Free Obsession by Traci Hunter Abramson

then I thought I’d make some dinner. Any chance you want to join me?”
    Kendra looked at him blankly. “Join you?”
    “Yeah.” Charlie nodded, amused by her expression. If he didn’t know better, he would have thought that she wasn’t used to having men ask her out. Not that he was asking her on a date, exactly. “Come have dinner with me.”
    “Oh, okay,” Kendra said, still looking somewhat stunned.
    “Great.” Charlie stepped toward the front door. “Why don’t you come over around five? That way, it will still be light out when you walk over.”
    Kendra simply nodded. Then Charlie pulled on his boots and walked out the door.
    * * *
    A bomb had gone off at her concert, she was hiding away from the world in a snowbound cabin, and all she could think about was her upcoming date. At least, she thought it was a date.
    Kendra shoved cans into the kitchen pantry, her conversation with Charlie replaying over and over in her mind. She cringed as she thought of how she had acted. She’d felt like a tongue-tied schoolgirl who had just been asked out on her first date. In a way, the description wasn’t all that far from the truth. Though she hadn’t been a schoolgirl for some time, she couldn’t remember the last time she had been out on a date.
    How long had it been? Two years? Three? She shook her head as she tried to remember when she had broken up with Steve DeFoe, her boyfriend of almost two months. The memory of those two months nearly caused her to reconsider going to Charlie’s for dinner.
    Steve had been so charming, so attentive when they’d first started dating. Then he’d turned possessive. When he had first started complaining about her bodyguards and their lack of privacy, Kendra had been sympathetic. Then the complaints had escalated into arguments, both with her and with those tasked with protecting her.
    When he’d shown up at her house in the middle of the night, demanding that she let him in, Kendra had realized Steve wasn’t who she thought he was. The argument that ensued had turned nasty, and ultimately, Kendra had ended the relationship. Steve’s temper had exploded then, and she didn’t even want to think about what might have happened had her bodyguards not been nearby.
    At first, she’d felt bad about the fistfight that had ensued between Steve and Alan Parsons, but then Steve had started giving interviews and spinning lies. After seeing the incident splashed in the tabloids and dealing with the constant media pressure in the weeks following the breakup, Kendra had resigned herself to the fact that dating simply wasn’t worth the effort.
    As she considered what it would be like to date like a normal person, without all the bodyguards and security, without any of the paparazzi or hovering fans, Kendra found herself smiling. Then another thought struck her, and her excitement waned.
    Perhaps this wasn’t really a date. Maybe Charlie was just being friendly. Kendra moved into the living room and stared out the window at the cabin across the street. Her lips slowly curved up into the beginnings of a smile. Whether dinner tonight was a date or simply a friendly gesture, it wouldn’t hurt for her to get to know Charlie a little better.
    * * *
    “You already saw her?” Elias Washington’s voice came over the phone.
    “Yeah.” Charlie nodded to the empty room. “I invited her over for dinner tonight. I thought maybe I could find out why she’s refusing protection.”
    “I don’t have to explain to you that gaining Kendra’s trust will go a long way in helping our investigation.”
    “I kind of figured,” Charlie said. “By the way, the weather reports say that this storm is supposed to keep dumping snow for another day or two. Do you have any idea how long it normally takes to get the roads plowed up here?”
    “Pinewood is a summer town. They don’t plow the roads up there,” Elias told him.
    “Then I guess it’s a good thing I picked up enough supplies in town to