drew a deep breath, and bit the bullet he'd been trying to dodge. He was going to have to go in there.
     
    He inched open the door.
     
    "Miss